Over the last seven years, the world has grown more dangerous while our military has endured indiscriminate defense cuts. Almost 10,000 American troops are still in harm’s way in Afghanistan and another 3,600 have returned to Iraq. Meanwhile the threats to our nation from ISIS, Iran, Russia, China, and North Korea, among others, have continued to multiply.

But as the dangers to our nation have increased, our military has been cut by nearly a trillion dollars over a decade. Because our men and women in uniform have been asked to do more with less, the forces we have are not ready to fight. Just one-third of Army brigade combat teams and less than half of Air Force fighter squadrons are fully combat ready, and the Navy has only one-third of the carrier strike groups and amphibious ready groups that it needs to respond to a crisis within 30 days.

We cannot survive the global perils of the 21st century with a military built for the 20th. Yet under President Obama, that is exactly what bad policymaking and a badly strained defense budget are forcing us to attempt. If we are to protect our national security, we simply cannot afford another four years like the last seven.

As Commander-in-Chief, I will restore American strength and give our armed forces the training and equipment they need to meet the threats they will face and, should efforts to deter conflict fail, make sure that our men and women in uniform go into battle with every advantage possible.

Restoring American strength begins with a defense budget for a modern national defense. I will heed the recommendation of the bipartisan National Defense Panel and return as soon as possible to the forward-thinking, strategy-driven, fiscally sustainable budget baseline proposed by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in 2011 before the senseless budget cuts that are now crippling our military.

These additional defense dollars will be prioritized to address critical readiness shortfalls, fix training and maintenance backlogs, and ensure that our troops are ready to deploy rapidly. Then I will set out to modernize our forces.

I will strengthen our ground forces by restoring the Marine Corps to an active-duty end-strength of 182,000 and the Army to 490,000. This will reverse cuts that are taking the Army toward pre-World War II levels and allow us to take common-sense measures like stationing more troops in Europe to deter Russian aggression.

I will recapitalize our Navy and increase the size of our fleet to a minimum of 323 ships by 2024, reversing cuts that have slashed our fleet to its smallest size since World War I. Because a major part of this effort must be to ensure a large and modern U.S. submarine fleet, I will order at least two Virginia-class submarines to be built each year.

South Carolina has an important role to play in this process. The Navy’s Nuclear Power School, located just outside of Charleston, helps train the next generation of officers and enlisted sailors to operate many of the vanguard ships in our fleet. In all, defense spending accounted for more than $6 billion in economic activity in South Carolina in 2014. That’s $1,262 per resident. A strong defense industrial base is essential to both our national security and our local economies, and that is why I will oppose another round of base realignment and closure, or BRAC, which threatens vital military installations in South Carolina and across the country.

Finally, I will modernize our Air Force by accelerating fighter procurement and fully supporting the development of a next-generation bomber. This effort will recapitalize an Air Force that has the smallest and oldest combat force in its history. I will also ensure that America preserves its robust aerial refueling capabilities with the procurement of the KC-46A tanker aircraft, and stop the Obama administration’s reckless proposed cuts to nuclear weapons.

I am running for president to make the 21st Century another American Century. That will require restoring American military strength — the underpinning of our security and prosperity.

South Carolina long has made a vital contribution to our defense and when I am president it will continue to help ensure that Americans are safe and free.

Our world is changing faster than ever before, and the skills necessary to get ahead are changing with it. Now more than ever, a quality education is a key to achieving the American Dream, but today America’s education system is failing our students.

We are at great risk of allowing our society to be one where the American Dream may be unachievable for too many young people — our children could end up the first generation in American history worse off than the generation that came before it.

For millions of parents and students across the country, the public education system is nothing short of a disaster. After World War II, the United States had the best education system in the world; today, we trail most of Europe and parts of Asia. We have alarmingly high dropout rates, and those students who do graduate aren’t equipped with the skills they need to succeed in either post-secondary education or the workforce. They’re products of an education system in which two-thirds of our kids can’t read at grade level.

Our future as a nation depends on an education system that provides a path upward for those who are not born wealthy or powerful.

We don’t have that today.

So how do we fix our broken system?

The most important step is to empower those most responsible for a child’s success: parents.

Parents should be the ultimate decision makers about their children’s education. But too many Americans — especially minority and working-class parents — are stuck sending their kids to failing, mismanaged schools. They have no say in their children’s education. They’re trapped, and that’s wrong.

This week is National School Choice Week, an annual chance to talk about one of the best ways to fix our broken system: redoubling efforts to increase parental choice and make more education options available to kids everywhere.

I’ve fought for choice throughout my time in state and federal government. In 2013, I introduced a new pathway to school choice nationwide, through the Educational Opportunities Act. Modeled after a successful program I supported in the Florida House, this proposal offers tax credits for donations that fund scholarships to low-income students. By redirecting taxpayer dollars away from the federal government and to scholarship organizations, this plan would expand school choice for those in need, give parents greater control over their children’s education, and promote innovation outside the public school system.

I have also worked to help states provide greater choice for military families and families with children who have disabilities. These students face unique challenges, and would be among the biggest beneficiaries of more choice. The federal government should not stand in the way of states trying to offer them new options.

Alongside choice, there’s another key principle for letting American schools flourish: local control. In government generally, but especially when it comes to education, the best decisions are made close to the people affected by them.

This means ending any and all federal efforts to impose Common Core on all 50 states and getting the federal government out of K-12 decision making. It means reinstating the popular DC Opportunity Scholarship Program, which has been jeopardized by President Obama’s partisan agenda. And it means supporting charter schools in an effort to better educate our children for the 21st century.

With four children of my own, I am deeply grateful that my wife and I can choose to give them the quality Christian education we want for them. I know that not every parent is lucky enough to do that. But as president, I’ll continue the fight to get them that choice, and ensure that no child is forced into a failing school.

School choice is a good deal in terms of dollars and cents: It’ll equip our kids with the skills they’ll need to do the jobs of tomorrow. But it’s about a lot more than that.

The hopes that parents have for children go well beyond the jobs their kids will someday hold. We care even more about what values our children learn, what kind of a society they’ll grow up in, and whether they will get the chance to live their dreams.

Right now, our education system is standing in the way of the American Dream for too many children. As President, I’d turn that around — school choice will be one of the most important ways we expand the American Dream to more Americans than ever before.

Thank you. I’m glad to be back here today.

Each time I return to this gathering, the urgency of the topic at hand has increased since the year before. That’s true this year more than ever. The threats facing both our country and Israel have grown dramatically in recent months, in large part because our president has placed his own legacy ahead of our mutual security.

But of course, when we gather here a year from now, we’ll have a new president-elect. And depending on who it is, we’ll have either taken a significant step toward reviving American leadership in the world and advancing Israel’s security, or we will have slid even further toward weakness and disengagement.

I think one thing that’s become obvious over this last year is the devastating cost of a foreign policy that lacks moral clarity.

Moral clarity means that we stand by our principles and our commitments. It means we speak up for what’s right, and speak out against those who are wrong — even if that opens us to criticism. It means our allies trust us, and our adversaries respect us.

It is common sense that American leadership should look like this. Presidents across both parties have led with moral clarity, from Truman to Kennedy to Reagan… until now. Now we have a president who leaves our allies feeling betrayed and our adversaries feeling emboldened. And there is no better example than what is happening in the Middle East.

In the entire region, there is only one pro-American free enterprise democratic nation: the Jewish state of Israel. America has strong ties to Israel on a personal, cultural, political, and economic level. It is everything we want the Middle East to look like in the future: free, tolerant, democratic, peace-loving, and desirous of a better future.

And today, Israel stands on the front lines of our civilizational struggle against radical, apocalyptic Islam. That term, Apocalyptic Islam, is not an attempt at being provocative; it is rather a description of the true beliefs of the leaders of both Iran and the Islamic State: that they are living in the end times and that mass genocide is their way to honor God.

This enemy hates our two nations — both liberal democracies, both products of the Judeo-Christian tradition — for the exact same reasons. And the first requirement of fighting for our common security is standing together. We must not separate the threat to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv from the threat to Paris, or London, or New York, or Miami.

I can think of no nation whose security is as closely tied to our own. For anytime there is daylight between America and Israel, it emboldens Israel’s enemies to take action — first against the Jewish state, but then against the rest of the free world. Last month, we saw how quickly terror can spread from the Middle East into the heart of Europe.

Many in Washington fail to understand this. They wonder why we should trouble ourselves with a small country thousands of miles away. They fail to see its connection to our national security and our moral character. They fail to understand the danger of sending a message to the world that America is an unreliable ally. And so they argue we should distance ourselves from Israel — abandon it to its multitude of eager enemies.

I believe that, deep down, those who wish for this know what it would mean. It would mean we leave Israel’s citizens to face alone the terror of rockets falling on their homes; the existential threat of the Iranian nuclear weapons program, which President Obama has exacerbated; the death march of the Iranian proxy, Hezbollah, on Israel’s northern border; and Iranian-backed jihadists who indiscriminately kill Israelis on the streets of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv — and yes, in Judea and Samaria.

Those in Washington who wish America would abandon Israel also understand something else: the threat of physical violence is not the only threat Israel would be left to face alone; there is also a growing political and diplomatic threat.

In one international forum after another, Israel is attacked by despotic regimes and even free nations throughout Europe that should know better given their histories. It is singled out for condemnation relentlessly — a bullying to which no other nation is subjected.

Normally, the United States stops these attacks and shames the attackers. Normally, the United States speaks with confidence and clarity against the regimes that hijack international bodies to distract the world from their own wrongdoing.

Normally. But not under Barack Obama.

President Obama — and, I’m afraid, Hillary Clinton — have a different policy. They call it “engagement,” but what it should really be called is “abandonment.” Instead of standing up to those who single out Israel, the Obama administration takes the path of least resistance. It throws up its hands and says, in essence, “not our problem.”

Consider this: Just weeks ago, Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas began a speech to a UN body by asking, quote, “For how long will this protracted Israeli occupation of our land last? After 67 years, how long?”

As we all know, sixty-seven years ago was 1948, the year of Israel’s creation. So the man who is supposed to be Israel’s “partner for peace” has just said that all of Israel is illegitimate and that the Jewish state is an “occupation” of someone else’s land.

Now, this isn’t unusual rhetoric from a Palestinian leader — but what matters is that it should have provoked a harsh condemnation from the United States. But our president said nothing. By his silence, our government emboldened those who seek Israel’s destruction and made itself a bystander to a poisonous lie.

Similarly, over the past three months of Palestinian terror attacks, our administration refused over and over again to do anything more than call on both sides for restraint — as if there were no difference between aggression and self-defense. The Palestinian attacks are being incited by lies knowingly promoted about Jewish threats to the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, and spread through a vicious campaign of anti-Semitism in Palestinian media.

Or consider the European Union’s recent approval of a new trade rule that requires special labeling of products produced in what the EU considers “Israeli-occupied territories.” The goal of this is to encourage Europeans to boycott goods from Israel. The rule applies to no other country — not to Russia, which invaded Georgia and Ukraine, nor China, which occupies Tibet. The EU is singling out only Israel.

Let’s take a step back and realize what this means. Discriminatory laws that apply only to Jews are now being written into European law for the first time in more than half a century.

I believe we need a president who is not afraid to call this out for what it is: anti-Semitism. I will be that president.

I will take a very different approach to the United Nations. There will be no more complicity in attacks on Israel. Dictators, rogues, and terror sponsors will be publicly shamed. The United States will leave and defund UN entities that attack Israel or promote anti-Semitism.

I will also speak out against anti-Semitism here in America.

One important example is the movement that calls itself “BDS” — for boycott, divest, and sanction. This coalition of the radical left thinks it has discovered a clever, politically correct way to advocate Israel’s destruction. BDS couches hatred in the language of human rights and social justice.

But the movement reeks of hypocrisy. Boycotters do not seek to punish Cuba, North Korea, Iran, Syria, or Russia — all actual human rights violators. Their campaign is aimed only at Israel. They make wild, false accusations in the hopes of inciting so much hatred of the Jewish state, especially on our campuses, that eventually support for Israel will become politically taboo.

As president, I will call on university presidents, administrators, religious leaders, and professors to speak out with clarity and force on this issue — the same way they speak out against racism and other forms of bigotry. I will make clear that calling for the destruction of Israel is the same as calling for the death of Jews.

I will bring moral clarity to the White House, but I will also back it with strategic and military strength. When I am Commander-in-Chief, I will fortify our alliance with Israel. In doing so, I will send a message to our friends and enemies alike that America is back — that we will never again confuse adversaries for allies or allies for adversaries.

Let me be loud and clear about how I will begin: I will immediately shred this president’s disastrous deal with Iran. News reports out of Vienna this week indicate that Iran will not even be required to come clean about its past nuclear weapons work. This makes a bad deal worse. And those who are now rushing to do business with Iran need to know that upon taking office, I will re-impose the sanctions that President Obama plans to waive over congressional objection.

The days of giving the ayatollah of Iran more respect than the prime minister of Israel will be over. I will hold Iran accountable for the American hostages it has taken, and for its arming and funding of terrorist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas. I will impose crippling sanctions against the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.

When I am president, I will speak out against Palestinian terror in no uncertain terms, and will never confuse the victim and the victimizer. This means, as part of rebuilding our alliance with Israel, I will put the peace process in perspective. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have made it the defining feature of the relationship between our two countries. It should not be for the simple reason that Israel currently has no viable partner for peace.

In fact, the “partner” that this administration claims is interested in peace rewards Palestinian terrorists up to $3,500 for every month they spend in an Israeli prison, which is more than five times as much as the average Palestinian in the West Bank makes per month. They get tens of thousands more upon their release from prison, and the entire level of payment is tied to the number of Israelis they have killed. Does this sound like a group interested in peace?

Some in our own party actually question Israel’s commitment to peace. Some in our own party actually call for more sacrifice from the Israeli people. They are dead wrong, and don’t understand the enduring bond between Israel and America.

Generation after generation of Israelis have struggled and sacrificed to find peace with an enemy seeking only war and death. I know and honor those sacrifices, and reject those who believe that Israel is the impediment to peace.

Let me be crystal clear: there is no moral equivalence between Israel and its enemies.

I will say it again. There is no moral equivalence between Israel and those who seek to destroy her

Understanding that fundamental truth is essential to being the next Commander in Chief. This is not a real estate deal with two sides arguing over money. It’s a struggle to safeguard the future of Israel.

As President I will challenge the real impediments to peace in the Middle East, and stand up for Israel.

Instead of pressuring Israel to make unreciprocated concessions, I will work with its prime minister on areas of mutual interest. I will finally move our embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. I will help ensure that Jerusalem remains the Jewish state’s undivided and eternal capital. I will revive the common-sense understandings reached in the 2004 Bush-Sharon letter and build on them to help ensure Israel has defensible borders, including through its continued control of the Golan Heights.

This is only the beginning of what I will do as president in support of Israel, but it is far from the beginning of my efforts on this issue as a public servant. Throughout my time in the Senate, I have worked to strengthen and deepen our alliance.

I’ve passed new sanctions against Hezbollah, passed a budget amendment to move our embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and fought to require Iran to recognize Israel’s right to exist. I’ve proposed crushing sanctions on Iran for its ongoing support for terrorism and human rights abuses.

As Speaker of the Florida House, I pioneered what became a national effort by requiring the Florida pension program to divest from companies linked to Iran’s terrorist regime. And earlier this week, I introduced a resolution with Senator Kirk to ensure that states like Florida can continue to divest from Iran.

I’ve also led efforts in the Senate to pressure the Palestinian Authority to end its partnership with Hamas, attempted to defund UN agencies that attack Israel, and supported legislation to force Europe to stop its despicable anti-Semitic boycotting of Israeli products. I have been a staunch supporter of our military assistance to the Jewish state, especially the Iron Dome system that has saved countless lives. These programs have ended up benefitting America by leading to technological innovations now used by the U.S. military.

In choosing a president, we need to look at what candidates do, not just what they say. Just a few short years ago, many in my own party were trying to derail the postwar consensus about America’s role in the world. They will never call themselves isolationists, but that is exactly what they are.

I believe those who speak about their pro-Israel views but carelessly support a gutting of our international affairs budget, including assistance to Israel, or who vote against legislation funding U.S.-Israel defense programs, need to check their priorities. You cannot be pro-Israel while also attempting to eliminate assistance that Israel uses to defend itself.

I’d like to leave time to take your questions, so let me just close with this point.

One thing that inspires me the most about Israel is that, in the face of so much adversity, no nation wants peace more. No nation has shown greater restraint toward its enemies.

And even as the current administration has turned its back on them in recent years, no people have stood by our nation, on issue after issue, more than the people of Israel.

I’d encourage all of you to go back and look at the United Nations roll call votes. Time and again, when the interests of America are challenged, Israel is one of the few countries that votes with the United States.

Like our own country, the state of Israel is an extraordinary story in the history of the world. I believe our nations share a moral foundation and a moral destiny. And so let us stand with them as they have stood with us. Let our nations, together, serve as beacons of light in an ever-darkening world.

Aside from its violation of Turkish airspace, the downed Russian plane was apparently targeting Turkmen-populated pockets of northern Syria rather than territory controlled by ISIS. Most Russian military strikes since the end of September have been non-ISIS targets, including many civilian areas, revealing that Russia does not share our interest in confronting and defeating ISIS but instead is intent on propping up the Assad regime.

It is farcical to think, even after the terrorist attacks in Paris on November 13, that the United States and Russia can work together in resolving the crisis in Syria. We simply do not share common interests, let alone values, with Russia. President Vladimir Putin, a veteran of the KGB, leads one of the most corrupt, kleptocratic, and authoritarian regimes in the world.

Transparency International ranks Russia very low in its corruption perceptions index (136 out of 175 countries). A recent Reuters report revealed how Putin’s daughter and her husband have holdings worth some $2 billion. And Putin himself is estimated to be worth tens of billions of dollars.

Corruption is Putin’s greatest export, but it is not the only problem we face from his rule. Putin resorts to any measures necessary to stay in power, and critics and opponents wind up harassed, imprisoned, and even murdered.

The human rights situation in Russia under Putin is the worst it has been since the collapse of the USSR. And given the dreadful way he treats his own people, it should surprise no one that Putin supports like-minded authoritarians, including Syria’s Bashar al-Assad. He invades his neighbors to prevent their deeper integration with the West. He fabricates the myth that the West and NATO enlargement are threats to Russia, when the reality is that Russia’s most secure and stable borders are with countries that belong to NATO.

Putin has described the Turkish downing of the Russian military plane as a “stab in the back.” But Putin has been attacking Western countries for years by, for example, use of energy cutoffs and trade embargoes against neighboring states; the cyber attack against Estonia in 2007; the invasion of Georgia in 2008; the invasion and ongoing aggression against Ukraine and the illegal annexation of Crimea (the first such annexation since World War II); military and diplomatic support for the murderous Assad regime in Syria; planned delivery of advanced missile defense systems to Iran; and dangerous flyovers by Russian military aircraft of NATO member states’ territory.

Putin exploits weakness in his Western counterparts, and he has seen plenty of that from President Obama and Secretary Clinton over the past seven years. He only understands strength and will back down if presented with a challenge. Some of my fellow Republicans naively think they can sit down and develop a good relationship with Putin. They think they know how to strike deals with him — that’s what Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton thought, too, and we all know what a disaster their “reset” policy has been for Europe’s security and America’s standing in the world.

This latest incident with Turkey should also renew conversations within the alliance about whether NATO as an institution should be involved in the response to the terrorist attacks on Paris and the broader fight against ISIS. The civil war in Syria has threatened the security of Turkey for years and now the fallout from this conflict has spilled over to threaten all NATO allies on both sides of the Atlantic. Bringing NATO into the fight in concert with regional Arab partners and local forces on the ground would bring some much needed firepower and coordination to a war that we are not currently winning.

Steps to avoid a repeat of what happened last Tuesday are worth pursuing to avoid a further escalation in tensions, but if another Russian military plane violates Turkish airspace, it too should be warned first and shot down if it ignores those warnings.

Eventually, Putin will get the message. He needs to understand that there are serious costs for invading neighbors, propping up a murderous dictator like Assad, and violating the airspace of and threatening other countries.

To be sure, Turkey presents its own challenges to our interests in the Middle East. For several years, it did little to counter the festering extremism on its borders, giving ISIS freedom to maneuver and import recruits. After agreeing to join the fight against the terror group this past summer, Turkey has targeted it sparingly, directing most of its efforts towards the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) and other Kurdish groups. Meanwhile, at home, President Erdogan has clamped down on the press and harmed freedom of expression.

These issues are important, and the United States must raise them. But unlike with Russia, the United States can do so within the context of our NATO alliance. Maintaining the integrity of that alliance is crucial — not just for the security of the Middle East, but also for the security of Europe. Were we to opt out of defending Turkey, Putin may conclude that he can bully our other NATO partners as well.

I believe strongly in speaking truth to power. We should not sugarcoat one of the most corrupt, abusive, and aggressive leaders in the world today. We need to show greater solidarity with our allies and friends around the globe and demonstrate a willingness to stand up for our principles. The days when Putin called the shots should have been over long ago. They certainly will end if I become president.

Hardly a day goes by without new incidents that underscore Iranian hostility to the United States, all with little to no response from the White House. Since the Iran deal was concluded, Iran has detained more Americans. In recent weeks, Iran launched cyber attacks against senior American officials and last month it conducted a ballistic missile test in flagrant violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1929. Iran has doubled down its effort to prop up Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, sending additional troops to aid a Russian-backed offensive against moderate opposition forces. Meanwhile, the mullah’s threats against Israel continue on a regular basis. At every turn, the Obama administration has ignored or downplayed Iran’s provocations.

Allies and enemies alike are watching, and what they have learned from the administration’s attacks on Israel and its indulgence of Iran is that antagonism toward America goes unpunished while friendship goes unrewarded. The visit of the prime minister of Israel, our greatest ally in the Middle East, offers the President an opportunity to begin to counter these perceptions.

But I have no illusions. Barack Obama is not interested in countering the prevailing perception of America and will likely use the meeting to address narrow, bilateral issues, such as weapons sales, rather than to address the real problem: America’s lack of credibility in the world.

As President, I will restore respect for America in the world. Just as the Obama administration’s intentional degrading of our alliance with Israel signaled to friends around the world that the United States was not a reliable ally, reviving our alliance with Israel is central to reassuring our friends that the America they relied on for the last seventy years has returned. I will make restoring the U.S.-Israel relationship a top priority.

My administration’s foreign policy will be conducted with the understanding that defending Israel, like defending other democratic allies, is a form of American self-defense — an idea with which the Obama administration obviously disagrees. When the administration falsely suggested, for example, that Israel was using excessive force in response to a wave of terror attacks, it undermined the legitimacy of America’s fight against terror. After all, our forces follow almost identical rules of engagement and are routinely subjected to the same false claims of targeting civilians and wielding disproportionate force.

Instead of criticizing Israel’s fight against terror, my administration will support it — morally and diplomatically. I will not force Israel to make compromises for peace when there is no viable partner on the other side of the table. The consequences are too great for the United States to force Israeli leaders to make deals with Palestinian officials who are only interested in inciting violence instead of actually achieving progress for their people.

To Israel’s north, Iran has armed the terrorist group Hezbollah with over 100,000 rockets and missiles capable of striking targets throughout Israel. We will partner with Israel in cracking down on arms smuggling to Hezbollah and intensify our joint R&D on the next generation of missile defense, drawing on the successes to date of Arrow, Iron Dome, and David’s Sling systems — technology that can be used to defend the United States and other allies as well.

However, I will not follow the Obama precedent and pretend that enhancing Israel’s military hardware is the sole sign of true commitment to its security. Maintaining Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge is indeed vitally important, but Jerusalem doesn’t need better planes so much as it needs better American strategy. I will therefore never suggest, as some Democrats are suggesting today, that the nuclear deal can somehow be reconciled with a policy that truly meets the full challenge that Iran represents. The nuclear agreement strengthens Tehran economically, diplomatically, and militarily. It is ludicrous to argue that we can strengthen Iran with our right hand and yet contain it with our left.

Terminating the Iran deal, therefore, will be a top priority of my administration. The United States and its allies will not be safe until Iran dismantles its nuclear program and allows intrusive inspections — the “anytime, anywhere” inspections the Obama administration repeatedly promised before caving to Tehran. And, finally, Iran must cease threatening its neighbors and promoting terrorism. Unlike the current administration, my administration will not treat Iran as a legitimate state while it acts like a terror state.

The task of dismantling the Iranian nuclear program will not be easy, but doing so is a prerequisite for bringing stability to the Middle East. President Obama’s failure to back Israel has undermined American credibility, American defense, and American interests. As the Israeli prime minister arrives in Washington, let us all pause and remember a time, not long ago, when American presidents needed no tutorials to understand that the United States can only achieve the peace and security we seek by standing with our friends and standing up to our enemies.

You can see the development of cutting edge systems designed to outfit Tomahawk missiles in the air, special purpose vehicles on land, destroyers on the sea, and even Virginia-class submarines hundreds of feet below it. You can see robots that sweep for mines and dispose of bombs, and innovations that make our servicemen and women safer, more precise, and more advanced than any enemy they currently face.

The innovative nature of our private economy is one of many national security advantages that are built into who we are as a nation. The problem is that our many advantages are being compromised today by a major weakness, and that is an outdated political establishment in Washington, D.C.

We have leaders at the highest levels of our government who believe the world would be better off with a weaker, less engaged America; who make national security decisions based on politics rather than strategy; and who fail to recognize that in today’s global economy, foreign policy and domestic policy are inseparable.

These outdated leaders come from both parties and both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. Their policies have undermined American strength — discouraging our allies, emboldening our enemies, and endangering our people.

Under President Obama, defense spending has been cut by nearly a trillion dollars over a decade. Our Navy is now smaller than at any time since World War I, our Army is headed for pre-World War II levels, and our Air Force has the smallest and oldest combat force in its history.

And the forces we have are not ready to fight. Just one-third of Army brigade combat teams and less than half of Air Force fighter squadrons are fully combat ready, and the Navy has only one-third of the carrier strike groups and amphibious ready groups that it needs to respond to a crisis within 30 days.

America’s adversaries around the world have taken note of this. They are sprinting up behind us, investing heavily in their own forces to close the gap in military strength. China has increased its defense spending by another 10% this year, and Russia by more than 20-fold since this century began.

They and many other nations recognize what so many in Washington do not: that the future of warfare will not take place merely on land, sea, and in the air, but also in cyberspace, outer space, undersea, and overhead in the form of powerful new missiles.

We cannot survive the global perils of the 21st century with a military built for the 20th. Yet that is exactly what bad policymaking and a badly strained defense budget are forcing us to attempt.

The last seven years should be all the evidence we need that it isn’t working. The world has become more dangerous while America has become less prepared. The threats to our security have widened while our president’s vision has narrowed.

Russia has invaded its neighbors, threatened the power balance of post-Cold War Europe, and is now projecting power into Syria to defend a murderous dictator and undermine the United States.

China has sought to intimidate its neighbors and dominate the South China Sea, one of the most vital shipping lanes on earth. It has stolen intellectual property from our companies and conducted the largest cyber attack ever against our government.

North Korea is developing nuclear-tipped missiles that can hit the United States, and has lashed out with a massive cyberattack.

ISIS has created a medieval terrorist state and inspired imitators from North Africa to South Asia.

Iran has advanced its goals of acquiring nuclear weapons and dominating the entire Middle East.

And that is only a partial list.

As president, Hillary Clinton would write the sequel to President Obama’s disastrous foreign policy, sticking to the same theme of weakness and the same plot of retreat. I am running for president because America faces new threats in this century, and new leadership will be required to face them. I have the record of judgment, the breadth of experience, and the quality of leadership necessary to restore our strength and security.

As Commander-in-Chief, I will understand that defense policy is foreign policy. By maintaining the strength to defeat aggression, we deter aggression — and that gives time and space for the tools of soft power to work.

Today I’d like to share a few of my ideas on how to bring our national defense into the 21st century. This isn’t the first time I’ve spoken in detail on this subject, nor will I have time in one speech to present my entire plan, so I’d encourage you to check out my full plan for Restoring American Strength at MarcoRubio.com.

I’d like to focus my remarks today on the importance of modernizing our forces to restore readiness and innovating to meet future threats. These goals will both require reversing the devastating defense cuts that have occurred on President Obama’s watch, particularly those resulting from sequestration.

As Commander-in-Chief, I will heed the recommendation of the bipartisan National Defense Panel and return as soon as possible to the forward-thinking, strategy-driven, and fiscally sustainable budget baseline proposed by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in 2012 before sequestration took effect.

A budget of this size is essential if we want a modern national defense. Look simply at the cost of modernizing our nuclear deterrent — an undertaking of increasing importance as more nations obtain nuclear weapons. This alone will cost up to $18 billion a year over the next decade. The current administration hasn’t made this a priority. As Commander-in-Chief, I will.

I will prioritize additional defense dollars to address critical readiness shortfalls, fix training and maintenance backlogs, and ensure our troops are ready to deploy rapidly.

Then I will set about modernizing our forces on land, sea, and in the air. This is the first goal of restoring American Strength, for we cannot worry about innovating for the future if we do not first survive the present. The threats we face in these traditional theaters of war are growing and changing, and our forces must grow and change to meet them.

We cannot pick and choose which threats we will meet. The United States must be a “full spectrum” superpower, capable of maintaining security simultaneously in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. A threat in any one of these regions could endanger our security, yet we have not previously sized our forces for all the contingencies they may face.

As President, I will ensure we have the number of personnel we need to meet these challenges. And I will ensure our personnel have the tools they need to succeed.

As President, I will never send our troops into a fair fight; I will always equip them with the upper hand and the technological edge. But today, unfortunately, they are forced to use weapons systems developed during the 1970s and ’80s, from Ticonderoga-class cruisers to Abrams tanks to B-2 Stealth bombers. Others are even older, such as the B-52, which has been flying since 1955.

If I become president, the days when a father, son and grandson all fly the same plane will be over.

To continue owning the skies against advanced fighters and missiles, we need to invest in technologies that allow us to see the enemy first, and we need laser or electromagnetic weapons to shoot down enemy missiles and aircraft.

To maintain our superiority beneath the seas, I will ensure funding for the Ohio-class replacement program. It is vital to maintaining a robust nuclear triad and to America’s undersea deterrent capabilities. It’s not fully funded now in our defense plans, but it will be if I become president.

Modernization of our undersea capabilities will directly impact the work done here in this facility. As president, I will order at least two Virginia-class submarines to be built each year, and many of the components of these will be forged and formed right behind me — by the men and women in front of me.

They will also be maintained at Portsmouth naval shipyard here in New Hampshire. Those advocating for the closing of this facility have failed to grasp the importance of our defense industrial base to our national security. That is why I join your Senator, Kelly Ayotte, who has been a great leader on these issues in Washington, in opposing a new BRAC round.

The final point I’d like to make about modernization is a vitally important one — not just to our security, but to our character as a nation. The duty to equip our military personnel for success does not end with the battle, but continues here at home. This is why I have led the fight in the Senate to create an accountable Department of Veterans Affairs, and it’s why I will continue that fight in the White House.

Modernization is crucial to restoring security today. But even as we modernize our forces on land, sea, and in the air, we must never assume future wars will be fought in the same way as wars of the past. That is why modernization must go hand in hand with innovation.

I’m sure many in Washington will roll their eyes when they hear me talk about realms such as cyber space and outer space as the new battlefields of our age. Many still see these as the stuff of science fiction. And this assumption — dangerous as it is — is nothing new. The nature of warfare is always changing, and leaders of the past are almost always blind to the changes.

When Billy Mitchell — considered by many to be the father of the U.S. Air Force — warned in 1921 that airplanes would one day be capable of sinking battleships, he was mocked all across Washington. The Secretary of the Navy responded by saying, quote, “Good God! This man should be writing dime novels.”

The attack on Pearl Harbor put those doubts to rest.

As quickly as the airplane evolved as a tool of warfare, evolutions in cyber space, outer space, and missile capabilities are happening far faster.

In cyber space alone, we’ve seen the headlines. Rogue nations and terrorist groups have been testing the fences of American cyber security with attacks on both government and private companies. A large enough cyber attack could paralyze our critical infrastructure and economy, yet somehow we still remain unprepared to face the threat.

As President, I will ensure we harden our military and civilian computer networks, and examine the sourcing of our weapons components so they are not vulnerable to attack. I will invest in offensive cyber capabilities and ensure our commanders have the tools and authorities to respond to an attack. My administration will outline a declaratory policy so our adversaries understand the consequences of attacking our cyber systems.

We must also be aware of the increasing strategic and economic importance of outer space.

Americans rely on satellites for everything from checking the weather, to GPS navigation, to communicating on our smart phones. Our military also relies heavily on space for the full range of its missions, from intelligence, to reconnaissance, to targeting.

Because of our dependence on space, adversaries are actively developing capabilities that could put U.S. assets at risk. For example, China has conducted multiple anti-satellite tests. As President, I will invest in technologies to protect our space capabilities.

We must also invest in missile defense. The 21st century differs fundamentally from the Cold War era, yet the Obama administration has not moved beyond the missile defense policies of the past.

Hostile regimes such as North Korea see missiles and nuclear weapons as means of blackmailing the United States. We should be working to take away any adversary’s ability to coerce us with these threats. But the Obama administration has instead slashed spending on missile defense by 30% since 2009 and canceled plans to deploy vital missile defense programs in a failed effort to appease Russia’s leaders.

As President, I will end policy limitations on the development and deployment of missile defense. I will fully fund missile defense programs to ensure we take maximum advantage of modern technologies and stay ahead of this growing threat.

Finally, as all of you in this room know, true advances in innovation will only be possible if we sustain a dynamic and healthy defense industrial base. We must open new pathways between the private sector and the Pentagon so our warfighters can gain access to the latest innovations.

For example, advances in 3D printing could revolutionize the way we manufacture parts. It could allow fast, on-demand production in times of need at much more affordable prices.

Our economy is constantly producing innovations such as this that, if creatively applied to our defense needs, could greatly benefit our national security. But taking advantage of them will require cutting layers of unnecessary bureaucracy at the Pentagon and making our acquisitions process more nimble and adaptive.

The innovative nature of our people is on display in this facility every day, and it gives me great optimism about the future of American Strength.

I’d like to close by noting that we are almost exactly one year away from choosing the next president of the United States. I believe the year ahead will be characterized, in no small part, by a national debate on the very subject we’re discussing today.

If ever an issue should rise above the pettiness of political gamesmanship, the importance of a strong and modern national defense should be it. But I know that’s wishful thinking. Many of our outdated leaders will continue to posture on this issue and mischaracterize my support for American Strength.

They’ll continue promoting what I believe to be the most dangerous misconception of our time — the very misconception our current president has clung to, and that has driven the discord we see around the world today. And that is the idea that a strong military is somehow a path to war.

The exact opposite is true. A robust national defense has always been about preventing war rather than promoting it. And presidents from both parties — from Kennedy to Reagan — have understood that fact. They have understood that the world is at its safest when America is at its strongest.

President Truman grasped as well as anyone the relationship between strength and peace. It was he who advocated for the creation of the Department of Defense.

In doing so, he stated, “[A] desire for peace is futile unless there is also enough strength ready and willing to enforce that desire in any emergency. Among the things that have encouraged aggression and the spread of war in the past have been the unwillingness of the United States realistically to face this fact.”

Here we stand seventy years later, and so many of our leaders are once again unwilling to face this fact — and that unwillingness is once again encouraging aggression and the spread of war throughout the world.

I am running for president because if we do not return to the bipartisan tradition of American Strength — and return to it soon — the tide of danger and discord that has swept the world in recent years will grow stronger, and that tide will eventually drag down our economy, wash away our influence, and bring danger to our shores that we will be unprepared to meet.

I am ready to argue this case to America and the world in the years ahead. I will not tire in my efforts, and I will not flag in my optimism for the future. Our nation has great reservoirs of strength we have not yet begun to tap: a dynamic and resilient people, a creative economy our adversaries cannot hope to match, and friends and partners all over the world who are waiting for us to recover our confidence.

With these strengths we cannot be discouraged, for with these strengths, we cannot fail.

So I ask you to join me today.

With strength as our organizing principle, and peace our ultimate goal, let us recommit to the task of leadership and the cause of freedom — and let us establish, together, a New American Century.

Thank you.

Read more details of Marco’s plan to restore American Strength here.

Indeed, speaking at Harvard on Tuesday, Secretary of State Kerry imputed responsibility to the Israelis. “There’s been a massive increase in settlements over the course of the last years,” he said. “Now you have this violence because there’s a frustration that is growing.” This is false. There has been no massive increase in settlements, and his statement ignores the campaign of incitement based on the lie that the Israelis are seeking to displace the Muslims from the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

By lying about the true causes of the violence and falsely blaming the Israelis, Kerry brings dishonor on the United States. By providing a Palestinian leadership with cover for its support for terrorism, he rewards incitement.

For her part, Hillary Clinton is no better. She refuses to even say the words “Palestinian terrorism.” Her statement on Monday fails to identify those guilty of stabbing women and children. It avoids criticizing those who for weeks have exhorted Palestinians to murder and wound Israeli civilians — namely, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, his Fatah Party, and Hamas. It does not even endorse Israel’s right to defend itself.

The United States, however, must defend Israel’s right to fight terrorism as if its own rights depended on it. Indeed, they do. History shows that the excuses for terror that are hurled at Israel today will be hurled at us tomorrow. Speaking the truth about Israel under siege is our first line of defense.

We will see outdated politicians who believe new economic innovations should be stifled by more regulation. For example, they believe companies in the on-demand economy, such as Uber and Airbnb, are a threat rather than an opportunity. They believe a revolutionary technology like hydraulic fracturing, which has unleashed American energy and created thousands of jobs, is a risky practice that must be stopped. They believe the Internet needs more government oversight in the form of net neutrality.

We will see a group of 20th century politicians who believe the way to fix our outdated institutions is to pump more money into them rather than reform them. They believe we can spend more on the higher education system of the 1950s without updating it for a new century. They believe we can lean on retirement programs from the 1930s without saving them for future generations. They believe expanding the safety net programs of the 1960s will be enough to help the struggling escape their circumstances.

And the sad irony is, while they consider outdated ideas of the past to be progressive, they consider timeless ideas of the past to be regressive. They believe the dignity of life at all stages to be an old-fashioned concept that America should have moved on from by now. They believe conservatives are outdated for spending so much time resisting the erosion of religious liberty. They believe the way of the future is for Washington to compete with marriage and family life rather than to encourage or protect it.

I believe the opposite of these things. I believe the challenges our people face today have erupted out of Washington’s refusal to adapt to the realities of the 21st century. I believe Washington is broken and both parties are to blame. Our entire political establishment is out of touch with our people, which has left a massive disconnect between our government and our lives.

I believe this new era requires new leaders with fresh ideas — still rooted in the principles of free enterprise, limited government and individual responsibility, but adjusted to meet the new challenges of a new day. My ideas are built on a foundation of basic truth about America: That government exists to empower its people, not itself; that family is the most important institution in society; and that our free enterprise economy is the greatest generator of opportunity and prosperity in human history.

I believe extraordinary opportunities lie ahead in the 21st century, and that America is better equipped to seize them than any other nation. The new economy is all about innovation, creativity, and productivity — and we are the most innovative, creative, and productive people on the planet. But first we must do what every generation before us has done. We must meet the challenges of our time.

That’s why the theme I’ve chosen for my campaign is “the New American Century.” For me, this isn’t just a slogan or a bumper sticker; it’s a description of the stakes of this election. I am running for president because I want to extend the American Dream my family has lived to every family in America, and I believe the only way to do so is to embrace the promise of the 21st century. Unfortunately, on stage tonight at the Democratic debate, you will see politicians who believe the opposite: that we can win the race for the future by driving in reverse.

This terrorism follows weeks of growing violence against Israel, from firebomb attacks on Israeli security forces at the Temple Mount to Palestinian rock throwers, who stoned a Jewish driver in Jerusalem, forcing him off the road and killing him. Reminiscent of the days when Yasser Arafat talked peace in English and jihad in Arabic, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas — a man President Obama regularly hails as a peacemaker — is inciting the bloodshed. “Every drop of blood that has been spilled in Jerusalem is holy blood as long as it was for Allah,” he recently declared on Palestinian television. “Al-Aqsa is ours and so is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre . . . [Israelis] have no right to desecrate them with their filthy feet.”

Abbas has used such anti-Semitic language to promote lies that Jews are defiling the Al-Aqsa mosque area and attempting to alter the status quo, in an attempt to take it over. He followed this incitement by declaring at the United Nations last week that he was no longer bound by peace agreements with Israel. The very next day, Fatah claimed responsibility for the brutal terrorist attack in the West Bank — an attack which killed an American citizen.

And what has been the Obama administration’s response to weeks of official Palestinian incitement, anti-Semitism, and violence? President Obama refuses to criticize Abbas or demand that he stop the incitement and violence. Instead, the administration plays the moral equivalence game. “All sides,” it says, must “restore calm,” as if Israel is somehow to blame for being the victim of terrorism. Secretary of State Kerry this week cautioned “everybody to be calm, not to escalate the situation.” For her part, Hillary Clinton has been silent. This is not surprising given that as Secretary of State she led many of the Obama administration’s attacks on Israel.

Indeed, the indifference that President Obama and Hillary Clinton display toward incitement and violence against Jews fits a long-running pattern of callousness and neglect toward the Jewish state. In June 2009, President Obama reportedly told American Jewish leaders that he wanted to put daylight between America and Israel. He went on to demand a full settlement freeze to restart Israeli-Palestinian negotiations — an extraordinary precondition that even Abbas himself never made.

The president’s demand destroyed any hope of moving forward on peace, asking too much of Israel and giving Abbas no incentive to negotiate. The Palestinians refused to enter negotiations until the last month of the freeze, but Hillary Clinton reserved her anger for a 45-minute rant aimed at Prime Minister Netanyahu. Over the next five years, this pattern persisted — administration officials largely absolved the Palestinians of responsibility for incitement and terror while threatening to reassess relations with Israel and calling the leader of a close ally a “chicken — .”

By distancing the United States from Israel, President Obama has created an atmosphere that rewards the provocative behavior of the Palestinian Authority. Absolving the guilty, blaming the innocent, and ignoring Palestinian incitement is putting lives at risk. It is long past time for President Obama and Hillary Clinton to call on President Abbas — clearly and publicly — to work to stop the anti-Semitism and terror. And it is also long past time for President Obama and Hillary Clinton to pledge — clearly and publicly — to block the Palestinian campaign to bypass peace with Israel by unilaterally declaring statehood.

Israelis are under attack as they seek to do nothing more than go about their daily lives. It’s time for the United States to make clear that we stand with Israel and reject President Abbas’s ugly tactics, which are leaving Israel without a partner for peace and only leaving his people with a future that is more uncertain, less peaceful, and less prosperous. With the Middle East in flames, the best way to stabilize our role in the region is to restore our ties with Israel as the Israeli people once again are under attack.

I’m here today not just to tell you my ideas, but to listen to yours. I think that’s a big part of what campaigning is all about. No one understands the needs of the on-demand economy as well as those of you who are building it.

Coming into this discussion, here’s something I can state with absolute confidence: If there’s one thing that matters in the 21st century economy, it’s innovation. In order to be the leading economy on earth, America must be the most innovative economy on earth. It’s that simple.

And whenever we talk about innovation, what we’re talking about is problem solving. We’re talking about finding ways to do things more efficiently, more affordably, and more conveniently than ever.

So I want to begin today by telling you about a problem I had earlier this year that American innovators, including many of you in this room, are attempting to solve. And then I want to tell you something you already know, which is that government is getting in your way of solving it.

My problem was this: A few months back, my refrigerator at home stopped working. It just died on us. And with four growing kids home for summer break, you can imagine I was facing some pressure to get it fixed. So I googled appliance repair companies in Miami and made some calls.

First of all, it was frustratingly difficult to get anyone to take me off hold or call me back. And when I finally got in touch with a real person, they told me, “No problem, we’ll have someone out to your house in three days to take a look at it.”

That just can’t be how our economy works in the year 2015. Other things that took three days in the old economy now take three minutes — or three seconds. What struck me in that moment was the following realization:

Inevitably, somewhere not far from me, there was someone capable of repairing appliances who was just as eager to make some extra money that day as I was to have a functional refrigerator. The only problem was that this person and I had no way of finding each other.

That is a problem that will not exist within a year or two, at least not if American innovators have their way. And the reason is because of the on-demand economy.

This is a revolution happening right before our eyes. Also known as the “sharing economy” or “gig economy,” the on-demand economy is allowing millions of professionals across multiple industries to connect directly with consumers.

The most obvious examples are companies like Uber and Airbnb. But just last week it was announced that Amazon and Google would be entering the on-demand market. And right behind these giants are thousands of small, innovative startups. If you haven’t heard of them yet, just wait.

The on-demand platform is one example of an important truth facing us in this election, which is that the American economy is fundamentally transforming. Uber didn’t even exist when our current president was sworn in. Today it’s worth $51 billion.

And it’s not just the fact that the economy is changing; it’s the fact that it’s changing faster than ever. It took the telephone 75 years to reach 100 million users. It took CandyCrush one year!

Yet while our economy is changing, our government is not. And both parties are to blame. Never before — at least not in my lifetime — has the political establishment in this country been more out of touch with the American people than it is today.

The result is a worsening friction between our mid-twentieth century government and our rapidly changing 21st century economy. Nowhere is this friction more apparent than in the on-demand economy. Here, innovative companies are running up against an antiquated tax code, burdensome regulations, and numerous outdated politicians.

And that’s not all. These companies are also the victims of a coordinated attack from established businesses, which influence the political process to pass new regulations that block competition. We’ve seen this play out with taxi companies lobbying to stop Uber. And here in New York, the government is spending millions to try and stop Airbnb from threatening hotel chains.

I want to give you another example today. I want to tell you about a growing company based here in New York that, like all businesses in the on-demand economy, is facing unnecessary challenges as a result of our outdated government.

It’s a company called Handy, and its CEO, Oisin, is here today.

Handy is an online platform that allows consumers to connect directly with home cleaners, handymen, plumbers and other home service professionals. It’s quickly growing, now operating in 37 cities with over 11,000 professionals registered to use the platform.

Handy is groundbreaking for consumers for obvious reasons. It provides simple booking at the tap of a finger, a rating and review process that helps them find the best contractor for their needs, and an easy online payment system that eliminates haggling over prices.

But it isn’t just great for consumers. One of the things I love most about the on-demand economy is the way it promotes upward mobility for the professionals who use it.

Through Handy, workers without the resources to start their own cleaning business, pay for their own advertising, or manage their own books can now have all the independence of self-employment and the customer base of a large established business.

Professionals who use Handy earn an average of $18 an hour, which is more than the typical worker in the field. Best of all, they set their own hours, checking into the app whenever they have time to take on a job and signing out when they have other obligations.

Many workers use this flexibility to pursue a higher education, which is central to upward mobility in this new century. Others use it to spend more time with their kids or work other jobs.

Innovations like Handy are part of the reason I’m so optimistic about not only saving the American Dream in this century, but actually expanding it to reach more people than ever before.

In the last century, my mother worked as a maid in hotels. She had no control over her schedule, no influence over how much she earned, and few opportunities to set herself apart, yet she still achieved the American Dream. Just think what she could have achieved cleaning homes through a company like Handy. She would have had total control over her own financial life.

The on-demand economy is a miracle that only American free enterprise could produce. That’s why it’s so shameful that the biggest obstacle to the growth of this platform is our very own government.

In fact, think about this: I met the CEO of an on-demand startup a few weeks back who asked that I not mention his business today out of fear that it would attract attention from legislators, lawyers, and competitors.

What does that say? Do we want America to be a place where honest, innovative businesses have to hide to succeed? Of course not. We need to be the most business-friendly economy on earth. But right now, with the highest corporate tax rate in the developed world and a regulatory structure that’s directly hostile to innovation, we’re quite nearly the opposite.

Here are some of the obstacles that Handy and companies like it face every day.

First, our outdated tax code. Companies like Handy only have two options for how to classify the professionals who utilize their services. They can either be classified as full W2 employees or as 1099 independent contractors. But neither makes perfect sense.

If Handy’s CEO, Oisin, classifies the workers as W2 employees, then much of the flexibility that makes working with Handy so appealing would disappear. He’d have to regulate workers’ hours and comply with a litany of expensive requirements that would stunt the growth of his company.

So instead, Oisin makes sure the relationship complies with the 1099 independent contractor requirements. But this causes other complications. For example, the company can’t provide training to its contractors, they can’t make recommendations to them based on customer feedback, and they can’t even ask them to wear a shirt or uniform with the Handy logo on it.

Oisin is also prevented from providing the perks and benefits that would allow him to attract more high-quality professionals to his platform. Think about how ironic that is. Our outdated politicians bash the on-demand economy for not taking better care of workers, yet our outdated government is the exact force preventing it from doing so.

This is why I’ve proposed a comprehensive tax reform plan that is both pro-growth and pro-family. And today, I’d like to discuss with all of you some additional ways to make the tax code more welcoming for on-demand companies. Some ideas I’ve had are to maintain the “physical presence” standard for taxation of online purchases, to stop discriminatory taxation of digital goods and services like app downloads, and to ensure the Internet remains tax-free.

But on-demand companies aren’t only hurt by our tax code; they also face the uncertainty of a volatile regulatory environment. Just last Friday, the chairwoman of the Federal Trade Commission said the on-demand economy would require, quote, “targeted regulatory measures.”

We have to realize that all of the best innovation in our economy is happening in the unregulated space. Yet Washington has imposed 60,000 pages of new federal regulations just this year, costing our private economy almost $70 billion in compliance costs.

As president, I will put an end to this. I will place a cap on the amount regulations can cost our economy each year. I will also require federal agencies to include an analysis of exactly how each proposed regulation would impact competition and innovation.

I believe the more America regulates, the more we create an opening for other countries to deregulate and draw jobs away from our shores.

Other nations are already scrambling to cater to the on-demand economy. Germany, for example, has created a middle ground between full-time employees and independent contractors. This classification, known as “dependent contractors,” allows professionals to work for a single company, receive benefits and protections, and yet still retain control over their own work.

Whether this model is the best option for America or not is something we need to figure out. But here’s what I know for sure: We have to change the way the political establishment in this country thinks about the new economy.

Right now, they recognize that the new economy doesn’t fit our current tax code and our current way of doing things, so they ask themselves: How can we force the new economy to adapt to our old policies? I’d rather ask: How can we change our old policies to adapt to the new economy?

That has always been the American way. We are a nation unique in all the world — a nation founded on the idea that government doesn’t get to choose what our economy looks like; the American people get to choose. And guess what? The American people have chosen.

They have chosen a convenient, fast, tech-driven economy — one with direct lanes of access to the products and services they need.

The American people have chosen an economy in which the most valuable retailer in America, Amazon, owns not a single store; the largest transportation company, Uber, owns not a single vehicle; and the largest accommodation provider, Airbnb, owns not a single hotel.

Free enterprise has brought us these developments, and free enterprise will bring even more developments in the years ahead. In fact, I believe free enterprise will work better in this century than it did in the last, because the new economy is all about innovation, creativity, and productivity, and we are the most innovative, creative, and productive people on earth.

I believe the 21st century not only can be a new American Century; I believe it will be. It will be as long as everyone in this room keeps doing what they’re doing, and as long as Washington stops doing what it’s doing and starts looking for a better way.

How to Get Washington Out of the Way Of Building a 21st Century Economy was originally published in On Demand on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.