[Interview] Phil Gramm: The Return of Dr. No

WSJ: Commentary: The Weekend Interview ^ | June 28, 2008 | Stephen Moore

[Uncle Ralph]

Terry Shoffner

"They didn't live up to what they promised to do. Power corrupted them. They spent lots of money and tried to buy votes. Republicans concluded that they could make voters love them by governing the way Democrats did."

So says former Texas senator and current John McCain economics adviser Phil Gramm.

When he rode off into the political sunset in 2002 for a high-rolling investment banking job at UBS, there was joy among many of his liberal colleagues on Capitol Hill. For two decades the man who came to be called "Dr. No" had earned a reputation as a one-man wrecking crew of big-government legislative priorities. "I consider defeating Hillary health care as one of my greatest accomplishments," he says.

A look at the record confirms that Mr. Gramm played a decisive role in nearly every fiscal conservative victory in the 1980s and '90s -- from the Reagan budget and tax cuts to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley banking reforms of the late 1990s.

Mr. Gramm tells me he's been "intentionally invisible" since leaving Washington "so that he could devote his full energies" to the art of the deal on Wall Street. This is his first lengthy interview on politics in years...

[Liberty Valance]

ping

[allmost]

Let him rant. Hear hear!

[fieldmarshaldj]

McCain’s Treasury Secretary ?

[kbennkc]

Will the real Dr. No please report to Spectre Number 1 .

[BenLurkin]

I thought Phil Graham would have made a fine President a decade or two ago.

[kbennkc]

I thought Phil Graham would have made a fine President a decade or two ago,

I'll bet a lot of the people who used to take shots at his wife would think she seems pretty good compared to Michelle O .

[ninonitti]

I liked him when he tested the waters in 96 before we put up the tired old man. I notice that he dispatches Bush’s people pleasing budget policy but how big would Juan’s veto pen be if he’s up against a down economy and a Dimo Congress.

[upsdriver]

I thought Phil Graham would have made a fine President a decade or two ago.

He was my choice in '96.

[iowamark]

Three years ago when I interviewed Mr. McCain, he admitted that he doesn't understand economics very well. Clearly neither does Barack Obama. But one thing that separates the two is that at least Mr. McCain has the good sense to know where to turn to for first-rate advice.

So have I been speaking with the next Treasury secretary? Almost certainly, yes, if Mr. McCain wins in November. "I don't feel any burning desire to do it," Mr. Gramm tells me. "Look, I had a great career and I quit when I was at the top of my game. I'm not eager to come back." Then he chuckles and says only half-jokingly, "I know a lot of people on the left, who would hate like hell to see me come back."

[johnthebaptistmoore]

When you talk to most people, “Dr. No” is Ron Paul and not the James Bond character, if “Dr. No” is anyone at all in their minds. Too many young voters won’t have a clue of who “Dr. No” is.

[backhoe]

"They didn't live up to what they promised to do. Power corrupted them. They spent lots of money and tried to buy votes. Republicans concluded that they could make voters love them by governing the way Democrats did."

I've said that all along. For whatever it's worth...

[SoConPubbie]

Three years ago when I interviewed Mr. McCain, he admitted that he doesn't understand economics very well. Clearly neither does Barack Obama. But one thing that separates the two is that at least Mr. McCain has the good sense to know where to turn to for first-rate advice.

Does anybody really believe this nonsense?

If that were true, he would not be pandering to the left with his support of the Global Warming Scam and the Carbon Cap-and-Trade System that he wants to implement in the US which will totally wreck the US economy.

[Liberty Valance]

"Does anybody really believe this nonsense?"

LOL - not for a minute. You make a great point there.

[SoConPubbie]

LOL - not for a minute. You make a great point there.

I don't know who Phil Gramm thinks he's fooling, however, anyone with a political pulse knows he's lying through his teeth.

[iowamark]

The article mentions Gramm's take on cap and trade:

I remind Mr. Gramm that Mr. McCain supports the multitrillion dollar cap-and-trade global warming tax, which contradicts much of what he says on shrinking government. It is comforting to learn that Mr. Gramm is not so comfortable with that McCain position. He agrees that this legislation would be "one of the largest interventions of government into our economy in my lifetime and could do lasting economic damage. We can't allow Congress to spend any of the revenues from selling these carbon allowances." One Gramm idea would be to claim the revenues to allow "real private investments that are owned by Social Security recipients."

[SoConPubbie]

One Gramm idea would be to claim the revenues to allow "real private investments that are owned by Social Security recipients."

That's rich, more BIG government intervention to try and cure more BIG government intervention.

The irony of it all is staggering, especially coming from someone whose has had, in the past, a sterling reputation for being a Small-Government, small 'l' libertarian leaning conservative Republican.

This is what happens when you sign on to try and put lipstick on the proverbial pig, YOU GET DIRTY!

[SupplySider]

I think that is just Mr. Gramm making the best of an ugly idea of John McCain's.

In the next election, I'll be voting for Phil Gramm first, against Obama second, and for John McCain, well, I'll just stick with first and second.

"When you help a company raise capital, to put its idea to work, and you create jobs, those jobs are the best housing program, education program, nutrition program, health program ever created. Look, if a man in one lifetime is responsible for creating 100 real jobs, permanent jobs, then he's done more than most do-gooders have ever achieved."

Amen!

"Why is America the richest country in the world?" he asks. "It's not because our people are more brilliant; it's because we have a better free-market system. Why has Texas created 1.6 million jobs in the last 10 years whereas Michigan has lost 300,000 jobs and Ohio has lost 100,000 jobs? Because governance matters, taxes matter, regulation matters. Our opponents in this campaign are so dogmatic in their goal of having more government because they love the power it brings to them that they're willing to let it impose costs on the working people that they say they want to help. I am not."

Thank you!

Reaganomics still lives and breathes, on the Journal editorial page, the Larry Kudlow show, with Steve Forbes and, if McCain is elected, in the national government in the person of Phil Gramm.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

I don't know who Phil Gramm thinks he's fooling, however, anyone with a political pulse knows he's lying through his teeth.

You owe Phil Gramm an apology. This is one fine man and this country is better because of him. This man stopped Hillary Care.

[SupplySider]

This man stopped Hillary Care.

Indeed he did, nearly single-handedly.

I am very excited about the prospect of Treasury Secretary Gramm. If that happens, in my humble opinion he will be the first decent one in my lifetime. He is not a washed out mealy-mouthed corporate type like every appointee of a Bush, nor an unprincipled pragamatist like the Reagan appointees, nor a repellant Marxist like we get from every Democrat.

For the Obama lovers who tout "diversity", how about Wendy Gramm? She happens to be Asian American, for those who care about the categories, but more importantly she is a serious financial markets scholar and a heck of a free-market advocate.

This country needs fewer adversarial win at all costs lawyers, and more principled thinkers. Bring on the Texas economists!