Power Game

More praise for
The Power Game

ALSO BY HEDRICK SMITH

No book is an individual enterprise. This book, like many others, has benefited greatly from the cooperation, assistance, wisdom, and generosity of many people—my editor, academic mentors, researchers, news sources, journalistic colleagues, friends, and family.

Five people in particular gave special nourishment and encouragement to this book, for which I am deeply grateful: my father, Sterling Smith, whose lifelong questioning of government and whose relentless probing about the real workings of Washington were a stimulus for me to tackle this subject; Kate Medina, my editor at Random House, whose immediate and persistent enthusiasm for the concept and for the reporting, seasoned with insightful and demanding critiques, provided me with both the lift and spur that I wanted and needed; Austin Ranney, my sponsor and friend at American Enterprise Institute, whose gentle coaching and sheer enjoyment of the power game put fun and reward into the work of writing; Bill Nell, my chief researcher, who poured heart and soul and tireless hours and attention to tasks and facts too numerous to begin to enumerate; and Susan, my wife, whose “reader’s reactions” often helped me and whose faith and patience and support nurtured me throughout the writing of this book.

This book would not have been possible without two institutions and their leaders to whom I feel and owe special thanks. Over the past twenty-five years
The New York Times
has given me the rich opportunity of having a fifty-yard-line seat at the power game, and of getting to know so many government officials and congressional politicians at close hand. I am especially grateful to Publisher Punch Sulzberger, and former Executive Editor Abe Rosenthal for granting me a leave of absence to write the manuscript, and to
current Executive Editor Max Frankel, who was understanding when I needed more time.

For one very important year, the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research and its former president. Bill Baroody, Jr., gave me an academic home as a visiting journalist. I am extremely grateful in particular to four senior fellows at AEI—Austin Ranney, Michael Malbin, Norm Ornstein, and John Makin—for their willingness to share so much time and knowledge to educate me. Austin Ranney and Tom Mann of Brookings Institution were generous enough to read the manuscript and give me their insights, and I am deeply in their debt, though obviously I alone bear responsibility for the judgments rendered in this volume.

Many members of Congress and administration officials offered me help or access—some four hundred to five hundred interviews—far too many for me to list them all. And some of the most helpful asked to remain anonymous. I am grateful to Presidents Reagan and Carter for their interviews with me and for similar access to Speakers Tip O’Neill and Jim Wright and Majority Leaders Howard Baker, Bob Dole, and Robert C. Byrd, as well as to scores of members of Congress and several dozen senior Reagan administration officials.

A few people—normally less visible to the public—deserve special mention because they enjoyed analyzing the power game as much as I have and they shared their understanding of the process of governing, and helped me see the patterns more clearly: Richard Darman, who is rich with insights into the levers of power and political dynamics of the presidency, or anywhere on the playing field; Mike Deaver, who has a storyteller’s gift for the inside world of the Reagan White House; Ken Duberstein, Kirk O’Donnell, and Chris Matthews, who tutored me on the ways of new-breed and old-breed politicians in the House; Tom Griscom, Steve Bell, and Linda Peake, whose expertise lay in the Senate; Dick Conlon, who provided vital “institutional memory” on the congressional reforms; Marty Franks and Joe Gaylord, who have for many elections kept me abreast of the partisan battle for control of the House; Bob Sims, unfailingly helpful, whether at the National Security Council or the Defense Department.

Journalistic colleagues helped on many points, large and small, in providing information and refining my own understanding of events—especially Lou Cannon and Hanes Johnson of
The Washington Post;
Charles McDowell of the
Richmond Times-Dispatch;
Charles Corddry of
The Baltimore Sun;
Bob Shogan and Jack Nelson of the
Los Angeles Times;
Steve Roberts, Marty Tolchin, Barbara Gamarekian, and Jonathan Fuerbringer of
The New York Times;
Leslie Stahl of CBS News; Chris Wallace of
NBC News; Sam Donaldson of ABC News; Paul Duke of the Public Broadcasting System; and Brian Lamb of C-Span.

Important material for many chapters in this book was pulled together by my three consecutive researchers—Bill Nell, Lauren Simon-Ostrow, and Kurt Eichenwald—whose assistance was indispensable to my writing. All three assisted me in many ways: compiling files, doing interviews, preparing memos, relentlessly chasing minutiae. Each brought special reporting and research talents to this project, and I am extremely grateful for their care, skill, and dedication. And we all owe thanks to Nancy Ganahl, the librarian at the Washington bureau of the
Times
, for her willing and thoughtful help.

I am most appreciative, too, for support in many areas from Lynda McAvoy, my efficient and cheerful assistant at AEI. To Randa Murphy, Mildred Edlowitz, Lyn Balthazar, and Penny Dixon goes my gratitude for their careful and patient transcribing of literally thousands of pages of my taped interviews.

Through the auspices of AEI, I was fortuante to have the help, too, of several interns, and I hope they got as much from this project as I did from them. Let me thank John Carpenter, Dave Deluca, Stephen Greene, Kathleen Hynde, Phil Hinz, Carol Monaghan, Debra Piehl, Mark Shaw, and Beate Thewalt.

My thanks, too, to Mitchell Ivers for his hours of patient copy-editing of my manuscript, to Olga Tarnowski for so cheerfully shepherding my work through Random House, and to Julian Bach, my literary agent, who got a light in his eye when I first mentioned the power game and who launched the project and put it under Kate Medina’s kind and constructive care.

—H
EDRICK
S
MITH
Chevy Chase, Maryland
February 5, 1989