Presidential candidate Gary Hart ; Gary Hart, Hart for President

Right right right right there Senator. We got. You. First of all thank you all for coming. Please be back in New Jersey the home of two great United States senators Democrats and a strong Democratic Party I intend to

campaign very strongly in the state throughout 1083 and 84 seeking both a base of support and delegates to the national convention in 1904. There are a variety of areas in which this administration has defaulted on its obligations to the American people in particular their public health and safety. Perhaps none is as important as the question of cleaning up the toxic waste and hazardous substances in this country the state. More perhaps than any other state in the union is afflicted with those ways and yet the last two and a half years have been a period of almost total national government inaction. We have found in the course of the last two years the Superfund legislation passed by the Congress and 1978 is not adequate in spite of the 1.6 billions of dollars allocated to cleaning up toxic waste dumps in this country primarily because the number of those dumps has grown geometrically and almost daily to the point where there are now seventeen thousand five hundred or

more located across the country. Of those the EPA has classified some 419 as high priority dump sites. And this state unfortunately has the highest number of any state of those high priority sites I believe some 67. There is very little action going on particularly because of the mismanagement of the EPA over the past two years. We hope we keep our fingers crossed that Mr Ruckelshaus will reverse administration's policies allocate funds from the super fund and begin the very necessary process of cleaning the sites up. I have introduced two major pieces of legislation which will accelerate this and as president of the United States intend to do all I can to get those passed very quickly. One is to tax all new toxic materials produced in the society at the point of generation and the revenues would go into the Superfund to clean up not just the high priority sites but they more than 17000 other sites small sites around the country. I think this is necessary to provide a

disincentive for the unnecessary generation of toxic materials but also to provide the necessary funds to get on with the cleanup task. The second major part of this legislation is to increasingly prohibit the land disposal of of new hazardous materials in the future. The state of California has already passed legislation in this regard and I think the federal government should do the same. There is no there is nothing. There is no safe land the supposal of highly toxic materials. It just cannot be safely disposed of. So this material must be reprocessed recycled treated pretreated and and made harmless if it is to be disposed of and in the soil. And I hope we can and can I know diminish the amount of that material which is disposed of in that way. This is an extremely important issue for the state and I think increasingly other parts of the country. I think it will be the environmental issue of the 1980s. We buy to try to answer.

Well there is a there is an environmental agenda of the 80s which really wasn't widely recognized in the 70s when we began this process of clean air and clean water. One of our we talked about that's a hazardous substances toxic waste. A second is is acid rain. That was an issue first identified by the National Commission on problems in the Rocky Mountain West my own home territory. So it's increasing in national and increasingly an international problem as well. And a third area of what I would call the environmental agenda of the 80s is is a disposal of nuclear waste. This is a another time bomb is ticking in this society we've accumulated 30 years of both domestic and military nuclear waste and yet have no solid national policy. The long term disposal of. The most great white are ways and the government of the United States. Contrary to what this president says he's going to have to take some responsibility for solving the problem. You know very

well you know I've said consistently for announced four months ago of the presidency that the public opinion polls would continue to favor the two candidates who are best know that in the year before the nomination election process. Public opinion polls reflect name and name identification. The vice president the United States and a former astronaut clearly are better known than the rest of us. But there is no direct correlation between running ahead the public opinion polls in the year before the nomination and actually getting the nomination. The candidate who will be nominated will be that candidate that offers new leadership and new ideas new directions for our party in our country and the best alternative to Ronald Reagan. I think I clearly am that candidate. So I've never expected 1983 to burst to the front of the public opinion polls because there's prior to the start of the primaries there's almost no way to do that. I've been in another state since early one thousand nine hundred two. I was

here in the fall of 82 on behalf of Bob Torricelli. I came in and campaigned on behalf of other candidates and participated in a variety of fundraisers. We have a base of support here. In the state capital as well as state wide among people I have known over the past year or two or more or even worked with in the previous presidential campaign in 72. Now this is a late primary I have not campaigned here as actively as I have in other states but I intend you intend to increase my presence and visibility here and I believe we'll be prepared to announce a statewide steering committee sometime in the fall. Their breadth and their depth and their specificity. I am the only candidate to put forward. A specific generation. Who will be coming along later. But none of them have as a risen in this national race. I think the major thing that distinguishes me from the other five. Is generation. And is.

The degree to which I've analyzed. I believe accurately that the challenges of our time and offered again specific alternatives. I don't think you'll find another campaign that that has the kind of detail to govern this country in the 1980s that I hope a generation we did that in 1960. And I think. Increasingly people in the Democratic Party are saying we cannot offer warmed over. The old policies of the party and expect to succeed in the 1980s. There is an enormous search I think on for for the leadership of the 80s. And I think I happen to be positioned. To take advantage of that. So I think it's both a function of age and experience but also of ideas. You know you're right. I have organized well over 150 campuses and I have a strong base of support among younger voters and young professionals. But my

support in every state where we have. Organized and formed a base and that's now about half the states about 25 states is spread across all. All age groups and. All income groups. We formed our committee in the Hampshire the other day 50 leading Democrats and so you know after a. Very. Rough. I don't know. But I can indorse understanding it.

I think good what it does illustrate what I am in favor of is is a great deal more creativity between federal state and local governments and how to finance infrastructure rebuilding re industrialization. I think we I have said before that I hope the election the national election of 84 most closely paralleled well interest in generational terms 960 But in terms of of. The need to address fundamental economic structures 932 and patchwork proposals from the Democratic past or laissez faire economy economics of Reagan are not going to address the structural changes so all that to say that the creativity and imagination of Roosevelt is very much needed. And instead of just saying if we win we Democrats are re-elected we're going to go back to war. Many of the programs of the 60s and 70s I think what we have to say is there are fundamental structural changes that need to be made in the public and private sector. And our president intends to create new mechanisms to do that the way Franklin Roosevelt did.

You know I'd be more than happy to but whatever it might be interesting I don't think I've been invited to be here you know. Oh I think by the time I we get to the New Jersey primary the race will be down to no more than two candidates I don't know who the other one will be but I will be one of them. And at that point I would intend to win this primary. And the same is true of the New York primary actually the first primary is an eastern primary. I've tried to resist the temptation to comment on the health of others campaigns there's been a lot of comment by them on mine all of it wrong. So I don't intend to return the favor. I have great respect for Fritz Mondale and he is a true national leader. He's a very good friend of mine

and I I think he has a.