THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release October 17, 2000
REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
TO PRESIDENT'S CUP DINNER
National Building Museum
Washington, D.C.
8:50 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. I'm sorry to be the only
person here who is not properly dressed. (Laughter.) But as Tim said, I
just got off the airplane and I wanted to come by and welcome you to
Washington and say how thrilled I am to be the Honorary Chair of the
President's Cup this year. I'm pleased we're going back to RTJ, and that
my friend and golfing partner, Vernon Jordan, is the president of the club,
so he'll let me on to walk around a little and watch you.
I want to thank Ken Venturi and Peter Thompson for serving as the
captains of the team. And I want to thank Tim Finchem, who, like Vernon,
has been a friend of mine for well over 20 years, for the outstanding
leadership he provides the PGA.
I'm delighted to have you here and I want to say a special word
of appreciation for the work the President's Cup does -- first, to raise
money for worthy charities. When you finish this year you will have raised
over $6 million in the last four Cups for worthy causes, and I'm very
grateful for that and you should be proud of it. (Applause.)
You know, like all ardent golfers, I sometimes go over the top in
explaining to people why golf is like life or why life ought to be more
like golf. But I would like to say, as you know, I just went to Sharm
el-Sheikh, in Egypt, to try to reach an agreement to end the violence that
we've seen in the Palestinian territories and Israel for the last couple of
weeks.
I don't know if any of you have ever been there, but it is one of
the most beautiful places on earth, and it is exploding in development
because the climate is so perfect. And I sat there for a day and a half,
didn't sleep, and all our meetings were conducted on the edge of one of the
most beautiful golf courses I've ever seen in my life. (Laughter.) So I
thought to myself, why am I being punished for the fact that I can't solve
this problem here?
But what it made me think of coming back here is that we all come
from countries which at one time or another had significant internal
strife, where people had to overcome their differences. I was very moved
when I saw Greg at the closing ceremony of the Olympics by the incredible
way that Australia not only welcomed the Olympics, but used the Olympics to
show the healing process that has gone one between the Aboriginal people
and the other citizens of Australia.
Everybody knows now that America is becoming the great melting
pot of the world. And it's well to remember that the kind of understanding
that you have, the idea that people play by certain rules and if you do,
everybody is treated with equal respect is really the way the world ought
to work and the kind of idea we're trying to bring to all the troubled
places in the world, but most importantly, to the Middle East -- which,
ironically, is the home to all three of the world's great monotheistic
religions and is still one of the most bedeviled places on the planet.
I hope you have a great time over the next several days. I hope
that no matter who wins or who loses, that you'll show the world one more
example of how our common humanity is more important than our interesting
diversity. I'll look forward to seeing you tomorrow at the opening
ceremony.
Thank you very much. (Applause.)
END 8:54 P.M. EDT
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