DEAN: IT'S ALL ABOUT JOBS

RACINE - Howard Dean said very little about the other people in the 2004
presidential election - except for President Bush. During an appearance at
Festival Hall on Saturday morning, he had a lot to say about Bush.

"What I want to talk about today is jobs," Dean said to about 200 people in
the hall. "What this president has done to us has been the worst leadership
economically since Herbert Hoover was in the White House."

Balancing the budget is crucial for the health and security of the country,
Dean said. When the economy picked up in the 1990s, Vermont did not cut
taxes, Dean said, but other states did, and that set the stage for current
fiscal problems. Most of the problems in Wisconsin today are the fault of
neither Gov. Jim Doyle nor former president George H. Bush but of former
Gov. Tommy Thompson, Dean said.

"If you want social justice, you also have to care about balanced budgets."
Then the social programs that poor people depend on don't get slashed, he
said. "Ronald Reagan once said ... he once said that the best social
program is a job. And it's true.

"If you want jobs in this country you have to stop giving tax credits to
big corporations that move their headquarters to Bermuda and the jobs China."

The focus, Dean said, should be on small businesses because they create
most of the jobs in the country and because they have deep ties to their
communities and don't move elsewhere. He has proposed, and repeated on
Saturday, a loan fund for small business that would work like the home
mortgage market. Small business loans made by local banks would be bundled
and resold, just as home mortgages are now, freeing up the banks to make
more loans.

"We have not had a major infrastructure investment in this country since
the intestates were built." So we should look at investing in mass transit,
renewable energy, high-speed computer connections and schools, he said.

The United States has been a stable democracy, Dean said, because it has
had a stable middle class. This enabled people to improve their lives, and
that's why U.S. trade agreements need clauses covering human rights, the
right to have labor unions, environmental protection and child labor, he
said. Prices at Wal-Mart may increase under revised treaties, but when
wages and conditions improve in other countries, those people can form
their own middle classes, Dean said, and that will aid the spread of
democracy because it's middle class people who are better educated and
concerned about their countries and the education of their children.

"The truth is that nobody has benefitted from these trade agreements - not
our middle class and not the countries we trade with."

In an interview afterward with reporters, Dean said the U.S. has leverage
in renegotiating those trade agreements - 25 percent of the world economy.

Dean said he wouldn't commit to pulling out of a treaty in order to gain
what he wants. "I'm not willing to say what I would be willing do. I think
no chief executive puts their cards on the table. All I'm saying is I want
changes in the trade agreements, and we're going to have changes in the
trade agreements."

On other topics, during a question-an-answer session with the audience and
talking to reporters, Dean said: * Developing renewable energy is necessary
for the country. Not only does it keep money in a local area, where the
money can be used to create jobs, but it also means money isn't sent to the
Middle East where the United States, one way or another, has been
encouraging the spread of radical Islam instead of its moderate counterpart.

* He favors treatment for drug users, because they have a medical problem,
but thinks dealers, such as those who sell heroin to children, should go to
prison. Legalizing marijuana use is not good because we already have
problems with alcohol and tobacco, and adding another drug would send the
wrong message to children.

* Working parents should be granted a few hours of family leave time from
their jobs in order to participate in parent-teacher conferences and other
facets of their children's schools. Parent involvement is a good predictor
of children's success in school because the children see that school is
important.

* "This president came into office and either dismissed or abrogated a
number of treaties. I think that's a mistake. The reason we're no longer
the moral leader of the world under this president, for the first time
since World War I, is that he hasn't treated any other countries with any
significant amount of respect. In order to get people to respect you, you
have to respect them."

* "I think therapeutic cloning ought to be allowed." That's the type of
cloning for research on embryonic stem cells. (On Thursday South Korean
scientists announced they had cloned a human embryo to produce stem cells
capable of forming any tissue in the body.) "I think this president's done
a lot of Americans with long-term illnesses a terrible disservice by
inflicting his religious beliefs on public scientific policy." Dean, who
trained as a physician, said he opposes reproductive cloning - the
production of a human through cloning. "I'm going to let scientific facts
govern my judgments, not political or religious theories."

* The guest-worker program proposed by President Bush amounts to indentured
servitude for immigrants. Employers would have the freedom to do as they
choose because if they stopped sponsoring a foreign worker, that person
would immediately leave the country. This also will push U.S. wages down.
"It doesn't help immigrants. It doesn't help American workers. It's the
worst of all possible worlds - except for corporations, of course, which is
his main interest."

* Reaffirmed recent declarations that he'll stay in the presidential race
beyond Wisconsin. The New York Times on Saturday morning essentially
declared the Democratic nominee is certain (Sen. John Kerry) and the race
is now for the vice president's spot. Dean said he hadn't read the paper,
and, in his clipped and concise manner of speech said, "Fortunately voters
have more power than the New York Times."