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-------- Clinton ----------
Thank you. Thank you. It's great to be back here at Penn and in Philadelphia. I remember giving the commencement address here some years ago and I always had that image of the beauty of this campus and, of course, its extraordinary reputation. And I'm delighted to have a chance to be here with you to talk about an issue that is critical not only to Pennsylvania but to our country.

I want to thank Congresswoman Schwartz, she and I will be together later this afternoon. I'm looking forward to that very much. Mayor Nutter, I have heard the governor say that you could be the second best mayor in Philadelphia history. I know you're aiming for first, so keep it up. You're doing a great job. And Governor Rendell who has been so visionary and strategic in his leadership first to Philadelphia, then of course to Pennsylvania. And what he just said about how he and his administration responded to the first signs of trouble from the mortgage market is just typical of Ed Rendell. He really is someone who is always looking to solve problems and that's why he's been so successful and why I'm so grateful for his support.

I want to take a moment to note yesterday's heartbreaking news that five years after the start of the war there have now been 4,000 U.S. military deaths in Iraq. Tens of thousands of our brave men and women have also suffered serious wounds, both visible and invisible, to their bodies, their minds, and their hearts. As president, I intend to honor their extraordinary service and the sacrifice of them and their families by ending this war and bringing them home as quickly and responsibly as possible.

As the headlines of the past months have made clear, we are experiencing a crisis of confidence in our country. We have a crisis of confidence in our leadership with respect to Iraq and we have a crisis of confidence in our economy. What started out as a subprime mortgage crisis has now become a national credit crisis, rippling out from banks and boardrooms to businesses and living rooms across America. We've had three straight months of private sector job losses. Consumer confidence is down and falling. The dollar has hit record lows and gas prices, record highs. And last week the Federal Reserve took unprecedented measures to rescue Wall Street, the likes of which we haven't seen since the Great Depression. These are not just red flags or warning signs - they are indisputable indicators that our economy is in serious trouble. And now we face an urgent question: how do we keep today's turmoil from spiraling into a long and painful recession? This is no easy task.

The 21st century American economy is more complex and more interconnect with the global economy than ever before. It is shaped each day by billions and billions of individual transactions and interactions on every continent. Subject to crises or even just speculation in one country can move markets in dozens of others with the blink of an eye or a flick of a mouse.

In today's economy, trouble that starts on Wall Street often ends up on Main Street. Sometimes within minutes, sometimes over the course of months or even years. When there's a run on mortgage-backed securities and the bottom falls out for investment banks, the bottom falls out for families who see the value of their homes, their greatest source of wealth, decline. When our credit markets freeze up, that doesn't just cause panic on our trading floors, but in small businesses that can't get the capital they need to survive. And on college campuses like this one, when the student loan for next semester falls through. When we continue to persist in brain dead energy policy as confidence in our currency erodes, that means gas prices so high you feel like it costs more to commute to work than you make when you get there. It means rising food prices that strain household budgets. It means having less left over for savings or ever dipping into savings to make ends meet. It means more challenges for the mayor because property tax revenues drop, businesses don't have the same ability to make that profit that benefits the city. It means more problems for the governor who has to look across a complex state economy trying to figure out how to keep what has been a remarkable string of real budget balances and surpluses. It causes problems for our country.

Ultimately the true currency of today's American economy is confidence. When people lose confidence in the economy and our president's ability to manage it, problems become crises and crises lead to more crises. So we need a president who can restore our confidence, a president who is ready to confront complex economic problems with comprehensive solutions, a president who will act at the first signs of trouble, working with experts to identify the problem, with agencies to adapt regulations, with congress to pass necessary legislation, working to prevent crises rather than just reacting too little too late. We need a president who is ready on day one to be Commander-in-Chief of our economy. If you give me the chance, I will be that president. I will start by facing our economic situation as it is, not as we wish it would be.

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