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Clinton unveils upbeat agenda for final year in office

WASHINGTON: President Bill Clinton delivered his last annual State of the Union address like a campaign stump speech, promising an active final year in office and also trying to boost the chances of Al Gore to succeed him.

In a lengthy speech brimming over with bold new social initiatives to be derived from the ongoing US economic boom, Clinton on Thursday strayed far from the image of a lame duck president to his final year in office.

"Never before has our nation enjoyed, at once, so much prosperity and social progress with so little internal crisis or so few external threats," he told a joint session of Congress.

"Never before have we had such a blessed opportunity Ñ and therefore, such a profound obligation Ñ to build the more perfect unioin of our founders ... We are fortunate to be alive at this moment in history."

His administration had helped build, he implied, a softer, gentler society. There had been a 20-percent drop in crime to the lowest level in a quarter century, with reductions in teen pregnancy and in the numbers of welfare recipients, as well as the creation of new millions of new jobs, he noted.

In foreign policy, Clinton laid out his key goals: promoting stability and democracy in China and Russia, and preventing terrorists from acquiring high-tech weapons.

Russia, he said, was being held back from achieving its full potential by "the legacy of communism, economic turmoil, a cruel and self-defeating war in Chechnya".

China, he acknowledged, was being held back "by the illusion that it can buy stability at the expense of freedom," referring to Beijing's deteriorating human rights record.

Clinton also urged passage of the once-rejected Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and enhanced efforts to promote peace in troubled areas like the Middle East.

"We stand on the mountain top of a new millennium. Behind us we can look back and see the great expanse of the American achievement, before us we can see even grander frontiers of possibility," he proclaimed.

Proposing bold new social initiatives and highlighting the extraordinary economic growth that has accompanied his two terms in office thus far, Clinton was clearly keen to cement his legacy and remove the stain of the sex scandal that led to his becoming the first elected chief executive in US history to be impeached, although later acquitted.

He announced a proposal for a 350-billion-dollar tax cut to be spread over 10 years, as well as massive increased on education, health and child care programmes.

Clinton insists that the federal budget surplus, which may rise to $1.9 trillion over the next 10 years, should be applied to paying down the publicly-held national debt, obligations that, according to official estimates announced earlier this week, could be paid off by 2013, two years ahead of schedule.

In addition, Clinton, lauded his own wife Hillary, an all-but-certain candidate for the Senate from New York, twice. She was a tireless supporter of childrens' rights, he said, and he urged the television industry to adopt her proposal for a single rating system alerting parents to violence programmes.

Clinton called for legislators to pass sweeping gun control measures.ÑAFP