LES IS LESS
Leventhal, George L.
Les Is Less Les Aspin was elected to Congress in 1970 from Wisconsin's First District and quickly cultivated a reputation as a thoughtful critic of Pentagon excess. When he ran for reelection in...
...First District activists are meeting to find a Democratic primary challenger to Aspin...
...The point is, we don't stand for anything any more...
...But if we want to make defense policy in the White House and the Pentagon, then we had better stand for something...
...More than half of the contributions Aspin received in the first ten months of 1985 came from one group of contributors: the weapons industry, which contributed 120 times as much to the campaigns of members of the Armed Services Committee in 1985 as it did five years ago...
...We felt he had turned his back on us, and we were angry...
...Of the $36,600 Aspin received, General Dynamics chipped in $5,000, Lockheed $3,000, and Hughes Aircraft $2,500...
...But since he became chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, As-pin's fortunes—and politics—have changed...
...Most liberals in Congress, however, criticize Aspin more for his flip-flopping on major military issues than for his campaign financing...
...Aspin is one of a long list of people who have been bought by the contractors...
...In 1982, Aspin was a freeze supporter," says Liz McBride of the Wisconsin Freeze...
...Campaigns are very expensive," says Spellman, "and Les raises money from many different sources...
...It included more than $7 billion for such General Dynamics products as Trident II missiles, M-l tanks, and F-15 fighter jets...
...But Aspin's press secretary, Jim Spellman, says it's not fair to link Aspin's support for weapons systems to the increased donations he's received from the weapons industry...
...There is a deep disillusionment, a very real anger," said Representative Les AuCoin, Democrat of Oregon, after Aspin helped save the MX missile in March...
...Jane Gruenebaum, executive director of the Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign in Washington, D.C., sees it differently...
...Aspin has used the conspicuous position we have given him to blur the distinction between the parties...
...Les is an example of the oldest political story in the books," she says...
...We are the Doctor No of the debate," Aspin told the Committee for a Democratic Majority last April...
...George L. Leventhal (George L. Leventhal is a free-lance writer in Washington, D.C...
...It's inevitable that as his stature on defense issues has risen, his contributions would rise...
...At home in Wisconsin, Aspin has also faced attack from constituents angered by his pro-military stand...
...People saw Aspin as our opportunity to bring down the military budget and stop Star Wars," says an aide to one liberal Democrat...
...They were quickly disappointed...
...When he ran for reelection in 1980, his campaign committee received only $300 from the top 100 military contractors' political action committees...
...If Democrats want to spend the rest of their careers writing op-ed pieces and giving lectures at universities, then we can continue to stroke our anti-defense image...
...With stature, Aspin boasts a new philosophy on armaments...
...As the money goes, so go the beliefs...
...Frankly, it burns the hell out of us...
...The $302 billion House-Senate agreement on military spending Aspin helped engineer in 1985 represented $10 billion in increased Pentagon spending authority...
Vol. 50 • January 1986 • No. 1
