All right, it's a young lady's turn. It's your turn? (Laughter.) No, I'm going to call on her. I might call on you later, though.
All right, go ahead.
Q I'm a licensed acupuncturist and licensed massage therapist in Florissant. And so --
THE PRESIDENT: I could use one right now. (Laughter.) My back is stiff. I've been working hard.
Q I'll be happy to help you. (Laughter.) And this kind of fits into what you were just talking about as far as health care. I'm wondering, as a practitioner of Oriental medicine, knowing that the National Institutes of Health and the World Health Organization has discovered through their studies that alternative medicine often is more cost-effective and very effective, how will alternative medicine fit in your new health care program?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, look, my attitude is that we should -- we should do what works. So I think it is pretty well documented through scientific studies that acupuncture, for example, can be very helpful in relieving certain things like migraines and other ailments -- or at least as effective as more intrusive interventions.
I will let the science guide me. We just swore in an outstanding new Secretary of Health and Human Service, Kathleen Sebelius, former governor of Kansas. (Applause.) It's good to see that a Jay Hawk got applause on this side of the border here. (Laughter.) But she's going to do an outstanding job. And my charge to her is, as we're going through health care reform let's find out what works.
I think one basic principle that we know is that the more we do on the prevention side, the more we can obtain serious savings down the road. So giving children early checkups, making sure that they get immunized, making sure that they are diagnosed if they've got eyesight problems, making sure that they're taught proper nutrition to avoid a life of obesity -- those are all issues that we have some control over. And if we're making those investments, we will save huge amounts of money in the long-term.
Unfortunately, the hardest thing to do in politics -- and certainly in health care reform -- has been to get policymakers to make investments early that will have long-term payoffs. Because people -- their attitude is, well, I'll be out of office by the time that kid grows up; and, the fact that they're healthy, that doesn't help me. And in the private sector insurance system, oftentimes insurers make the same calculation. Their attitude is, well, people change jobs enough for us to pay for the preventive medicine now when the problem may not crop up for another 20 years and they'll be long out of our system, so we don't want to reimburse it because it will make things more costly. That's the logic of our health care system that we're going to have to change.
The recovery package put a huge amount in prevention. We are, in our budget, calling for significant increases in prevention. And my hope is, is that working in a bipartisan fashion we are going to be able to get a health care reform bill on my desk before the end of the year that will start seeing the kinds of investments that will make everybody healthier. All right? (Applause.)
Okay, it's a man's turn. It's a guy's turn, it's a guy's turn. This gentleman right here, he raised his hand. Go ahead. Yes, sir -- hold on, wait for your -- now, are you an elected official, by the way?
Q No, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay, good. Because elected officials, you guys can't hog the mic right now.
Q No, sir. I'm a pastor.
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, God bless you. (Laughter.)
Q Mt. Sinai Baptist Church in the City of St. Louis. My question has to do with foreign policy. While we spend so much money with Afghanistan and in other parts of the world, fighting and what have you, on the continent of Africa -- Sudan, Darfur and other places -- the poverty level is so high, so many people are dying. Is there a chance in your administration that we would be able to build in that area? (Applause.)
THE PRESIDENT: It's a good question. Let me, first of all, say that whatever arguments we had about Iraq, I think we've been able to build a consensus that it is time for us to bring our troops home and give responsibility over to the Iraqis. (Applause.)
We are doing it in a careful way, because we don't want the country to collapse -- that would not be in our strategic interests. There's been recent flare-ups of violence in Iraq that are highly sensationalized, and that indicates the degree to which this is a ramp-down that is conducted over the course of 18 months. I think that's the right thing to do.
In Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan, we do have real problems with the Taliban and al Qaeda. They are the single most direct threat to our national security interests. And I had some grumblings and complaints from certain factions in the Democratic Party when I made a decision to send 17,000 additional troops there. I understand people's concerns. But as Commander-in-Chief it is my responsibility to make sure that bin Laden and his cronies are not able to create a safe haven within which they can kill another 3,000 Americans or more. That's an obligation that I have. (Applause.)
Now, having said that both on Iraq and Afghanistan I think we're doing the right thing, I think it's difficult; it's going to require a new strategy that mixes not just military action, but also includes diplomacy and development. We can't neglect these other parts of the world. So I've appointed a special envoy, a Major General Scott Gration, a very close friend of mine, was one of the top fighter pilots in our military, in our Armed Forces, and somebody who's also an expert on development issues. He just returned from Sudan. We are trying to find a way to create peace and stability that will allow the kind of humanitarian assistance that's needed to take effect in that country.
But you're making a broader point, which is there are a lot of countries, not just in Africa, but in Asia, and Eastern Europe, et cetera, that need our help. And sometimes people ask me, why should we help other countries when we've got so much to do here at home? I mean, foreign aid is very unpopular. I'm telling you, it's probably the single most unpopular thing. If you just ask the average American, they'll say, why should we be giving money to other countries?
And people usually grossly overestimate how much our foreign aid budget is. If you ask people, they'll say, well, we give 10 percent of our federal budget away in foreign aid. Actually, it's 1 percent. We give less in foreign aid than any other wealthy country as a percentage of our GDP.
Here is the reason why it's important. The reason why it's important is that a lot of times we can advance our national interests more effectively by showing that we are interested in the well-being of the people of other countries. That makes those countries more predisposed to work with us on a whole range of issues that are very important to us. It's an important tool for us to be able to meet our national security interests.
So, for example -- let me just give you one very specific example. If in Latin America, where I just returned, people see that we are sending doctors and teachers and Peace Corps workers into these communities, then that's the face of America; when it come time for them to help us on drug interdiction, it's a lot easier for the President of a Colombia or a Mexico to ally themselves with us because we're known to the Mexican people or the Colombian people as good friends, as people who care about them. And that may actually then ultimately save us money in the long term because we don't end up having to send troops in and do some things ourselves, because we've got allies to work with us.
So not only is it the right thing to do from a ethical and moral perspective, but it is also good strategy. And so I have said to the Congress, even in these difficult times we need to do some additional work in terms of foreign assistance, because it will save money for us -- and lives, blood and treasure for us -- in the long term.
I mean, right now everybody is concerned about the swine flu, and properly so. This is a potentially serious issue, and we've got to monitor it very carefully. But think about it. If Mexico has a good strong public health system that is catching these things early, ultimately that's going to save us money, because flu gets contained. And a lot of the threats that we're going to be facing, whether it's international terrorism, cyber terrorism, nuclear proliferation, pandemic, climate change -- a lot of these issues, they cross borders. So it's not like we can just draw a moat around America, and say, I'm sorry, don't bother us; keep your problems outside. It just doesn't work that way.
People get on planes from Africa, and will bring a disease right here to our doorstep, because we weren't concerned about whether or not they had a public health system that could catch these diseases early. So this is all part of our interests, and not just other people's.
All right. Okay. I was told that I have time for one more question. I want to -- I'm sorry guys, but I'm going to go with a student -- (applause) -- because young people, this is their school. But I want a young lady, because it's a young lady's turn. This young lady right here, this is the one, the one with the lei on here.
All right, there you go. She looks ready with a good question. (Applause.)
Q It's an honor to meet you, President Obama.
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you so much. What is your name?
Q I'm a fourth grader. I was curious, how is your administration planning to be more environmentally friendly? (Applause.)
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that is just a great question. You're a very poised and articulate fourth grader. (Applause.) Yes, isn't she impressive? (Applause.) Yes, absolutely. We might have to run you for President some day. (Applause.)
Well, there are some short-term things we can do, and there are some long-term things we can do. On the short-term list, we already, for example, passed a historic public lands bill that creates many more acres of public space that is environmentally protected -- (applause) -- from logging and from other -- from mining and from other uses. And that I think is going to be very important.
Now, in some cases what we do is we balance the need for economic growth, but we do it in a sustainable way. There doesn't have to be a contradiction between jobs and the environment, we just have to be thinking a little smarter. So, for example, when it comes to forestry, there's nothing wrong with us cutting down some trees for timber, as long as you make sure that it's done in a sequence and is spaced properly so that the forest itself is sustained.
Sometimes these debates become this all-or-nothing thing: either commercial interests can do anything they want -- dump stuff in the oceans and tear down all the forests, and that's the only way we can get economic growth; or alternatively, everybody is hugging trees and you can't cut a tree. You know, there's a balance that can be struck, and the key principle is sustainability. Are what we are doing -- will it ensure that you have this incredible treasure we call America when you grow up, for your kids, so you can take them into a park, so sportsmen or fishermen can enjoy it. That's the key.
Now, there is a long-term problem that we've got to deal with, and that's is a tough one. And that is this issue of climate change. I want to tell you the truth here because this is going to be a debate that we're going to be having over the course of the next year. The average person probably thinks, yes, climate change, that's kind of a drag, but it's not one of my top priorities -- because you don't really see it or feel it, it doesn't hit your pocketbook, it doesn't have to do with your job directly. And so the tendency is just to kind of push it off. People think, well, this just has to do with polar bears, and I feel bad about polar bears but I've got other things to worry about.
I don't think people fully appreciate the potential damage
-- economic damage, as well as environmental damage -- that could be done if we are not serious in dealing with this problem. If the temperature goes up a couple of degrees, well, it will change weather patterns pretty significantly. It could create droughts in places where we haven't had drought; it could bring insect-born diseases up into places like Missouri that we haven't seen before. But we can probably manage. If the temperature of the planet goes up 5 degrees, you're now looking at coastlines underwater. You're now looking at huge, cataclysmic hurricanes, complete changes in weather patterns. Some places will get hotter, some places will get colder. Our economy would be disrupted by tens of trillions of dollars.
So this is no joke. And the science shows that the planet is getting warmer faster than people expected. Even the most dire warnings, it's gotten -- it's moved forward faster than anybody expected. They're talking about, just in a few years, during the summer, there won't be any ice in the Arctic, something we have never seen before. So we have to do something about it.
Now, the question, again, is how do you do it in an intelligent way? There are some people who would say this is such a big problem that you just got to shut everything down. Well, I'm sorry, that's not going to happen. People have got to go to work, and we've got to drive, we've got to fly places. Our economy has to grow.
But there are ways that we can do it that are intelligent and smart. And I think one of the best ways to do it is to say, in a gradual way, let's set a cap, a ceiling, on the carbon pollution that comes out of all sorts of places: our utilities, our cars, our industries. Let's take a look at all the carbon that's being sent into the atmosphere that's causing climate change, and let's say that each year we're going to reduce the allowable amount in total that is released.
And what we'll do to each industry is we'll say we're going to make a deal with you: Come up with ways to improve your processes and bring pollution down, and you can make money by sending out less pollution; on the other hand, if you have more pollution than you were allowed, then you're going to have to pay money. You start creating a market for the clean energy, and you start making it less economical to produce harmful energy.
Now, if we do that in a smart, gradual way and in a way that protects consumers from the initial attempts of utilities, for example, to pass on those costs to consumers -- which is what they'll try to do, so we've got to rebate some of that money to make sure that people are held harmless -- then I actually think that we can get control of this problem, we can save the polar bears, but more importantly we can make sure that we are preserving our economy.
And here is the great opportunity. Everybody knows that we're going to have to do this. The country that gets there fastest, the country that's the first one to figure out really good battery technology for a plug-in hybrid car, the first country that perfects wind power and solar power and knows how to get it from one place to another in an efficient way, that country will dominate the economy of the 21st century the same way that America dominated the 20th century. I want that to be America. That's what we're fighting for. (Applause.)
All right, everybody, I had a good time. Thank you. (Applause.)