The Book on Stockman
Barnes, Fred
THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR VOL 19, NO 7 / JULY 1986 Fred Barnes THE BOOK ON STOCKMAN The Administration asked for it. Here's the way I figure it. Ronald Reagan has done mighty well in this life....
...So I pass...
...By a gradual but certain process, they became the legislative chambermaids of the welfare state...
...That was Stockman's idea, a measly director of the Office of Management and Budget overplaying his hand...
...That was when they agreed on supply-side economics and nearly everything else...
...As George Bush would say, Stockman has stepped in "deep doo-doo...
...And Stockman was still a congressman at the time...
...I started counting his con-versions recounted in his book...
...But it turned out to be a mighty fainthearted and short-lived rebellion...
...To defend Reagan, critics like Sidey,Will, and Schneider rely on the notion that he never had deep and painful spending cuts in mind...
...Better than anyone, he knows that billions and billions are spent on programs that benefit the precious few simply because small groups often mount effective lobbies in Washington...
...354 pages...
...Only mayors, who have more money to play with...
...Fred Barnes is a senior editor of the New Republic...
...Using his book to make some political points is one thing...
...Now, he thinks Kemp is rigid and foolish...
...Stockman was well known by then, and there was indeed a movement behind him, a strong one...
...372-5 $14.95 ^---susf^ s=—^ =11Is~s's~ Customer Service AS6A U.S...
...388 pages...
...hours celebrating itself...
...283 pages...
...Why, he must be some kind of nincompoop...
...Okay, so he made a cool $2.5 million on the book deal...
...266 pages...
...This collection includes over 5,500 maritime quotations from the speeches and writings of philosophers, admirals, generals, poets, prophets, and politicians over the past two thousand years...
...Did we need $170 million worth of additional spending at the Indian Health Service, the free world's most spectacularly inefficient organization...
...I resisted this conclusion, but I wavered after Stockman unloaded a few vignettes...
...136 pages...
...What shocked Stockman more, though, was when Reagan signed a $2 billion dairy subsidy in 1983...
...091-2 $14.95 Title Qty...
...60 illus...
...He's the most popular President at this stage—second year, second term-ever...
...Not many people, I'll wager...
...Reagan was "grinning enthusiastically" as he said this, according to Stockman...
...You want to talk about deficit spending...
...Egotism is one...
...At first, he describes Kemp as "an unusual politician—he read books and talked about them...
...Translated, that means Stockman doesn't agree with Kemp anymore...
...Not the poor...
...That's on page 39, which describes Stockman's pre-White House days...
...Air Force and Army terms in everyday use in Navy programs...
...Well, not many weeks later, the Interior appropriations bill wound up on the President's desk, a mere 25 percent, or $2 billion, over budget...
...Anyway, the best part of Stockman's book is where he spins out his vision 14 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JULY 1986 and shows how far short of it the Reagan Administration has fallen...
...All that really stood between them and the Democrats was their content-free rhetoric about `private initiative' and `fiscal responsibility.' " Above all, they don't share Stockman's vision of "minimalist government—a spare and stingy creature, which offered even-handed public justice, but no more...
...Sad to say, Stockman winds up yielding to them...
...In response I pointed out the obvious," writes Stockman, "that a bill 25 percent over the line was a budget buster by any definition...
...Stockman tends to take any rejection of his policy advice as an affront to the gods...
...So when adviser Edwin Meese informedhim that the companies had plunked down a small bit of their own money, the President was fully persuaded...
...The deficit is hardly as dangerous as Stockman says, but it is a problem and it might have been avoided...
...482-9 $14.95 WORLD WAR II U-BOAT COMMANDER A Periscope View of the Battle of the Atlantic By Peter Cremer A true-life war thriller by famed U-boat ace "Ali" Cremer, this book presents an authentic view of the notorious wolf-packs and their encounters with the Allies...
...296 pages...
...Worse still was the lingering fraud of the so-called veto strategy...
...But given the pummeling his book has taken, Stockman is on the verge of not being taken seriously at all in Washington...
...Apps...
...This chilling story of the Allies' narrow escape from defeat at the hands of Nazi submarines documents the most critical months in the Battle of the Atlantic, the winter and spring of 1942-43.312 pages...
...In California, these instruct farmers how many oranges or grape-fruit they can market each week...
...Washington, to hear Reagan's spiel, was nothing but wretched excess...
...Wrong...
...584 pages...
...Sometimes the desire to go after his enemies gets the better of his egotism...
...If there was ever a President who might be expected to rebel against handouts to interest groups, it was Reagan...
...Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard, as well as U.S...
...He concludes that the ill-starred operation exposed serious deficiencies in the military decision-making process and offers proposals for change...
...Stockman accuses him of adhering to "a free lunch message and a mindless political addiction to tax cutting without regard to the fiscal con-sequences...
...Stockman is beside himself in his denunciations of Meese and Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, who bested him time after time in appeals to Reagan...
...Was it too much for Stockman to have expected that Reagan would want to back up his rhetoric with actual cuts...
...Stockman argues the reason is simply that Reagan is not a revolutionary, but a conventional politician who isn't, interested in sweeping change...
...If this is what America's elected leaders favor, then that's got to be what the American people want, he concludes...
...Sometimes the changes come with mindboggling speed...
...39 illus...
...send me the books indicated below .. . ^ My check or money order is enclosed...
...Just because it happens doesn't mean it is democracy at its best...
...The Reagan presidency should survive without a rousing defense from me...
...Senator James McClure of Idaho pleaded for approval...
...345-8 $16.95 SHORT STORIES OF THE SEA Edited by George Solley, Eric Steinbaugh, and David Tomlinson This anthology contains both familiar and not-sofamiliar works of nineteenth-and twentieth-century writers that explore our unending fascination with the sea...
...We can't cause an honest business to lose money," he said...
...But no...
...Not quite...
...His book is crudely written, he is overwrought on the matter of the federal budget deficit, and his overarching policy advice (raise taxes, you dopes...
...It wasn't Kemp who changed...
...Meese had indicated a veto was coming, and Stockman had spread that word on Capitol Hill...
...The anti-statist position got a true test under Reagan, Stockman insists, but it "was utterly repudiated by the combined forces of the politicians—Republican and Democrat, those in the executive branch as well as the legislative...
...Harper & Row, $21.95...
...Stockman zings columnist Robert Novak for writing in late 1980 that a movement was building behind Stockman's bid to be budget director...
...This bill defines it...
...MIDWAY The Battle That Doomed Japan By Mitsuo Fuchida and Masatake Okumiya An honest and factual ac-count of the battle from the Japanese point of view by two former officers in the Imperial Japanese Navy...
...By page 40, I'd counted five of them...
...288 pages...
...155-2 $16.95 DICTIONARY OF MILITARY AND NAVAL QUOTATIONS By Col...
...And he's got a fancy job with a New York investment firm, doing who knows what...
...date Signature (Credit card dueges not %lid unless signed...
...He is obsessed with discrediting his supply-side allies...
...In 1984, his advisers urged him to veto all congressional appropriations bills that exceeded the ceilings in his budget...
...No one at the White House ever said he didn't...
...This is nonsense, and I don't think Stockman believes it for a moment...
...In the 1980 presidential race, he endorsed John Connally, voted for George Bush in the Michigan primary, and worked for Ronald Reagan in the fall campaign...
...The trouble is, he has no intention of following through and trying, at some political risk, to make it a reality...
...Robert Debs Heinl, Jr...
...Glossary...
...He could have stood firmly against the costly ornaments that were unnecessarily added to the 1981 tax cut...
...Name Address City State Zip POSTAGE & HANDLING charges are $2.25 for orders up to $15.00, $3.00 for orders of $15.01 to $30.00, and $3.75 for orders in excess of $30.00...
...Another problem is score settling...
...867-0 $15.95 THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER By Tom Clancy A race between the Soviet and American fleets to find an errant Russian submarine brings the superpowers to the brink of disaster...
...Naval Institute Press Books FICTION THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JULY 1986 15...
...So much for defending the guy.There are some bad parts to Stock-man's book that even I won't overlook...
...But Kemp has the audacity to differ with Stockman on raising taxes...
...The unfettered market-place had lost its magic in this case...
...Yet he has something to say, especially to a smug administration that nowadays spends most of the daylight 'The Triumph of Politics: Why the Reagan Revolution Failed...
...344 pages...
...And Reagan went along...
...And in the Washington Post, William Schneider said Reagan was doing fine as President, while Stockman's book left him with "an inescapable conclusion: David Stockman is a stinker...
...Stockman once thought Kemp a Renaissance man...
...Illus...
...I don't think the American people demanded this...
...Suddenly, he's a blockhead, a nudnik, a betrayer of friends...
...149-8 $19.95 NAVAL TERMS DICTIONARY Fourth Edition By Captain John V. Noel, Jr...
...Stockman then waited for other advisers to support him...
...It's a false note...
...The President seemed to believe that he had such a strategy...
...Whatever tiny veterans' cuts I managed to stuff into the budget were made instantly non-operative by [VA administrator Harry] Walters's ability to claim with impunity that he spoke for the President," writes Stockman...
...Not the middle class...
...Maybe hanging around Reagan for so long made him want to exit on an upbeat note...
...It's remarkable how quickly they wind up as "patrons of pork," coopted by "the congressional culture and welfare state apparatus...
...Reagan doesn't want a tax increase after what I've told him...
...EDA, remember, is the outfit that paid for the carving of a limestone model of the Great Wall of China, in Indiana...
...Stockman is flat-out right about that...
...Using it to stick needles in his old foes in the Administration is another...
...He didn't...
...But Stockman is clearly in a heap of trouble...
...Reagan wouldn't cause the Veterans Administration, a $27 billion complex of programs, to spend less, either...
...But his entire political career prior to reaching the White House consisted of making one major point, namely that the federal government was spending way too much and doing way too much...
...Illus...
...Or if narrowing the deficit seems too prosaic a goal, he could have utilized the 1984 presidential campaign, which he was certain to win, to make the positive case for a sharply pruned government, namely that it is better for everyone, the poor included...
...Illus...
...His message is this: you haven't done half as good a job as you think you have...
...I stopped counting...
...NAVAL HISTORY ICEBOUND The Jeannette Expedition's Quest for the North Pole By Leonard F. Guttridge Here is the riveting account of America's 1879 dash for the North Pole and the cover-up that followed...
...Meese told the President that eliminating the orders would "disrupt" the farmers' marketing plans...
...John M. Waters, Jr...
...The Reagan failure left such egregious relics as agricultural marketing orders in place...
...It is an intriguing and unforgettable story...
...Republican politicians in Washing-ton are like that, Stockman says...
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...He didn't...
...23 illus...
...Silence...
...Did we truly need to layer the Bureau of Mines and Geological Survey with more bureaucratic fat...
...He didn't...
...Sure, "special interest groups do wield great power, but their influence is deeply rooted in local popular support...
...Charge my ^ VISA ^ MASTERCARD Acct # Exp...
...Hugh Sidey of Time declared that "long years of leadership that hone instincts and crystallize common sense," Reagan's long suit, in other words, are more important than anything an arrogant young policy entrepreneur like Stockman might offer...
...and Captain Edward L. Beach Contains a glossary of U.S...
...On this, yes, I agree," Reagan finally said...
...You'd think Reagan, of all people, would be wary of billions given to Exxon, Union Oil, and some gas pipelines to build synthetic fuel plants...
...Reagan could have written the passage himself...
...330-X $19.95 THE IRANIAN RESCUE MISSION Why It Failed By Paul B. Ryan The author draws together all the significant elements of this tragic episode to objectively analyze what went wrong and why...
...367 pages...
...Navy colloquialisms, slang, and technical terminology, followed by five appendices that explain various equipment nomenclature and the enlisted rating structure...
...Actually, there was no movement at all, Stockman says, and Novak was only trying to get a job for a supply-sider, which Stockman was at the time...
...There's no way Stockman could think so, either...
...In the end, Stockman's most salient trait is frequent changes of mind...
...969-3 $16.95 BLOODY WINTER Second Edition By Capt...
...The abortive Reagan Revolution proved that the American electorate wants a moderate social democracy to shield it from capitalism's rougher edges," he says...
...Could we really afford to raise subsidies to private forests by 140 percent...
...Stockman just can't seem to find anything to hold his allegiance permanently...
...Now I was the fool, and the reasons revealed the final answer as to why the Reagan White House's anti-spending rhetoric could not be taken seriously," he writes...
...650-3 $18.95 REFERENCES DICTIONARY OF NAVAL ABBREVIATIONS, Third Edition By Bill Wedertz This volume contains over 45,000 abbreviations of the U.S...
...And that would be a mistake...
...Who is better off for there having been an Economic Development Administration...
...True, Reagan didn't single out specific cuts during his campaign in 1980...
...Naval Institute, 2062 Generals Highway, Annapolis, Maryland 21401 YES...
...is wrongheaded in the extreme...
...I don't think so...
...Reagan could have used up a little of his popularity by leading the fight for deep spending cuts...
...Illus...
...That's on page 400...
...Its vision of the good society rested on the strength and productive potential of free men in free markets...
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...Who is helped by Urban Development Action Grants, which build fancy hotels in cities...
...He spends nearly 400 pages attacking their wimpishness, then capitulates himself...
...285-0 $14.95 THE LEFT-HANDED MONKEY WRENCH Stories and Essays by Richard McKenna Edited by Robert Shenk This marvelous, first-time collection of short stories, essays, and excerpts from an unfinished novel offers a treasure chest of reading from the author of the best-selling novel The Sand Pebbles...
...Index...
...This is not the kind of thing we had in mind to veto...
...And political writer after political writer, upon scanning David Stockman's book,' has rushed to at-tack Stockman and defend Reagan...
...Reagan was ready...
...George Will noted in his syndicated column that the nation used to worry about Reagan's age, but now "Stockman's book demonstrates how youth can be a menace to good governance...
...Kemp had a seriousness of mind and intellectuality of approach that made him stand out like a lighthouse in a sea of fog...
...Stockman flips out on the subject of Congressman Jack Kemp...
...And so on...
...Just ask Ronald Reagan...
...I can't wait to get my pen out," he said...
...Index...
...The Reaganites were, in the final analysis, just plain welfare state politicians like everybody else...
...256 pages...
Vol. 19 • July 1986 • No. 7
