{back from break--Issues At Hand logo, dissolve to Richard}

{screen images behind RICHARD: collage of Window screens--from e-mail, government services, grants, educonomy, etc. See IH2-18/I344}

We are living in the future that Jack built, like it or not.

Jack Williams's Information Agenda has changed America--at least on the surface. Critics of the Agenda say that Williams' changes have harmed America; supporters of it say that the changes have made America wealthier, more inclusive, and more democratic. Perhaps it has even made it ... more American.

{background image shifts to streetscenes of interviews, people walking by}

RICHARD:

Tonight we'll be hearing from Americans from all walks of life as they talk about the changes that have gone on in their lives over the past three years.

But to put these voices in the right context, we must remember how we came to be where we are today.

{Dissolve to: images of the Democratic National Convention

1992; flags, waves, confetti. Focus on Williams & family waving to crowd.}

RICHARD, overdub:

There was no question that Williams' campaign was helped by Bush's precipitous drop in approval ratings as report after report came out indicating that the recession was indeed becoming the "D" word--a Depression.

{RICHARD dissolves to GRAPHICS here (See IH2-18/I345). In 1/4-screen box in lower left, chart representing decline in Bush's approval rating from January 1990 to October 1992; in other 3/4 screen flashes historical scenes--press conferences, speeches before crowds, the Williams/Bush debates, the increasingly haggard-looking Bush, the smiling Williams--See TAPE #IH9684-9145}

RICHARD, overdub:

That impending depression, compounded by the revelations about his lies and misrepresentations during the Iran-Contra scandal, his administration's mishandling of the S&L debacle, the insurance collapses, the banking upheavals, and the military adventuring in the Middle East, all weakened George Bush's candidacy so much that his former vice president Dan Quayle ran a nearly successful race against him in the primary, even though he didn't announce his surprise candidacy until January of 1992.

{Graphic of Quayle addressing crowd of flag-wavers: TAPE #GA9613125-223}

RICHARD:

Denounced as a traitor by many Republican stalwarts, he was hailed by many conservatives as a man who had placed his loyalty to the Republic above his loyalty to the President.

Some commentators have since called Quayle's entrance into the race the beginning of Bush's collapsed candidacy. There is no question that the Democrats played the split party sides against one another, and that Williams in particular was not shy about ridiculing them.

{caption:}

{Red, white, blue background, podium. Cloudy day}

Well, I say the level of discussion influences the level of thought. And I say the American people deserve better than that. Should I treat everyone as if they're simpletons, and can conceive of nothing larger than a sound bite? Say "read my lips" and make the level of discussion shrink to the size of a pea? I refuse to believe that people want that level of discussion, or will put up with it for long.

{looks at the cameras:}

{he pauses, makes a still image, then animates, voice resonant:}

{the audience roars, pauses, then roars with laughter again. Dissolve to:}

During the next three months, those last five seconds were played over 203 times in major markets. Williams used that fact as proof that there were limits to what the press would cover.

Ecological fears also played into Williams' hand. From June of '91 to June of '92, reports on fourteen nuclear waste dumps acknowledged them as actively dangerous.

{Background shows images of dumps, consolidated TAPE #GA9234-21766}

Statistical analysis techniques previously unavailable--based on census data correlated to insurance records, and individual health reports--showed that living in proximity to the dumps for even two years raised the risk of certain forms of cancer by a factor of 400, especially in children.

These fourteen, the "Toxic Baker's Dozen," completely drained the Superfund's already dwindling resources.

Compounding these costs were a panoply of other crises--the toxic waste dumps in Silicon Valley in California, for example, were producing neurological damage in the children living in the area. Air quality was steadily decreasing, and the ozone layer seemed to be thinning at an exponentially progressive rate.

{Graphics of closed banks, S&Ls, and insurance companies, TAPE #GA9223131-331}

More influential than any particular ecological threat, though, was the general consensus among the electorate that the existing political system had failed them. The savings and loan debacle was followed by the insurance collapse and the banking fiasco. Elected officials were no longer seen as representative of the constituencies' real needs; instead, as poll after poll showed, over two-thirds of the voters (and over eighty percent of the nonvoters) believed that elected officials, from county to state to country, were protecting only their chances for reelection.

It was clear that Williams knew that Bush had hurt his chances drastically, and was on the defensive--that Bush had to prove to the American public that his policies weren't flawed. He continued to press his advantage during the summer, which pressured Bush to take the role of the chalenger, requesting dates from the Williams camp for election debates.

{behind Richard, graphic IH2-18/I212a, intersecting approval ratings for Bush and Williams, Jan. '92 through August '92}

As a consequence, Williams didn't need to make his policy desires explicit during the election, even though Bush tried to press the issue. One famous instance of Williams' finesse was his handling of Bush's prepared "stumper" in the last Candidate's Debate.

{cut to TAPE #GA96101825-553, the Williams/Bush debate, October 18, 1992}

{looking Presidential}

{dissolve to Williams, later, in response}

And you ask me, George, for specifics, and I point to those thousand points of light that you praised, and then ignored, and wonder about how specific you expect me to be. As for me, I point to the essays I've written, the statements I've made--all a matter of public record--that speak of what I want to do, how to make these nuts and bolts work.

There are no single answers, George, as you know.

There is no magic formula, no simple sound bite answer that will cure the fevers raging in of our democracy. If I said "read my lips," it would mean less than nothing. If I stated a single answer, no one would believe me. Nobody believes sound bites anymore, nor should they.

What I hold to is a set of principles that are at the heart of our American way of life, and that celebrate the best in our society.

I've stated them many times, and I'll continue to say them in as many ways as I can: The U.S. government is intended to represent the people who vote it into existence.

Our tax dollars pay for the government. As such, our government is the property of the people, and any information it acquires, devises, presents, promotes, prepares, or creates also is the property of the American people. Further, the government has a duty as a servant to make that information available to its people freely and easily so that any citizen can profit from the information he or she paid for.

One of the federal government's primary jobs is to facilitate commerce and trade within the borders of the federation. The interstate highway system is a wonderful model of that sort of facilitation. The roads are supported through a blend of federal and state funds, and are coordinated and maintained for the profit of all.

Information highways, with federally supported interchanges and interconnections, could assist in the development of the country in thousands of ways. Business on all levels would flourish.

I believe in the free market, but not in an anarchic market, where there are no rules or principles to guide the choices. What the last twelve years--if not the last fifty years--have taught us is that unfettered, undirected capitalism has a cost, and that that cost is the financial and physical health of the future. Unfettered, undirected capitalism benefits those businesses who can get rid of their waste the most cheaply, rather than the most effectively. Who can produce their product the most cheaply, rather than the most humanely.

That unfettered capitalism, George, has given us waste dumps that are leaching into the groundwater. It has given us air unfit to breathe. It has given us the savings and loan debacle. The insurance collapse. The chaos in the market. The bankrupt energy policy. And a planet warming faster than we'd have thought possible five years ago.

What unfettered capitalism eventually does, as well, is end up costing the taxpayer a great deal of money. To clean up toxins. To pay off bad debts made by crooks. To pay the health costs of addiction. To rebuild and retool shoddy workmanship.

Don't get me wrong. Capitalism is the fastest horse of progress, and I'll ride it anywhere. But I will not ride that horse unbroken or bareback. Capitalism is very powerful horse, but undirected, it is a dangerous horse indeed. If this horse is to take me where I want to go, it must be led, limited, directed. We must find ways to control that bucking beast.

What I'm saying here, George, is that you and the policies you represent have led us to the brink of a chasm into which we dare not go. It will take a great deal to get us out. Do I say "no new taxes "? No, I do not. What I say is, Different taxes. Taxes that reflect the true cost of doing business. Taxes that reflect the true cost to society and to mother nature of unprincipled capital. And what I'm also ...

Moderator:

Time, Mr. Williams...

Williams:

... saying is that I have no sound bite answers for you, George, and quite frankly I wouldn't trust myself if I was giving you sound bites. There is too much to be done to be oversimplifying....

Moderator:

Time, Mr. Williams!

Williams:

{chastened, but smiling}

{cut to:}

Though no one thought so at the time, Williams' response itemized most of the important policy changes that he would later introduce. The critics called him unspecific, although in truth he was being quite specific--though not admitting it directly. Later, in a widely reported speech in late October, he continued the attack:

{cut to TAPE #GA9613125-62, Williams' acid condemnation of existing administration}

{caption:}

George asked for specifics, and I'll give them to him.

Sixteen years of record budget deficits from the terms of his Republican presidents. Continued military hardware buildup, while the infrastructure of the American people crumbled before his eyes. There is still no comprehensive energy policy, and the environmental policies of his party are laughable--though the laughter is that of a death-row inmate who is told he has incurable cancer.

Public promises broken, George; public promises made, public promises broken. Nobody believes you. Nobody believes that the wealthy know better. Nobody believes that the rich deserve their wealth, since we know it has been gained at the expense not just of the poor, the needy, the indigent, the uneducated, the subjugated. It has been gained most of all at the expense of our world.

We have overdrawn our account in the bank of the world.

We were given an endowment by Nature, and for thousands of years we lived on the interest of that endowment. But the industrial age, the era of monopolies, trusts, and robber barons, the epoch of laissez-faire capitalism has spent the endowment itself, profligately, wastefully, and then borrowed more at compound interest.

I ask the American people, as I ask the world people:

Who made these choices? Who decided to dump waste untreated into our rivers? Who decided to sully virgin soil with poisons? Who decided to spew filth into our air? Who decided that people were chattel, cattle, objects, consumers, things to be used up with the same obliviousness to the future that the world has been used up?

Was it you? It certainly wasn't me! I say we must rebuild the principal, rebuild the endowment, and the only way to do that is to remake our society in a finer image, based on the highest values that the Founding Fathers expounded upon.

We've been told all our lives that we had no choices in such high matters. But the last twenty years has given us information that showed us--without question--that the choices being made in our name were bad ones, false ones, destructive ones.

And I believe that the people listening now know better than any other population in history what needs doing. I believe that we can make that change, we can make good choices.

I believe that we, the American people, in concert with the people of the world, can find a way out of our mess. I believe that it is not naive to say that we can save our world. I believe it is the height of rationality to say those things.

Information and communication will make us free.

Information is the greatest power of all, and we can take that power back from the cowards that have been hoarding it like priests of a false god. I say we can save ourselves, even if the cowards won't.

{behind Richard, graphic IH2-18/I212b, intersecting approval ratings for Bush and Williams, Jan. '92 through November '92}

Williams' crowd-pleasing rhetoric was also thick enough with ideas that the editorialists and political scientists around the country chewed on what he said and made the words stronger. His critics called him demagogic, but regardless of those critics, and regardless, it seemed, of what Bush said or did, Williams' numbers in the polls continued to grow. His election was almost a foregone conclusion by the time November rolled around.

{Dissolve to: Electoral results map, IH2-18/I6124. Blank states turn green in sequence with overdub's content:}

Williams was elected, as were twenty Senators and over a hundred Representatives, on a platform based on reempowering the individual. "Information is the greatest power of them all," Williams cried at the grass roots. "We can save ourselves, even if the cowards won't," he stated boldly on national television, and those who rode that horse galloped into office. Williams himself won not by a landslide, but by a convincing enough margin to convince the commentators that he had a mandate.

The Midwest, a populist stronghold at the turn of the century, followed suit in this populist-flavored election.

The Eastern seaboard, with the notable exceptions of Washington DC, New York, and Pennsylvania, also came out strongly for Williams' Agenda.

California was a close race, but Williams again managed to pull a 54% win, while Oregon and Washington were solidly for Williams. In the Southwest, Williams predominated, while the South was mixed.

Texas was lost on the hints--in so many of Williams' speeches--of higher oil taxes, though Williams still received 28% of the votes, allowing enough electoral votes to push him over the edge. Some wags said Williams didn't win, he just didn't lose. In any event, the backlash vote of citizen outrage was a deciding factor in the election.

{Fade back to RICHARD; screen behind him uses IH2-18/I3444, bar charts of votes:}

In all, Williams succeeded in getting 64% of the electoral votes, and 59% of the popular vote. The backlash from the voters on the economy ousted Senators who had been assumed to be shoo-ins, and their "Green" or "Agenda" or "New Democrat" opponents won instead. While not being able to claim the mandate for his agenda that Reagan was able to in 1980, Williams was able to show that the country was ripe for change, and that his mandate had to be taken seriously

{cut to man-on-street bitlets, consolidated in TAPE #GA9613125-214d:}

{tall fellow, 26, black, smirking}

Man:

{wide, 35, white, shaking his head}

Woman:

{slender, fair, very short hair, 41}

Woman:

{with two kids beside her, staring at the camera}

Man:

{stout, hispanic, wealthy, 48}

What's his domestic policy? What's his presidential policy?

Do you know? I sure don't know. But I knew what I did know, and that was that I wanted the powerbrokers who got us into the mess out. O-U-T out. The rest of it I'll wait and see about.

{cut to: images from around the country--montage of polls, plains, traffic, traffic jams, the general hubbub of urban life, the general peace of rural life. Rhoda G. is working on this right now.}

For many, those questions about Williams' intentions, his policies, and his expectations resonated. What change had we asked for? What change was coming? Williams was elected leaving many question marks on the horizon. How was he to institute policies based on the assumption that "information and communication can set us free"? How could he change the environmental laws without devastating an economy already sliding toward ruin? How could he emphasize education without sacrificing jobs? How could he bolster the spirit of the country without damaging the pocketbook?

{see consolidation tape #GA9613125-772. Williams in discussions with those mentioned below. Rhoda is also working on the "people on the street" footage mentioned}

RICHARD, overdub:

Between the November elections and January inauguration, Williams kept himself busy by meeting with professors, politicians, thinktank leaders, world leaders, economists, and by asking surprised people on the street what they were thinking.

{cut to tape #IH9213125-133, stock Wall St. footage}

Williams' staff had an unusually high number of academics and "intellectuals"--a term they fought, but which stuck nonetheless. Several hard-nosed economists, some of whom were reformed "supply-siders," were highly-placed advisors and staff members. His chief of staff was a conservative businessman who had brought a struggling corporation out of bankruptcy with some revolutionary steps not dissimilar to Williams' "Information Agenda."

During those busy weeks, rumors abounded about what Williams and his developing administration were planning.

The theme of the Information Age infused nearly every rumor, and high-tech stocks in particular began to rise in value.

Hints of new taxes fueled much discussion, as did murmurs of a new form of international trade.

{more shots of Wall Street activity, newspaper headlines, images of Bush walking from helicopter, addressing the press corps, etc.: consolidation TAPE #GA96143550-23

Bush, during his lame-duck months, did little to change the course of either the economy or the policies that he had maintained throughout his Presidency. The numbers of homeless grew, as did the number of unemployed. As he put it himself in his memoirs, "I went out not with a bang, but with a whimper."

Williams' Inauguration Day speech stood in stark contrast to that whimper. No inaugration day speech had ever had a larger audience, according to the polls.

Everyone was curious about what they had elected.

{caption:}

Now is the time for our own evolution. Old choices are pushing us forward inexorably. There is vast complexity in our world, and if we are to avoid being sucked down by the economic whirlpool threatening us, we must find new answers. We must change our world. And we must do it now.

Such change cannot be made by one man, or by one administration, or by one congress. It can only be done by a nation, by consensus. We must, therefore, make the tools available for everyone--every individual in this nation of individuals--so that everyone can contribute to the discussions, to the debate, to the decisions.

More than anything else, we must be informed. And the tools for disseminating and retrieving that information are available and can be applied. The tools may need to be modified, and the changes will not be instant. But the changes will allow us all to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps into the Information Age.

In the next few weeks, I will be proposing what I call the Information Agenda, a series of legislative acts that could define the next decade, if not the next three decades.

The Information Agenda is complex, but not beyond the comprehension of anyone who can read, who can listen, and who will take the time to do either. In many ways it's very simple, and the simplicity will be what will allow it to succeed.

If we are to realize our potential, and if we are to create the most equitable society we can, which provides equal educational opportunities, equal job opportunities, and equal freedom of information to all, then we must actively seek means to that end.

Market forces have brought us to a time of economic danger; the market will not provide the answers we need directly, though the market must be involved in the solutions. Existing educational systems cannot completely solve the problem, though education is the key to intellectual freedom. Existing information systems are not suffient to serve the needs of all Americans, because the tools for accessing the world of information are not accessible to most of our citizens.

The government must make a proactive choice to provide access to these tools. The government must make a proactive choice to address these needs. Providing those tools will be a self-supporting enterprise, and no doubt the government will get a great deal of heat for being in "business" instead of just assisting business.

But I say we are in business. The government is in the business of facilitating the development of the country and the people it represents. Providing communication lines.

Providing consensus tools. Providing information. And making that information useful. If information is public, then it should be truly public, and available, and free.

And accessible to all.

Knowledge can make us free. Providing tools for responsible freedom is precisely what the government's business is. And if I have a mandate, it is to assure that all Americans have access to the tools of education, to the tools of wealth, the to tools of freedom. Without these tools in the hands of every citizen, we will fail. But with these tools, we will thrive, and we will prosper.

{Dissolve to consolidated Shotseries TAPE #GA9613125-923, visuals of Williams getting out of limos, talking to people over long tables, etc. Usual presidential trappings}

RICHARD, overdub:

For the two weeks after his Inauguration, Williams and his staff prepared--with well-placed leaks occurring fast enough to guage public support for particular policies--a course of action unprecedented except perhaps by Roosevelt's New Deal.

{follow with consolidated Shotseries TAPE #GA9613125-5583, screens from CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, C-Span, of Williams in legislative session, in press conferences, or looking directly at the camera.}

RICHARD, overdub:

What followed those two weeks was something unheard of in contemporary politics. A ten-day onslaught of words, ideas, and radical politics the likes of which the world had never seen.

{Issue at Hand logo resolving it as Richard dissolves, as ad break looms:}

Those "ten days that shook the world," and how they changed the American dream, after this.

{cut to AD BREAK--120 seconds}

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