Well, first of all, I think that a lot of the voters who are voting for the tea party candidates have really good impulses. That is, they believe that for years and years and years, the people with wealth and power or government power have done well and ordinary people have not. That's true.
Interpretation
Clinton acknowledges the good intentions of tea party voters, highlighting their concerns about inequality.
In this quote, William J. Clinton points out that many supporters of tea party candidates are driven by genuine concerns over economic inequality and the perceived failures of those in power. He recognizes that these voters seek change, believing that those with wealth and government power have prospered at the expense of ordinary citizens, which reflects a deeper discontent with the political and economic status quo.
In practice
This quote could be used in a political debate to discuss voter concerns.
You know, there was a recent poll which said that young people in the generation of the students here felt it was far more likely that they would see a UFO than that they would draw Social Security... It's very important you understand this. Once you understand this, you realize this is not an episode from the X Files, and you're not more likely to see a UFO if you do certain specific things.
When we got organized as a country, [and] wrote a fairly radical Constitution, with a radical Bill of Rights, giving radical amounts of freedom to Americans, it was assumed that Americans who had that freedom would use it responsibly...When personal freedom is being abused, you have to move to limit it.
For too long we've been told about 'us' and 'them.' Each and every election we see a new slate of arguments and ads telling us that 'they' are the problem, not 'us.' But there can be no 'them' in America. There's only us.
There is a huge body of business evidence now showing that energy savings give better service at lower cost with higher profit. We have to tear down barriers to successful markets and we have to create incentives to enter them.
Demand that your government pays more attention. It's immoral that people in Africa die like flies of diseases that no one dies of in the United States. And the more disease there is, the more political unrest there will be, leading to more Darfurs, which the U.S. will have to pay to fix.
I was not elected to produce a pile of vetoes.
Terrorism is the war of the poor, and war is the terrorism of the rich.
Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.
They say, oh, let’s have multiparty politics. Let’s have different parties change and be in charge of the Government. Is it that simple? You vote in a Division Three government, not a Division One government, and the whole economy will just subside within three, four years. Finished.
If you're worried about the deficit, pay attention to the fact that it's almost all attributable to military spending and the totally dysfunctional health program.
The less government interferes with private pursuits, the better for general prosperity.
Greece wishes to be part of the eurozone, but it must, of course, go through with the necessary reforms to make this happen.
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