Letters

From the February 1997 issue

Clinton Clobbered

Richard B. McKenzie ("Clinton Confidential," November) tries to have it both ways: giving Clinton credit for the fact that "the relative growth in federal spending seen during the Bush years has been reversed during the Clinton years" and also admitting that Clinton "has not been able to expand federal involvement in the economy as much as he imagined he could four years ago."

Indeed, if the era of big government is over, it is in spite of Bill Clinton and not because of him. In February 1993 Clinton announced his first economic program--a $16 billion "fiscal stimulus" package that was nothing but a pork-filled payback to the big city Democratic mayors who helped him win election. In September 1993 he lobbied to defeat the bipartisan Penny-Kasich bill that would have cut federal spending and the deficit by $90 billion over five years.

In January 1994 Bill and Hillary announced ClintonCare, the proposed government takeover of one-seventh of the U.S. economy that the Congressional Budget Office projected would have added at least $75 billion to the deficit over six years. In January 1995 Bill Clinton submitted a 1996 budget plan that called for $12 trillion of spending over seven years and $200 billion deficits as far as the eye could see. Clinton's April 1995 budget, according to the CBO, would have had a $210 billion deficit in 1996, rising to $349 billion by 2002. In February 1996 Bill Clinton released a $1.6 trillion 1997 budget that increased spending by $360 billion over seven years, or $3,100 per American household.

It is hard to see how Clinton's proposal for spending like the Gipper's proverbial drunken sailor "compares favorably" with the record of Ronald Reagan. Not on this planet. Professor McKenzie concedes that the "Clinton White House has been constrained by Republicans in the Congress" but alleges "the differences between the two on budgets" are only "a matter of a few billion dollars a year."

Really? A few billion? Former Congressman Tim Penny and Stephen Moore of the Cato Institute state that between 1996 and 2002 "the federal government will borrow about $1.1 trillion less under the congressional budget than it would have otherwise" had not the GOP taken control of Congress in 1994. Indeed, the 104th Congress, not Bill Clinton, produced a real cut--not just reduced growth but a real cut--in discretionary spending of $53 billion. Christopher Frenze, chief economist to the Joint Economic Committee, notes further: "Of the $126 billion decline in the deficit between 1992 and 1995, $71 billion is accounted for by a continuation of the business cycle, $21 billion by swings in deposit insurance outlays related to the S&L problem, and $8 billion by spectrum auctions."

Professor McKenzie says we "should be happy that Bill Clinton defeated George Bush." Instead, we should be lighting candles for Newt Gingrich. Daniel John Sobieski Chicago, IL Richard McKenzie replies: I find truly amazing the extent to which policy partisans seek to shift the grounds of the debate when the numbers don't turn out the way those partisans might like. My article sought to evaluate the Clinton years (as distinguished from the Clinton effect) by way of key measures of government involvement in the economy that have been used widely in the past by Republicans and conservatives to tout the record of the Reagan years (as distinguished from the Reagan effect). My article was concerned with what happened, not with who did it.

What happened during the past four years stands in sharp contrast with what a lot of people think happened (which can also be said about the 1980s). I agree that Clinton intended to be an activist president and that the data cited emerged in spite of his fondest dreams. I don't give much credit to the Republicans either. As Rick Henderson reports elsewhere in this issue (page 10), Dwight Lee and I were so confident back in 1992 that government would be a smaller part of the national economy in 1996--in spite of Bill Clinton's election and in spite of Democratic dominance of the Congress at the time--that we wagered $500 in print in this magazine. We won! I suspect that Mr. Sobieski would have been eager back then to take our bet. He would have lost.

Contemplating Koontz

Thanks for running the interview with Dean Koontz ("Contemplating Evil," November). I've read most of Koontz's novels and have found him to be a friend of liberty and human dignity, as well as a very entertaining storyteller. I hope many of your readers try Koontz's novels. I suggest they start with Watchers and Mr. Murder. If they can read these two and not go immediately back to the book store for more, they're probably hopeless policy wonks who watch C-SPAN on Friday nights.

While Koontz's novels are not overtly political--Dark Rivers of the Heart is the most political-- there's always an anti-government meddling, pro-individual subtext that takes intelligent pokes (and the occasional body slam) at the futility of and outright dangers posed by big government. He spares neither left nor right.

Koontz's disadvantage with serious (I hate to use that word here, but I don't know what other adjective to use) readers is the supernatural dimension of his novels. He gives us some monsters, human and otherwise. But he also gives us rich, non-monstrous characters we can care about; great suspense, mystery, romance; and satisfying endings. His characters overcome their obstacles through solid human qualities, not with supernatural tricks.

With the great stories, we also get the Koontz world view, which is worth the price of admission. It's a view that libertarians and most conservatives (the ones getting enough fiber in their diets) find simpatico. And he's a lot more fun to read than Ayn Rand. Larry Thornberry Tampa, FL

Thank you so much for the wonderful Dean Koontz interview. What took you so long? I'd been wondering when REASON was going to comment on the intellectually stimulating, freedom- loving ideas in his novels. If the stories themselves, and the characters, weren't engrossing enough, his style elevates writing to an art form. I'm still wondering, though, why there was no mention in the interview of some of his call-to-arms novels, so reminiscent of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. This might have helped some of your readers, not familiar with his novels, better understand the gist of the interview. I enjoyed the interview immensely. It was just what I needed in the midst of this politically charged climate. Roberto M. Sanabria [e-mail]

Questioning Authoritarianism