Mourning in America

Catching up a bit here after a month or two of holidaying, slacking off and finding little to write about beyond repetetive stories about Palin and/or Obama's respective similarities to Reagan.

Deserving of a mention, though, is this ad, which appeared on American TV screens in September:



A direct reference to the definitive TV spot of Reagan's 1984 campaign, little this season has more forcefully demonstrated Republican's nostalgia for Reagan's presidency, and their willingness to use it as an argument. The ad was made by the GOP's current star creative, Fred Davis (behind "Demon Sheep" and "I am not a Witch") for the PAC, Citizens for the Republic - which explains its euology for Reagan's America. The group was founded by Reagan in 1977 to support conservatives in the 1978 elections and prepare for his 1980 run, and was revived thirty years later by a self described "hardy band of Reaganites" for similar purposes. Its chairman is Craig Shirley, a man devoted to promoting Reagan in the public imagination, while its directors are all former Reagan officials.

The ad itself names no candidates, presumably bypassing campaign finance laws, but more than that, the Citizen's apparent lack of alignment to anyone but the beloved former president, and the activity of now at least two conservative PACs bearing the Reagan brand (son Michael's being the other one), seems to highlight the lack of obvious conservative leadership as 2012 approaches. We'll see what they do after November.

Deformed Republicanism

A few days ago, I suggested that former members of the Reagan administration were dull and partisan in their public comments. This cannot be said of David Stockman, Reagan's first director of the Office of Managment and Budget, who on Saturday appeared in the New York Times declaiming the "Four Deformations of the Apocaypse".

Stockman, though in many ways a committed ideologue, has never been reliably on message. Early on in Reagan's presidency, he risked his job by talking frankly to the Atlantic about the politically chaotic and murky process of budget cutting, downplaying the administration's legislatvie victories:

"I don't believe too much in the momentum theory any more," he said. "I believe in institutional inertia. Two months of response can't beat fifteen years of political infrastructure. I'm talking about K Street and all of the interest groups in this town, the community of interest groups. We sort of stunned it, but it just went underground for the winter. It will be back ... Can we win? A lot of it depends on events and luck. If we got some bad luck, a flareup in the Middle East, a scandal, it could all fall apart."

Stockman resigned in 1985, frustrated with entrenched political interests and exploding deficits, and declaring the failure of the Reagan Revolution. In his NYT column, which likely outlines the premises of his upcoming book on the financial crisis, Stockman reviews the past forty years of American economic history and castigates the Republican Party for the betrayal of principle in its "recycled Keynesianism" and its submission to the "primordial forces" of the "welfare state and the warfare state". The GOP takes the blame for four destructive changes: removing the gold standard, unleashing defecits, expanding the financial sector, and hollowing out the American economy. Their current political committment to retaining the Bush tax cuts is but a symptom of their irresponsibility and irrelevance. I doubt Stockman weilds much influence in the party any more, but any professed conservative hoping make office and make impact should probably pay attention to his ideas, and certainly make a study of his career.

Administration Resurfacing

A couple of Reagan administration veterans have got their points across recently. Edwin Meese was in Michigan, confirming that he is on the correct side of the party line - Tea Party good, Obama bad. Meanwhile, Richard Perle has appeared in Foreign Policy with an angry rebuttal to Peter Beinart's analysis of Reagan's dovish qualities. What could have been simple correction of Beinart's understanding of Reagan's arms control strategy becomes a confusing ramble where Perle insists on defining everything in terms of the conservative/liberal divide:

Beinart is not alone in confusing a tough, deliberate application of American power to achieve American ends with the bellicose reckless abandon that he seems to think is the essence of a "conservative" foreign policy. Indeed, it is a common liberal conceit (which Beinart swallows whole) that conservatives, like Reagan, are always spoiling for a fight, eager to launch wars and send American troops in harm's way.

It is reasonable to point out that there is a mythology on the left which sees Reagan as a reckless, bloodthirsty, nuclear cowboy, but thoughtless not to also concede the supportive myth of Reagan as a relentless warrior - particularly in response to an article which portrays Reagan as neither. Still, Beinart's arguments and many like them seem designed to undermine conservatives by denying them their central icon, so it is hardly surprising that defensive conservatives take the bait.

It is, perhaps, a consequence of Reagan's continuing symbolic presence in American politics that his former officials remain so dull and partisan.

Remembering Al Haig

Al Haig's life, 85 years of ambition rewarded and thwarted, has been recalled on his passing this weekend in the context of presidential crisis. His role in the resignation of Nixon, and his actions in the aftermath of Reagan's attempted assassination, are the defining moments of his career. They have made him symbolic of the uncertainty of power when a president is weakened, whether he is regarded as a shepherd of stability, ensuring a painless transition from Nixon to Ford, or a usurper of the constitution and "power-crazed general", breathlessly declaring himself "in control" while Reagan was in surgery.

Two authors, each plugging a book, offer new(ish) perspectives on the soldier-statesman. Paul Kengor, the conservative chronicler of Reagan's faith and Cold War victory, suggests that Haig was a dove in the belligerent first years of the Reagan adminsitration. Tom Schachtman, who seems to be quite an eclectic author now attending to neo-conservative infighting, argues that Haig purposefully undermined President Nixon for his own power-seeking agenda.

Personally, I will always remember Al Haig as Richard Dreyfuss.