Things I Would Ask, Were I President. . .
By Do we, um, actually have any alien spacecraft?
Q: From president to president, do you pass along a list of secrets – you know like where’s Jimmy Hoffa? What really happened at Roswell? Without giving away any state secrets, is there something that we can all look forward to in the future to read about that you know that we don’t know that will make reading the National Enquirer required reading?
CLINTON: (Laughing and blushing) Well I don’t know if you all heard this, but, there was actually, when I was president in my second term, there was an anniversary observance of Roswell. Remember that? People came to Roswell, New Mexico from all over the world. And there was also a site in Nevada where people were convinced that the government had buried a UFO and perhaps an alien deep underground because we wouldn’t allow anybody to go there. And uhm… I can say now, ’cause it’s now been released into the public domain. I had so many people in my own administration that were convinced that Roswell was a fraud but this place in Nevada was really serious, that there was an alien artefact there. So I actually sent somebody there to figure it out. And it was actually just a secret defence installation, alas, doing boring work that we didn’t want anybody to else see.
The Roswell thing, I think, really was an illusion. I don’t think it happened. I mean I think there are rational explanations and I did attempt to find out if there were any secret government documents that revealed things. If there were, they were concealed from me too. And if there were, well I wouldn’t be the first American president that underlings have lied to, or that career bureaucrats have waited out. But there may be some career person sitting around somewhere, hiding these dark secrets, even from elected presidents. But if so, they successfully eluded me…and I’m almost embarrassed to tell you I did (chuckling) try to find out.
I wonder if George Bush even asked. My guess is, given his reported total lack of curiosity, that the answer is no.