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Currently, Reagan seems to be misreading both the prospects for the economy and the meaning of his 1980 mandate. Unquestionably, many of the Reagan voters two years ago were indeed expressing resentful anger against Big Government and a yearning for a firm foreign policy based on steady opposition to Soviet designs. But many others were simply voting for a change, for the efficient economic and foreign policy management they felt Jimmy Carter had failed to provide. And such efficiency requires an adaptability that Reagan has yet to prove he possesses.
The budget drama is a prize example, important in itself and as an illustration of Reagan's decision-making processes. It had a prologue about a year ago, when a number of advisers, worried about the deficits that already loomed menacingly, pressed the President to prepare a fiscal 1983 budget recommending a slowdown in military spending and sizable tax increases. They were rebuffed so completely that they are not about to challenge the boss's most cherished beliefs so directly again. A favorite saying around the White House is that one staff member or another "broke his pick" confronting Reagan with such unwelcome advice. One prominent pick breaker was Baker. At one point he so nettled Reagan by pressing for excise taxes and defense cuts that the President took off his glasses, glared at his aide and asked, "If that's what you believe, then what in the hell are you doing here?" Says one colleague: "Baker has thrown in the towel" on budget matters.
The shaken advisers decided on a different strategy for this year's budget go-around: they would lay out the figures on expected spending and revenues in all their starkness, add much economic advice about the dire consequences of huge deficits, and report numerous warnings from Reagan's own Republican followers about the rebellious mood in Congress. But they would not urge the President to do or not to do anything. Their hope was that Reagan would see the necessity for military-spending cuts or tax increases and bring those subjects up himself.
The strategy, so far, has failed resoundingly. When Legislative Aide Kenneth Duberstein reported at a budget meeting that even so fervent a congressional hawk as Trent Lott of Mississippi, the Republican House whip, is now calling for a slowdown in military spending, the President silently shook his head no. Reagan then interrupted the uncomfortable session to place a call to the astronauts aboard the Columbia space shuttle. As if glad for an escape, he told the astronauts, "Well, now, wait till I get my hat and I'll go with you."