Lawrence Ari Fleischer

“ It's another sign that, around the world, people are taking President Bush seriously and understand that the United States, under President Bush will move forward with the development an the deployment of a national missile defense. ”

“ The surplus continues to grow larger, and the estimates that President Bush has made in his budget are very conservative, as far as the amount of revenue projected to come in. And interestingly, one other factor on that, too -- of course, if you looked at the last budget submitted by the previous administration, they projected growth for this current fiscal year to be 3.5 percent in 2001. ”

“ I was going to say, if you recall, during the campaign, the President said, and still believes, that we should have a ban on soft money coming from corporations, coming from unions. He does not believe that we should -- that the system should be filled with soft money coming from those groups. ”

“ That remains, frankly, more of a likelihood than revenue coming in at a lesser degree. Q So why use that, Ari, that the revenues have been stronger when the economy has been weaker? MR. FLEISCHER: Because the estimators are being too conservative. They are estimating revenue at a far less rate than has actually come in. And even with growth diminishing, the pattern continues. The revenue estimators, both at the nonpartisan CBO and at the Office of Management and Budget have missed the mark on revenues on the too pessimistic side, the too conservative side. ”

“ Q Ari, there's an article in the Los Angeles Times this morning that said that a top energy executive called while the President's speechwriters were trying to top off his address to the joint sessions of Congress, with a request which basically said, ask Bush to drop a line from his speech restating his campaign pledge to limit carbon dioxide emissions. ”

“ I think what you see are accurate measures of the economy. Q Ari, following up on that, the President yesterday was talking about -- this just struck me as one of his first comments on this -- but he seemed to balance out his comments about the difficulties of the economy with other ones talking about the fundamentals, and there are some things that are still good about the economy, and so on. ”

“ And today the President is announcing his further intention that among Mr. Haass' other responsibilities he take the lead on U.S. engagement in support of the Northern Ireland peace process. The United States will continue to support full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement and stands ready to assist the process in any way that the British and Irish governments and the parties deem useful. ”

“ He hopes that nobody would turn a blind eye to the economic difficulties in this nation at a time when people need to know straight facts from the government leaders. Q If I could just follow one more time, though. Just like you say, there's a psychological benefit to giving a tax cut, even if the dollar sign impact won't be so large in the first year. ”

“ And toward that effort, he is working to build common agreement around his principles with a variety of senators on the Hill, including Senator McCain and Senator Hagel and other senators as well. Q So McCain-Feingold is not dead? There can be a compromise that would build in the President's plan, Senator Hagel's plan and McCain-Feingold? MR. FLEISCHER: The President's focus on campaign finance reform this year is on making things live. He doesn't want anything to be dead, he wants to have an agreement. ”

“ The capital gains realizations represents a very small sliver of revenues in this country. Q Plus options income. MR. FLEISCHER: Still, it's a small sliver of revenues. That is not the bulk of revenues in this country. Q There is no irrational exuberance in the surplus projection. MR. FLEISCHER: No, the surplus projections in this administration are indeed very conservative. Q Try one more crack at this, Ari. Do you -- you're basically saying that a world exists now where growth can continue to decline and surpluses will continue to grow. ”

“ And given where California is today and where our nation may be facing in terms of high energy bills and a looming energy crisis, the President does not think it would be wise to proceed. Thank you very much. Q One follow-up. Does the President personally believe that carbon dioxide emissions lead to global warming? MR. FLEISCHER: Evidence does suggest that CO2 does play a role in global warming. But the's separate from it being a pollutant. ”

“ Prime Minister Blair said that, President Kim said that. The Russians and the Chinese also talking about development of missile defenses. And the President believes it's a reinforcement of what he has talked about. Q That's not actually an issue. It has not been an issue all along -- I mean, developing and creating missile defense. The issue here is breaking the old treaty. MR. FLEISCHER: And as I indicated to you, the President has ordered the review to take place. Q Ari, is the President considering another formal press conference? ”

“ Q Ari, a couple of issues related to campaign finance. Senator Torricelli has a bill that would require stations to provide the lowest possible rate for TV ads, not preemptable. And secondly, McCain has a proposal for free air time. ”