The Real David Stockman : The Report of the Presidential Accountability Group

The authors analyze David Stockman, keystone of the Reagan Administration's economic policies, as a powerful and ambitious man, who has used people and ideas for his own aims

Intended as a corrective to former federal budget director Stockman's forthcoming memoir, this report from Nader's Presidential Accountability Group depicts the controversial "super-peddler of Reaganomics" as an expedient power broker who pointedly fought a "war on the poor" in his four years as head of the Office of Management and Budget. Drawing on interviews, the authors trace Stockman's Michigan upbringing, his antiwar activism in college, his growing conservatism as director of the House Republican Conference and as a "get-tough" congressman, and finally his work as professed champion of the Reagan administration's "supply-side" ideology at OMB. The authors claim that Stockman's "personal agenda," however, was to cut the federal budget, estranging him from supply-siders and having devastating impacts on social programs. Greenya and Urban quote many, including former supporters, who describe Stockman as an arrogant workaholic whose "ideological fervor and rigidity," as the authors put it, led to acts of personal and professional betrayal. Greenya's books include For the Defense (with F. Lee Bailey); Urban is a legislative assistant on Capitol Hill.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

This is a book David Stockman will probably not want to read. In it, he is portrayed as a heartless opportunist with no commitment to anyone other than himself. In a larger context, the book also provides a review of the first five years of the Reagan administration. The battles over policy and turf are seen as they swirl around Stockman and Reagan. In dissecting the policies, the authors, who are associated with Nader's Presidential Accountability Group, see an administration based on pro-business, pro-defense, and pro-rich attitutes. Greenya and Urban have a definite point of view to promote, but their book will provide a useful counterweight to Stockman's memoirs and is recommended as such. Richard C. Schiming, Economics Dept., Mankato State Univ., Minn.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.