Well, think about that. Pretty soon you figure out that something is not quite right. Everybody has an elevated opinion of how his child or her child is learning. There were also many surveys done that showed that if you ask people how schools were doing, they said, well, they could do better. He said, how is your kids' school doing? People said, great. Now, again, it can't quite be right. What we had was a situation where parents, where teachers didn't really have the kind of information they needed to understand if kids were learning as much as they should -- as much as they need to be able to compete in a global economy.
And what testing does, I think, and what the President has shown in Texas, and we're getting some results here already, too, what testing does is show us how kids are doing. You know now how they're doing, instead of having to just have an impression of how they're doing.
You've got have them with high standards. And you in Iowa have set a mighty goal for the whole nation with your schools. You have very fine schools here in Iowa. And your kids always do very well at the top in national comparisons. Those high standards are important. Testing to see if kids have met them worked in Texas to bring everybody, every child up, but also to close the achievement gap between Africa America kids and Anglo kids, and Hispanic kids and Anglo kids -- closed those achievement gaps, began to close them. They're not closed yet. And early results show that that's beginning to happen nationwide, too. So testing is a central part of it. I know -- I didn't always like to have to spend time when I was in school taking tests. It was more fun to do an arts project. But it is really important for us to understand how well our schools are doing so that we can encourage to do ever better for our children.
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QUESTION: Illegal immigration, border safety and the President's amnesty policy, if the government doesn't come down hard on the people who are employing the illegal immigrants, and what is to prevent them, or what is the disincentive for them coming here?
R. CHENEY: Well, we've tightened up significantly on the borders since 9/11. We've had to. We've significantly beefed up our border security and so forth. But it continues to be a problem. Part of the difficulty that we're faced with, and one of the things that the President talked about with respect to the immigration policy is that we've got so many people coming across illegally -- primarily for economic reasons, that want to come to work in the United States. But we have no idea who is here. We have no idea what they do once they get here. We have no idea how long they're going to stay, and that there was a need to try to regularize this process. And what he has suggested is that we ought to consider the possibility of having what, in effect, would be a guest worker program so we'd know who was coming in, and that once here, then, they'd stay for a specific period of time. And they they'd have to go back home once their period of time was ended. They could not become citizens. But we would have track of who, in fact, was in the country. That's been proposed. Now, it's just an idea, a concept.
It hasn't gone anyplace legislatively at this point. And the problem we're faced with is that we need to find ways going forward to make sure we do, in fact, have knowledge of who is in the country and whether or not they've stayed, and how long they've stayed and what they're doing while they're here. And at present that's a very hard thing to do because of the enormous flow of people we've got back and forth. We've improved our system with respect to those that come in legally by visas and so forth. But we still don't have as good a grip as we need on all of those who come into the United States illegally, stay for a period of time, and then go back home.
And we need to do a better job than we are to make certain we screen out terrorists to the maximum extent possible. So it's an attempt to try to address that problem. It's not clear yet exactly how it ultimately gets sorted out or gets resolved. But that's at the heart of what is being talked about here.
QUESTION: I live in Altoona, Iowa. And I got my first paycheck for about $250. And the government took out about $50 from that. According to my math, that's about one-fifth. That means I work two days for the government. What can I do to change that? (Laughter and applause.)
R. CHENEY: How would you like to be Secretary of the Treasury? (LAUGHTER)
No, we're -- that's a lesson we all learn when we first go to work. And I think most Americans don't mind paying taxes if they think that the money is well spent, and if they think that it's not excessive -- that is to say that you don't mind working for a certain amount, if you will, to go for the common purpose -- those things we need like schools, and defense and so forth. But you lose confidence, or you become aggravated -- I know I went through the same process starting out -- I had a paper route. It was my first job. That was before Lynne knew me even -- and you get that check and not only were income taxes taken out, but you also -- the payroll tax to pay for Social Security. And now Medicare comes out of it, as well, too. And I think the thing is to support the kind of sound, sane policy and philosophy when you look at public officials to see whether or not they agree with your general view of what right balance is. And I think George Bush is the man.
I believe seriously if you look at tax policy over the years. You look at what the President has done. You look at what his opponents have suggested and recommended. Again, look at Senator Kerry's record in the Senate. He voted -- 20 years in the Senate, he voted 98 times for higher taxes, and about 130 times against various proposals to reduce taxes. He's said -- now, he's campaigning on the basis that he's going to raise taxes for at least a portion of the population. And if you add up all of the numbers, he's recommended two $2 trillion in new spending, and he's going to cut the deficit in half at the same time, the only way he can do that is to raise taxes pretty much across the board on everybody because the folks at the top don't pay enough to be able to make up that huge difference. You're going to have to go out and tax the vast majority of Americans. So I think there's a clear choice there with respect to tax policy. I think you've got in George Bush a man who will do everything he can to make certain that we don't overburden the American taxpayer with taxes because we believe very deeply that the genius of our society resides not inside the Beltway in Washington, D.C., or what government does with your money, it resides primarily with what the American people do for themselves, and the opportunities that we create for ourselves, and businesses that are created. The best anti-poverty program I know is a job. And jobs aren't created by Uncle Sam and the federal government, jobs are created out there in the private sector. And so I think that's the key -- (APPLAUSE)
QUESTION: Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Cheney, welcome to Iowa. And as a former Democrat, I would first like to honor your 40 years of marriage. Congratulations.
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I did vote for Bush, and I am now Republican. My question is, I am a volunteer voter registration coordinator at my church. And I would like to know what I can do to ensure, encourage more Christians to get out to vote to -- I think which will win Iowa. I would like to know what I could do, or we could do to ensure that.
R. CHENEY: Well, you've done a lot already by signing up the voter registration effort. What I like to remind people -- I still run into a lot of people. And of course, I've been involved in public life and politics and ran for Congress six times in Wyoming. And I've spent most of my career in it, and I suppose I've got a special affection for the political process and the political system. I just think it's important to remind people that it is a unique privilege. Very, very few civilizations in the history of the world have ever had the privilege we have of deciding who our leaders are going to be, and then hold them accountable for their performance. To live in the finest democracy the world has ever known is such a privilege. And for so many people to take that for granted, always offends me a bit. I like to remind people that what each individual does in fact matter. And all you have to do is look at the last election. It got decided by 537 votes in Florida. And when somebody comes to me and says, well, it's a big country, there are millions of Americans out there. It doesn't really matter what I do. I say, wait a minute, all you got to do is look at the election of 2000 and think about how close that election was; think about how momentous the events have been since then; and how important it is to have the right leadership, make the right decisions, and then tell everybody, look every vote matters. Every phone call matters. Every hour of volunteer time, every dollar that's contributed -- all of that goes to the success of this process, and that as Americans we ought to want a strong, vigorous election. We ought to want the candidates out there competing as aggressively as possible with respect to what they believe in, and what they stand for and what their platforms are. That's how we can educate ourselves, and also how we can ultimately hold them accountable.
If you can get a few minutes with a small group of people to try to convey that to them. And all we're asking them to do is to register to vote and then show up at the polls on Election Day, or in those states that have early voting, participate through that process. And it's such a privilege for us to be able to do that. You travel the world, and if you know anything about history, of you've spent any time looking at how people live in so many parts of the world, under dictatorships, oppressive regimes, no rights, no protections against the sovereign power of the state, to get to function and live your life as an American and participate in that process is just such a special privilege that nobody should take it for granted.
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QUESTION: Yes, as a proud uncle of a niece and nephew who graduated from Annapolis; they're serving right now, I'd like to ask the question: the advent of the Cold War and the end of SALT II, will we continue with weapons systems by leading the world -- as the Switch Blade and the F-22 Raptor -- the Raptor, itself, to be able to offer three versions of it to our allies, rather than have them shop around?
R. CHENEY: Do I think we will do that?
QUESTION: Yes.
R. CHENEY: Yes, I think the Raptor is the next generation aircraft for the Air Force. I supported it strongly when I was Secretary of Defense. It is now, I guess, getting into production now. And it has been in development for a long time. And it will be the state of the art aircraft for the United States Air Force, probably for the next 30, 40 years anyway. The F-15 has been the backbone of the Air Force. I saw it first rolled out about 1974-75 down at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona, when I worked for President Ford. And it has been in the Force now for 30 some years. It will continue to be part of the Force. But the Raptor is the next generation, if you will, after that. And we have in this administration protected it. It has been an important part of the defense budget each year. I have no reason to believe that's going to change.
QUESTION: I have more of a comment than I do a question. My son is a lance corporal in the Marine Corps. He's being deployed today. And I just want thank you and President Bush for everything that you've done for our troops. And I pray to God that you will be in there the next four years to finish.
R. CHENEY: Well, thank you very much.
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I hope you'll thank him on behalf of all of us for what he's doing for the nation.
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And again, I want to thank all of you for being here today, for giving us some of your time. This last comment is, I think, a reminder to all of us that -- how important this election is this year. And we appreciate you being here this morning.
Thank you very much.
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END
