BOOKS IN REVIEW Reagan Coopted

HIS IS A BOOK I VERY MUCH WANTED TO LIKE.Not York Times. Its coverage of Reagan promoted the idea because it was supposed to reflect a liberal’s that he was simply an actor going through the mo- awakening to the importance and signifi- tions as president—reading from speeches written by cance of , but because I hoped his staff, dutifully following the directions of his it was a book by a member of the academy that shrewd advisers, falling asleep in cabinet meetings took Ronald Reagan seriously. and generally sleepwalking through history. One of the remarkable things about Rea- The fact that this imagery fit neatly with the in- Tgan is the dearth of serious scholarly works terests of some of his staff in exaggerating their own about his presidency. Although Professor Diggins importance was lost in the media’s pell-mell accept- could describe him as one of the three greatest presi- ance of this narrative. If you’re a scholar and believe dents in American history—the others being Lincoln this stuff—and why not?—you’re not going to make and Roosevelt—the number of scholarly books on your reputation by studying the Reagan presidency. Reagan, almost two decades after he left office, can be To be sure, there were some problems with this counted on one hand. story. Reagan was successful again and again in get- This is reflected in Diggins’s bibliography. Most of ting the things he wanted most—the the cited works are by journalists, and cover specific tax cuts, spending cuts, tax reforms, issues in Reagan’s political life, or memoirs by journal- increases in military appropriations, ists or figures in the Reagan administration. Diggins’s and other priorities seemed to fall text mostly cites Lou Cannon’s book—President into his lap. Before Reagan became Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime—the title of which sug- president many observers of the pres- gests the arch way in which, at the time Cannon was idency concluded that it was just too writing, many people in the press thought of Ronald big a job for one person. Reagan. What we needed, they suggested, Still, the Cannon book is one of the fairest and most was a corporate presidency, with sev- balanced available. As Diggins acknowledges, “Rea- eral executives dividing up the work. gan’s reputation has suffered But Reagan made the job look easy—so Ronald Reagan: Fate, Freedom, from northern liberal biases easy that he was accused of being lazy. and the Making of History that dominate the teaching and Once, when asked whether he was By John Patrick Diggins writing of American history working as hard as he should, Reagan (W.W. NORTON, 493 PAGES, $27.95) today.” responded “Well, they say that hard But there is another and work never hurt anyone, but I say, why take a chance?” Reviewed by Peter J. Wallison perhaps more practical expla- But there is in fact an explanation for Reagan’s nation for this. Press coverage, often cited as the first success. He had a strategy for his presidency in which draft of history, is really quite a bit more influential he would govern with principles and ideas rather than than that. by constantly intervening in the decision-making pro- Historians and political scientists read the New cess of his administration. As Diggins notes, “Reagan thought ideas were real and could move mountains.” Peter J. Wallison is a resident fellow at the American He also selected four objectives that he wanted to Enterprise Institute and the author of Ronald Reagan: achieve: The Power of Conviction and the Success of His • Reducing the role of the government in the econ- Presidency (Westview Press, 2003). omy through tax and spending cuts.

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• Forcing American companies to compete by free- responsibility, freedom of the individual, and small ing trade. government, we have a figure who is skeptical about • Compelling the Soviet Union to come to the bar- the fundamental precepts of Christianity, and believes gaining table though a military buildup. that God wants people to create and take pleasure in • Restoring the American people’s faith in them- material abundance. selves. He concentrated almost entirely on these—and Reagan’s political philosophy is achieved them all. presented as inconsistent with the This was a completely different template for running the presidency from the one FDR pursued, political philosophy and objectives and Reagan showed that it could be successful. of the Founding Fathers—an In my book on Reagan, I pointed out this differ- ence in approach and strategy, in the hope that it eccentric view, to be sure. would attract the interest of historians and political Similarly, Reagan’s political philosophy is pre- scientists. Thus far, no luck. sented as inconsistent with the political philosophy This concerns me, because it will be historians and and objectives of the Founding Fathers—an eccentric political scientists who will ultimately establish Rea- view, to be sure. gan’s place in history, and it would be a shame if he does And second, that Reagan’s role in ending the Cold not get the recognition he deserves because of a mis- War and the threat of Communism was the result of his placed view by academics about the reasons for the conversion, once he became president, to views about success of his presidency. the dangers of nuclear war that one would normally associate with American liberals. HICH BRINGS ME to Professor Diggins’s book. In the end, Diggins, despite his high regard for Although this is a book about Ronald Rea- Reagan, actually underestimates Reagan’s contribu- W gan, there is very little Reagan in it. By this I tion to the collapse of Soviet Communism. mean two things. First, although Diggins makes a lot of interesting HE MAIN PROBLEM WITH THE BOOK, I think, is its and controversial assertions about Reagan and what failure not only to provide a complete under- he achieved, he doesn’t take the time to support these T standing of Reagan’s political philosophy, but statements with examples. to offer a complete understanding of the meaning of The book would be a more useful contribution to the terms “liberalism” and “conservatism” as they are an understanding of its subject if we had been given used in the today. examples of Reagan doing or saying something that Diggins writes: would give Diggins's observations more substance. And second, although Diggins regards Reagan as In confronting the Soviet Union, Reagan invoked great primarily because he ended the Cold War and the the principles of freedom, human rights, democrat- totalitarian Communist threat without firing a shot, ic elections, and self-determination, liberal ideas he is somewhat unclear about what Reagan actually derived from the natural rights legacy of John Locke did to achieve this extraordinary historical triumph. and the foreign policy of . Yet if In other words, the book does not fail in its con- Reagan carried forward the message of liberalism, ception, but in its persuasiveness. Because of the pub- why did he become the emblem of conservatism? licity it has received, this book could encourage some scholars to look more carefully at Reagan, but it won’t This question would seem incoherent to Reagan persuade anyone to accept Reagan’s greatness by the conservatives, who believe themselves to be, and in force of its argument. fact are, liberals in the classical sense. To illustrate these points, I will focus on two cen- They believe in smaller government, popular sov- tral ideas in the book. ereignty limited by natural or God-given inalienable First, that Reagan had a romantic and transcen- rights, individual self-reliance and economic self- dentalist personal philosophy, similar to that of Ralph determination for individuals freed to the extent possi- Waldo Emerson. ble from government regulation. Here, in place of the familiar Reagan of personal In foreign policy, conservatives who align them-

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selves with Reagan are idealists, believing that all peo- corporate bureaucracies and defend government reg- ple are basically the same, respond to the same eco- ulation that helps fend off risk and promote confi- nomic incentives, and will if given the opportunity dence and stability. prefer democracy and self-determination to state Reagan conservatives, on the other hand, admire controls. entrepreneurs and innovators; they understand and They will tend to see the United States as a force for welcome change and what Schumpeter called “cre- good in the world and in this sense have some kinship ative destruction,” despite its propensity for risk, tur- with a Wilsonian foreign policy. Reagan was, without bulence, and uncertainty. question, a liberal in this classical sense. While classical liberals are called conservatives In the American idiom, oddly enough, classical in today’s America, there are important differences liberals are called “conservatives.” In the sense that between classical liberals and what I will call Amer- Reagan is the icon of conservatives and Republicans, ican liberals. it can fairly be said that most Republicans and con- The latter, in my view, see people primarily as servatives are classical liberals. Thus, there is no par- members of groups rather than as individuals, believe adox in his promoting classical liberal ideas as an the power of the state is necessary to protect individ- “emblem of conservatism.” uals and groups from economic exploitation, and do There is, of course, another strand of conservat- not see the United States as an unalloyed force for ism which is not associated with Reagan. This conser- good in the world. vatism descends from Edmund Burke’s respect for Thus, American liberalism’s foreign policy is suspi- society’s institutions, and especially their effect in cious of and generally hostile to the use of U.S. econom- preventing turbulence and chaos. ic or military power in dealing with other countries and Traditional conservatives of this stripe—true to is more sympathetic than most Americans to concilia- their fear of chaos—generally see value in large stable tion with hostile groups. This distinction becomes important when we get to considering the role that Diggins ascribes to Reagan in the collapse of Communism and the Soviet Union. The views of American liberals would be com- pletely foreign to Ronald Reagan, and I would say to most Americans. In fact, Americans seem to have bro- ken the code. That’s why American liberals today call themselves “progressives,” and why conservatives can identify themselves as such without fearing that they will be considered hidebound or defenders of the status quo.

HE MISPERCEPTION about Reagan’s philosophy is fundamental to where this book goes wrong, T because it seems to consider Reagan without any philosophical or political context. Thus, Diggins spends a good deal of time attempt- ing to identify Reagan with Emerson’s transcendental- ism, in which Emerson articulated an idealistic view of human nature that transcended Christian notions of sin and evil. To be sure, there is something here—Reagan was certainly an idealist with great faith in individual effort and especially the American people—but the only way to say that Reagan was an Emersonian and had views that differed fundamentally from traditional Christianity is to tear Reagan from a philosophical con-

70 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JULY/AUGUST 2007 BOOKS IN REVIEW

text of his own construction. Reagan would use the language of idealism to ra- For example, in what is one of the book’s few quo- tionalize the schemes of materialism, forgetting tations from Reagan, Diggins cites the following sen- altogether Jesus and poverty and humility in or- tence from a lecture Reagan delivered at Moscow der to reconceive Christianity to make it serve the State University: interests and power of the rich classes.

Even as we explore the most advanced reaches of ••• science, we’re returning to the age-old wisdom of our culture, a wisdom contained in the Book of [Reagan thought:] Our beliefs about God no longer Genesis in the Bible: In the beginning was the spir- repress but liberate as though Christ died on the it and it was from this spirit that the material abun- cross so that we might better pursue happiness, dance of creation issued forth. not the salvation of our souls.

Anyone who understood Reagan’s philosophy ••• and outlook would have instantly known what he was saying. Reagan was a believer in what I’ll call the spir- Tocqueville presaged Reagan in sensing that the it of enterprise—the entrepreneur’s ability, if given American people, instead of seeking to be right the necessary freedom, to innovate and create value. with Jesus, or putting the public good ahead of all Incidentally, this does not mean getting rich. It other concerns, only loved “material enjoyment.” means being productive so that others can live better If a life devoted excessively to an evanescent mate- lives. rialism and its “petty pleasures” filled Tocqueville Thus, immediately after his “spirit” remark, with “religious dread,” it delighted Reagan. Reagan continued with this: None of these statements, regrettably, is accompa- But progress is not foreordained. The key is free- nied by footnotes, or references to things Reagan actu- dom—freedom of thought, freedom of informa- ally said. As far as I can tell, the sole support for these tion, freedom of communication. The renowned interpolations of Reagan’s philosophy is his statement scientist, scholar, and founding father of this uni- about “the spirit” in Genesis at Moscow State Uni- versity, Mikhail Lomonosov, knew that. “It is versity. But in the context of Reagan’s thought, that common knowledge,” he said, “that the achieve- turns out to have a quite different meaning from what ments of science are considerable and rapid, par- Diggins gave it. ticularly once the yoke of slavery is cast off and Reagan was not talking at all about religion or replaced by the freedom of philosophy.” God when he mentioned “the spirit.” He was reciting one element of views he had always held: that materi- This is pure Reagan, pure classical liberalism. al progress and abundance come from human free- But without this context, Diggins seems to take dom—by which he of course meant the freedom of Reagan’s words literally, summarizing what he be- people to communicate and innovate without the lieves Reagan was saying as follows: “God created the intervention of government. world to bring forth the affluent society of sheer ab- The “spirit” Reagan was talking about was the spir- undance. Religious faith depends upon the fecundity it of entrepreneurship and innovation. His reference to of plenty.” “the spirit” in Genesis was metaphorical, not literal. This is indeed a radical idea—that God wants It seems to me that Diggins's error here arises mankind to seek and enjoy material abundance, in from not understanding Reagan’s attachment to a fact He created the world for that purpose—but there classical liberal philosophy, and thus not understand- is no hint of support for the proposition that Reagan ing his words in this context. actually believed this. The same problem arises with respect to Dig- Yet Diggins, a renowned intellectual historian, gins’s discussion of Reagan’s political philosophy. He puts Reagan in an intellectual context that most of writes: us—and certainly Ronald Reagan—wouldn’t recog- nize. Here are a few more examples: Reagan’s political philosophy is also problematic because his theory of government has little refer-

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ence to the principles of the American founding. enforcement, ask the air traffic controllers. Tom Paine, Reagan’s hero, is anathema to most con- To the extent that Reagan wanted to reduce the servative intellectuals, who prefer The Federalist weight and impact of government, it was certainly not Papers as the foundation of political wisdom. to loosen the reins of social control or satisfy the appetites of the people. His admiration for Tom Paine Okay, that’s mostly accurate. But then he continues: came from the sense that, again in an economic con- text, revolution—“creative destruction” in Schum- Reagan, the scourge of big government, made it peter’s phrase—was a positive good. inevitable. The true conservatives, the founders, Without this political and philosophical context, framed a specific system of authority in govern- Reagan’s statement in his first inaugural address that ment to check the demands of the people. Reagan’s “government isn’t the solution to our problem; gov- rejection of authority and his celebration of the ernment is the problem” could be construed as loos- people thwarted efforts to limit their will….Under ening government’s limitations on the “will of the Reagan, Americans could live off the government people,” but that is of course no what Reagan had in and hate it at the same time. [Emphasis added.]. mind. What he meant was not that people should expect There are no citations for “Reagan’s rejection of or demand more from government, or that he wanted authority” or his “celebration of the people” and none government to reduce its traditional role in law enforce- for the rather unconventional idea that the ment and social control, but that he was going to remove Constitution was intended to check the demands of government as an obstacle to economic growth. the people rather than the power of the government. As he said that day: “Now, so there will be no mis- The general idea here, I guess, is that Reagan— understanding, it’s not my intention to do away with while denouncing government—actually presided government. It is rather to make it work—work with over its enlargement, and that was because he did not us, not over us; to stand by our side, not ride on our want to interfere with the will of the people. back. Government can and must provide opportunity, In one sense it’s true that the government grew not smother it; foster productivity, not stifle it.” under Reagan, but not for the reasons Diggins assigns. Reagan worked to free the American people to be Reagan certainly enlarged government spending on economically productive but certainly not to “live off defense, and was unable to stem the growth of enti- the government.” tlements, but as my colleague Veronique de Rugy has Accordingly, Reagan’s views of government were pointed out, while Reagan boosted defense outlays by much in tune with those of the Founders, including the 26 percent during his first term, he cut inflation- authors of The Federalist Papers, who—far from wanting adjusted non-defense spending by 9.7 percent. a strong government to restrain the people—were at No other modern president, from Lyndon John- pains to demonstrate that the Constitution had limited son to George W. Bush, has ever actually cut non-enti- the power of the government through the checks and tlement spending. And there is little doubt that if balances in the Constitution’s separation of powers. Reagan could have controlled entitlement spending, The idea was to assure the people’s liberties. When he would have done so, but the Democratic constit- this did not prove to be a sufficiently persuasive limita- uency for entitlements was too strong during his ten- tion on government power, the Founders endorsed the ure as president. adoption of the Bill of Rights, without which it is doubt- Nor is it accurate to place Reagan in opposition in ful that the Constitution would have been ratified by any sense to the ideas of the Founders or even the two the people of the states. authors of The Federalist Papers, Madison and Ham- ilton, especially if the point is that Reagan wanted to HE FAILURE TO UNDERSTAND REAGAN’Sclassical lib- loosen the reins of social control and free “the will of eral philosophy, his belief in the power of ideas, the people.” T and the nature of the conservative movement Citing Reagan’s suspicion of government as a con- itself seems to have led Professor Diggins to ascribe a cern about the people’s liberties is certainly accurate, more limited role to Reagan in the downfall of Com- but that does not in any sense mean that Reagan be- munism in the Soviet Union than in fact he played. lieved there was no need for “compulsory authority.” This is ironic, because Reagan’s role in this If you don’t believe me about Reagan’s view of law momentous historical event is the one thing that

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caused Diggins to classify him, along with Lincoln, as up the political mind; the second, ‘restructuring,’ the one of the greatest American presidents. “Reagan did attempt to reorganize the economy closer to a free mar- accomplish a great deal,” he writes, ket system.” Gorbachev is thus seen as an independent actor; so much so that he may be, after Lincoln, one of the Reagan is not a factor in Gorbachev’s actions. two or three truly great presidents in American his- Reagan’s role is different: “To be sure,” Diggins tory. All earlier presidents believed that the cold notes, “Reagan supported the arms buildup, actually war could be stabilized and communism at best begun under President Jimmy Carter, but he soon contained….The startling breakthrough came with came to see that the only answer to the cold war was Reagan in the mid-eighties, which forecast the to call it off.” beginning of the end of the superpower rivalry. Two There are two implications here, both of which momentous urgencies—Gorbachev’s desperate reduce Reagan’s actual role. need to initiate domestic reform, and Reagan’s First, the suggestion that Reagan was merely fol- growing fear of nuclear escalation veering out of lowing Jimmy Carter’s initiative in pursuing a mili- control—converged to change the course of history. tary buildup is a badly distorted summary of reality. Carter’s military buildup, such as it was, did not It is important to notice the respective roles of begin until after he was shocked by the Soviet inva- the two actors here, Reagan and Gorbachev. Gor- sion of Afghanistan, an event quite late in his presi- bachev’s role is to initiate domestic reforms, while dency, after he had told the American people to get Reagan’s is to act on a fear of nuclear escalation. over their "inordinate fear of communism.” “[I]n the end,” Diggins writes, “what brought down In addition, speeches that Reagan made before communism was liberalism itself, specifically Gor- he became president—and featured in Lou Cannon’s bachev’s introduction of glasnost and perestroika. The work—show that he was following a considered strat- first expression signified ‘openness,’ the attempt to free egy of either showing the Soviets that they could not

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JULY/AUGUST 2007 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR 73 BOOKS IN REVIEW

compete with the U.S. in military power, or bankrupt- curse. Fortunately for history, Reagan had ceased ing their economy if they actually tried. listening to his advisers and started listening to In either case, Reagan saw the buildup as a key himself. element of his policy toward the Soviets, which he pursued from the beginning of his presidency. Again, there are no citations that identify these Reagan did not suddenly have a revelation that a “conservative hawks.” nuclear war was an intolerable prospect. In fact, in an But we actually know who these people were. important sense the military buildup was a risky pol- Because of the way Reagan conducted his office, he icy, since it might have induced the Soviets to consid- had a very limited number of direct advisers on for- er a first strike, before the U.S. became too powerful. eign policy, so we can almost name them all. The same risk was associated with the Strategic His advisers were the secretaries of state and Defense Initiative, which Reagan saw as having two defense, the national security adviser, the director of purposes—to show the Soviets our technological prow- the CIA, and his chief of staff; these were the advisers ess and to persuade them that their nuclear power was he met with regularly. a wasting asset. During Reagan’s two terms, they included Alex- If Reagan was driven by a fear of nuclear war, he ander Haig, George Shultz, Cap Weinberger, Bill Casey, was not following a policy that was the most likely to Robert Gates, Bud McFarlane, John Poindexter, Frank avert it. Carlucci, Jim Baker, Don Regan, and Howard Baker. The second distortion is Diggins's idea that Are these the “conservative hawks” whom Rea- Reagan could “call off” the Cold War. gan ignored? That badge does not seem appropriate The implication here is that the U.S. was the cul- for what we know of these people. pable party—that various groups in the U.S. were Weinberger and Casey were the only ones who quite willing to continue the confrontation with the might come close. But neither was clearly out for war, Soviets, as they had for almost 40 years, and Reagan’s just military strength. unique contribution was to transcend the views of his But why this emphasis on unnamed neocons and advisers and try to make peace. conservative hawks? My guess is that suggesting that Throughout the book, Diggins refers to these Reagan ignored hawkish advice enhances his role in war-loving advisers as “neocons,” who are constantly bringing down Communism and ending the Cold in his narrative skulking in the background, but he War. Otherwise, despite Diggins’s praise, Reagan—in never identifies who they are. the Diggins account—really seems to have had little to For example, Diggins writes: “The neocon hard- do with these events. liners sought victory, not peace, or a peace by fear This seems rather shocking, since the book has rather than trust until the enemy collapses in exhaus- gotten a lot of attention precisely because it cites tion. They believed that Russia could be cowed into Reagan’s role in ending the Cold War as the reason he surrendering. Frederick the Great, Napoleon, and should be considered a great president. Hitler had also believed so.” But read carefully, the book gives the real credit to There are no footnotes or other support for these Gorbachev. Reagan’s role, according to Diggins, was to assessments, or any of the others about the “neo- overcome the fear of Communism and the Soviets that cons.” One wonders if these are the same neocons gripped Washington, to recognize the overwhelming who have been condemned as hopeless idealists for danger of nuclear war, and to persuade Gorbachev that believing that Iraq, after Hussein, could emerge as a the United States had no military or other designs on secular Arab democracy. the Soviet Union. In any event, Diggins praises Reagan for ignoring This sounds vaguely familiar. Where have we the advice of the “conservative hawks,” whoever they heard it before? might be: Yes, it is the American liberal view of the Cold War. It was the fault of the United States, of our xenophobia, He saw history as open to change and freedom. obsessive anti-Communism, and war-like behavior. They saw history as dark and foreboding, the lib- No wonder Reagan is a great president. He was eral world too naïve to understand what needed to elected as a conservative, but had the sense to become be done and the communist world forever stuck a liberal! with communism, as though condemned by a What Diggins never asks, however, is why Gorba-

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chev felt the need to restructure Soviet society with that Reagan was one of our greatest presidents glasnost and perestroika. would have had greater substance and been more If he had asked this question, he would have been persuasive. able to identify more clearly Reagan’s role in bringing about the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet system. Present at the Destruction First, of course, was the U.S. military buildup— not a very American liberal thing to do—which really LI ALLAWI, AN ECONOMIST BY TRAINING, was minis- seems to have shaken Gorbachev’s confidence in the ter of trade and briefly minister of defense under ability of the Soviet Union to keep pace with the Athe U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority United States in the military sphere. (CPA) and then minister of finance following the 2005 The crowning blow appears to have been elections that established Iraq’s Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, which Gorba- transitional government. Allawi The Occupation of Iraq: chev apparently feared; the entire minuet around the has written an important book, Winning the War, Reykjavik summit seems to have been choreographed The Occupation of Iraq: Winning Losing the Peace by Gorbachev in order to eliminate SDI as a threat to the War, Losing the Peace, the first By Ali A. Allawi the Soviet nuclear deterrent. major work by an Iraqi on this (YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 518 PAGES, $28) Perhaps more important was the enormous conflict. Its subtitle seems to change that Reagan’s policies of deregulation, open reflect the view of most Iraqis, to Reviewed by Laurie Mylroie trade, and tax cuts had on the U.S. economy. judge from this reviewer’s expe- The sudden burst of growth starting in 1983, with riences in Baghdad in recent weeks. Iraqis are grateful the elimination of inflation and the decline in unem- Saddam is gone, but there is electricity one or two hours ployment, impressed governments and economic a day only, because insurgents are toppling the trans- advisers around the world, and could not have failed mission towers. The water supply is erratic, because it to impress Gorbachev. depends on electricity, and fuel is expensive and in short Countries began privatizing government held supply. The U.S. “surge” has improved security some- assets and freeing up markets in order to capture what, but Baghdad remains dangerous. some of the growth and innovation that was so obvi- In short, life is difficult here, and Allawi’s first- ous in the United States. hand account of events helps explain why. The United In his speech to the students and faculty of Moscow States long had great difficulty finding and working State University in 1988, Reagan cleverly emphasized with Iraqis to replace Saddam’s regime—and this did the development of computers and the micro- not change with President George Bush’s decision to processors, and made clear that this innovation would oust that regime or even with its fall. The CIA and either break open closed societies or leave them in the State Department, reflecting an Arabist perspective dust. Only if communication were freer would this tech- oriented to the Sunni Arab regimes allied with the nological innovation be of any value. United States, had one vision for Iraq—essentially to Unquestionably, Gorbachev read this speech, reproduce a regime like theirs. The Pentagon and and was smart enough to realize that the totalitarian Vice President’s office had another—a democratic game was up. form of government that would end the dictatorship The Soviet government could not hope to main- of Iraq’s minority Sunni Arabs and accommodate the tain control of the information its population will Shia majority, as well as the Kurds. Rhetorically, receive and still keep up with technological develop- President Bush embraced democracy for Iraq, but in ments in the West, and particularly the United States. practice, policy flip-flopped. When Reagan made these points in Moscow, and The original U.S. idea after the fall of Baghdad was tied them to the open society and individual freedom to turn authority over to the largely exile Iraqi politi- that was the central point in his classical liberal phi- cians, with whom Washington had dealt throughout losophy, he was once again putting on display his belief in the power of ideas. Laurie Mylroie is an adjunct fellow at the American If Professor Diggins had followed this line of Enterprise Institute and author of Study of Revenge: approach to Reagan, rather than trying to convert The First World Trade Center Attack and Saddam him into an American liberal, his astute observation Hussein’s War Against America (AEI Press).

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