MCKEON POINTS OUT GOOD NEWS BEFORE ELECTION.

Byline: CHARLES F. BOSTWICK Staff Writer

LANCASTER -- U.S. Rep. Howard P. ``Buck'' McKeon says the stock market is at a record high, unemployment is low and the budget deficit is its lowest in four years, but Americans don't seem to be noticing.

``So why isn't everybody jubilant?'' McKeon asked Antelope Valley civic leaders rhetorically Tuesday. ``It seems like the war in Iraq has just cast a pall over everything.''

Speaking to Antelope Valley Board of Trade directors three weeks before he seeks re-election for his eighth term, McKeon said President George W. Bush warned Congress after the 9-11 terrorist attacks not to expect a quick victory.

``The president at the time said this is going to be long, it is going to be difficult ... we have to persevere,'' McKeon said. ``We don't like this kind of thing. Americans want to go in and get it done.''

Disagreeing with war critics who say America's presence in Iraq only helps its enemies recruit supporters, McKeon said, ``The only advantage we have, the president says, and I believe it, is it's better to fight them over there than to have to in New York or Florida or Los Angeles.''

A Santa Clarita Republican, McKeon faces Democrat Robert Rodriguez and Libertarian David Erickson in the Nov. 7 election for the congressional seat representing much of the Antelope Valley and Santa Clarita, as well as the Owens Valley, part of San Bernardino County and the Mammoth Lakes area.

In his breakfast talk Tuesday, McKeon told local civic leaders that the No Child Left Behind Act passed by Congress during Bush's first term has improved minority students' academic scores and that Congress this year approved $2.77 billion for securing American borders.

The border bill will pay for hiring 1,500 more Border Patrol agents and build 700 more miles of fencing. In a July visit to the border in the San Diego area, McKeon said Border Patrol officers showed him photos of people hiding inside a car seat, inside a dashboard and in an engine compartment to sneak across the border.

Drug gangs are now smuggling in people, he said.

McKeon also spoke in favor of a guest-worker program that would let immigrants work for a year or two in the United States.

``We don't have enough workers to fill all the jobs,'' he said. ``It's a necessary part of life but it has to be done in a legal way where we can have control of our borders and our interior.''

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