Ronald Reagan’s great biographer Steven F. Hayward courts charges of heresy by arguing that the Reagan Revolution was in some measure a failure, that its strategy of reining in the welfare state by “starving the beast” of revenues simply made it easier for us to enjoy the benefits of middle class entitlement programs while fobbing the costs off on future generations. The starve-the-beast strategy has been, he asserts, a “spectacular flop.”
There’s so much in this thoughtful and provocative article that it defies easy summary. Hayward affirms that there were some significant conservative victories—for example, welfare reform and ending the Cold War. But he also insists that conservatives have thus far failed in dealing with middle class entitlements. And he argues that conservatives have to face squarely certain facts of political life.
There are three dominant political facts of our age that conservative thinkers (and also liberals) need to acknowledge. The first is the plain fact that neither ideological camp will ever defeat the other so decisively as to be able to govern without the consent of the other side. This is not merely my political judgment; it is sewn into the nature of America’s basic institutions and political culture.
The second fact is that the divisions between Left and Right are fundamental and unbridgeable. A frequent trope of political rhetoric is that everyone agrees about the ends; we merely disagree about the means. Although this is often true at the level of a discrete policy issue (for example, broadening access to health care), it is wrong at the deeper level of what might be called the “tectonic plates” that shift individual political battles…. Left and Right have conflicting modes of moral reasoning that cannot be easily synthesized or bridged.
Which brings us to the third major political fact of our age: the welfare state, or entitlement state, is here to stay. It is a central feature of modernity itself. We are simply not going back to a system of “rugged individualism” in a minimalist “night watchman” state; there is not even a plurality in favor of this position.
There’s lots more here, and some might argue that his solutions (for example, raising some taxes, means-testing entitlements, and recovering conservative interest in the environment and infrastructure development) are not as bold as his analysis. He ends with the following plea:
It may be that internal ideological reformation must precede bipartisan political compromise. Ideological extremists in both parties have repeatedly succeeded in scuttling tax and entitlement compromises pursued by moderate reformers in their respective parties, and at the moment, the prospects for any compromises seem remote. It is easy and crowd pleasing to blame the intransigence of the other side, but this absolves both sides of serious self-examination and self-criticism without which political progress becomes impossible for both.
I have written this paper in the hopes that my fellow conservatives will recognize the need for a conservative reformation, and I believe that liberals must follow suit. In their current incarnations, both conservatism and liberalism are failing–not just because of poor strategies like starve-the-beast–but also because neither movement has properly adapted to the changing fabric of modern society. Given this, when there is bipartisan compromise between two outdated ideological camps it is usually unsatisfying to almost everyone. The lesson we should draw is that before the two camps can agree to an agenda truly in the national interest, liberals and conservatives must first reform themselves.
I’ve called attention to this article because it is worth discussing (and not just by the wonkish types who visit the AEI website or by the movement conservatives who might come across it elsewhere). Lots of people have disagreed with his analysis.
But I wonder also: is there anyone in the current crop of Republican presidential aspirants who could answer Hayward’s call or at least respond thoughtfully and intelligently to it? (I say this not because I think that the Republican field is peculiarly handicapped in this connection; I cannot imagine President Obama rising above his partisan posture to think any new thoughts.)
November 21st, 2011 | 9:43 pm
Since he’s outside the mainstream, he rarely gets put onto think-piece questions like this, but Ron Paul’s critique of Reagan is essentially the same. Reagan’s budget head (and finally critic) David Stockman has endorsed Paul, and his critique is actually much the same as the author’s.
Reagan gave up on spending cuts after securing tax cuts. The sheer irresponsibility of this is staggering, and unfortunately, trendsetting. Deficit spending is a moral issue, because passing debt down to one’s offspring is a moral failure, whether on the personal or the collective level.
Paul is the only one of the candidates who is serious about budget cuts, and it shows. Why couldn’t Perry think of three departments to eliminate? Was it absent-mindedness or fear? If it was the former (which is doubtful) it is the absent-mindedness of someone who expects to make an attempt for the sake of being seen doing so. Nothing real is at stake, so why pay attention closely?
Paul, on the other hand, has been talking about which departments need eliminated since he arrived on the scene in ’78. He’s bound himself to it and vice versa. The size and scope of today’s Federal Government is unsustainable. Reagan didn’t fight it’s growth hard enough. Paul would.
November 21st, 2011 | 10:52 pm
Please find a completely different assessment of the “great man” and his toxic legacy.
http://www.psychohistory.com/reagan/rcontent.htm
November 22nd, 2011 | 6:41 am
John – uh, OK
Matt – I actually like Ron Paul (although I disagree with most of his foreign policy approach), its his supporters who tend to be annoying.
November 22nd, 2011 | 7:58 am
The other thing is that most people in the Tea Party see government welfare as their personal own right, but that it should be cut for other people. How many of them are on Medicare or Medicaid? Almost all of them went or sent their kids to public school. And when I try to tell them how they themselves are on gov’t welfare, they just don’t get it — it’s as if it’s not really welfare for them, but rather their right.
November 22nd, 2011 | 8:04 am
It’s demonstrable beyond reason that Mr Reagan was a borrow-and-spend politician. There’s nothing wrong with borrowing for a big project if one can pay it back.
The real issue is upper-class entitlements and corporate profiteering. That’s not worth the spending frenzy.
November 22nd, 2011 | 8:44 am
The issue is moot anyway. The idea that the entitlement state “is here to stay” because it’s “a feature of modernity itself” will become an interesting anachronism once the public fisc completes its implosion.
Paul Ryan’s roadmap follows the same logic as Hayward’s critique. Ryan has presented a reasonable way to preserve the welfare state. He essentially put everything on the table as a way to initiate a compromise, as if to say, “Here is our plan, where do you disagree?” If his relatively modest reforms go through, then entitlement might continue to be a feature of “modernity itself.”
But there is no indication that any part of his heroic attempt at saving the bloated patient won’t be stymied by demagogues (as we see in Wisconsin, Ohio, California, etc.). Further, Ryan put into practice Hayward’s conciliatory but principled approach to the opposition well before Hayward advised it.
This is all deck-chair rearrangement on the Titanic, though, and every serious analyst understands that. The very idea of automatic “entitlement” because we were born American is a noxious arrogance that will be rejected by the world propping it up. Entitlement will be scoured from our souls by fire like OWS protesters hosed out of Zuccotti Park. At a certain point, our airy-fairy promises to ourselves become undeliverable. At a certain point, we run out of “other people’s money.” We are nearing that iceberg. Hayward’s criticism is the product of a certain political immaturity or stunted foresight.
No, what has occurred is massive intergenerational theft by the most spoiled and selfish, bratty cohort in history — the Baby Boom. In their solipsism, they have inculcated little regard for the ruins they will have left in their wake, they have no problem borrowing against their children’s livelihood to appease an omnivorous, spiritually-impoverished vanity. Only one or two generations get to consider themselves “entitled” above everything and everyone before the world collapses around their demonic egoism, like a cosmic singularity.
November 22nd, 2011 | 10:12 am
A telling question in this context: I don’t believe Reagan would respond “thoughtfully and intelligently” to this kind of analysis, either. That was neither his political nor his cognitive style. The parting shot at Obama also seems a bit unfair: we, the people of the United States, have made running for and successfully fulfilling the duties of president impossible without some resort to crass partisanship.
November 22nd, 2011 | 11:10 am
“Almost all of them went or sent their kids to public school. ”
That at least is not an example of “welfare”. Compulsory education is a type of conscription It exists either to educate students for their individual good as defined by the government(which is a shockingly impertinent thing for a government to do) or encourage the common benefit of having profitable citizens(in which case those inconvenienced by it should be compensated just like a public road that goes through people’s property must be) . The desire that the families of conscripted students be paid compensation is a demand for justice not welfare.
November 25th, 2011 | 4:40 am
Jason Taylor
Jules Ferry explained the purpose of public education, with an honesty rare in politicians – “So that the children of the nation shall be stamped, like the coinage, with the image of the Republic.”
He, and his master, Thiers, favoured universal conscription, for precisely the same reason.
Links
Blogs
Find Us
Contact