Category: Pete du Pont

Presidential candidates are coming out with plans to address health care. Let's start the new year by taking a look at them. Today, Al Gore.

With the change of the calendar from 1999 to the year 2000, people are naturally looking back at the past century to find one person, idea or event that most improved the future. Einstein's theory of relativity changed the basis of science; D-Day, the largest military assault in history, permanently changed the geopolitical course of the world; and Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon realized the dreams of centuries.

Every year, as the holiday season approaches, our nation's shopping malls and supermarkets are awash in holiday decorations and displays. Our neighborhoods become aglow in lights and our attention is turned to our loved ones.

In recent weeks, with the World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle serving as a backdrop, much has been made of President Clinton's desire to leave a foreign policy legacy. Two factors add urgency to Clinton's quest for lasting international glory. Serving his last year in office and facing a hostile Congress, Clinton is the classic lame duck – his major domestic policy goals are dead in the water. In addition, whatever domestic successes Clinton has are almost certain to be overshadowed in history books by his legal, fundraising and sexual peccadillos and the resulting impeachment and contempt of court conviction.

Echoing pronouncements from the administration, editorial writers and beat reporters across the country declared Congress' rejection of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty as a step in the direction of a "new isolationism" and global instability. If the commercial Al Gore taped minutes after the vote is a sign, this is surely going to be an issue in next year's campaign.

The Census Bureau reports that the number of Americans without health insurance has risen to 44 million, about 11 million of them children. Insuring the uninsured has become a major issue in the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination, with Al Gore and Bill Bradley presenting dueling proposals – each centered on uninsured children.

Looking for some excitement? The World Series was a big yawn this season, and Lennox Lewis vs. Evander Holyfield was a bust. So how about the battle in Seattle commencing November 30? A swarm of activists will descend on Seattle to try to disrupt the ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organization (WTO). In one corner we will have tens of thousands (the activists claim) of fightin' mad greens, reds, Naderites, unionists and other assorted anti-market zealots, and in the other, 5,000 bureaucrats from around the world. Admittedly, it's hard to root for either group.

Robert Reich, former Clinton Administration Secretary of Labor, wrote early in 1999, "The era of big government may be over, but the era of regulation through litigation has just begun." Only liberal political activists, trial lawyers and some politicians could love his frightening sentiment.

The pace of change is accelerating. We are in the midst of a digital revolution, and, let's admit it; we are in a new era. One innovation follows another-personal computers, fiber-optic cables, fax machines, the Internet, cell phones, CDs, DVD players, … the wonders never cease. And the best technologies are yet to come.

Very few people would disagree with the premise that all Americans, especially seniors, should have access to prescription drugs.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation released its latest figures on national crime rates the other day. Among the good news was that the overall serious crime rate is at its lowest point in nearly two decades.

Mitch McConnell is going to be demonized for blocking campaign finance reform. But whatever the Kentucky senator's motives, he is doing a public service if he keeps the Shays-Meehan bill from becoming law.

Social Security needs saving.

The main reason there wasn't more public enthusiasm about the $792 billion tax cut bill that Congress passed and President Clinton vetoed seems to be that people really didn't understand what was in it.

It's New Years Eve 1999. You're standing in the cold in New York's Times Square with a million of your closest friends, or perhaps you're curled up on your sofa under a warm blanket watching Dick Clark on the television. The big ball that has become an American tradition initiates its decent, and the 1900s starts to say its final farewell. As the ball nears its final destination you grab your loved one to bring the new century in with a passionate embrace. Then, just as the clock strikes twelve, all the lights go off, and you are left sitting in total darkness.

Why do I not feel reassured when government antitrust regulators tell us they are protecting consumer choice in the marketplace?

Question: Do you think the federal government is more careful with money and makes wiser spending decisions than you do? That is the real issue regarding the bill that Congress has passed that would cut taxes $792 billion over 10 years.

Recently, federal courts, including the Supreme Court, have begun to take more seriously their responsibility to act as a check on the federal government via judicial review. After President Franklin Roosevelt threatened to pack the Supreme Court over its refusal to find his depression-era New Deal policies constitutional, the court largely abdicated its responsibility to constrain federal legislative reach within the Constitution's limits.

Big brother — the United States government — which already owns more than one-third of the land in the U.S. (states own another 12 percent), wants more. A group of congressional Republicans and Democrats is working with the Clinton administration to place more land under government control.

In 1972, Congress passed one of those laws that sounded good on the surface but whose details ultimately turned devilish. Title IX was an amendment to the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Its goal was to combat sexual discrimination in education. Yet its effect has been to introduce a new kind of discrimination, this time against men's athletic programs. And there could be even worse news around the corner.

As the nation's schoolchildren prepare for another year in the classroom, the forces of change are sweeping the educational landscape for many of them. More and more families have the opportunity to hold their public schools accountable – and to take positive action if the schools don't measure up.

"Technological changes are increasing the mobility of labor and capital around the world. Because of this mobility, governments no longer have a fixed supply of productive resources to tax and regulate. Instead, governments are in active competition with each other."

It's almost time to go back to school. What's the number one concern of many parents, teachers and school officials? Safety and security. Despite the notoriety of last April's slaughter at Columbine High, the good news is that youth crimes have been declining sharply since 1994.

Let me start out by saying that Congress has predicted nine of the last three national crises. Many of you will remember the Swine Flu scare back in the 1970s. Congress got it in its head that this Swine Flu was going to be a huge health problem and so it pulled out all stops, spent millions of dollars and had everyone vaccinated.

Is it just me, or have the media been giving President Clinton a free ride on his Medicare prescription drug benefit proposal?