Reagan Economist Slams Bush

This book makes some points that we principled conservatives have been making all along:

The title is stunning: “Imposter: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy.” The author is Bruce Bartlett, an economist who worked in the Reagan administration. The publisher is Doubleday, not some highly suspect publishing company with a political axe to grind.

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It is no secret that many conservatives who consider themselves true Reaganites are disdainful of Bush, but Bartlett doesn’t pull any punches in his indictment of a man who, in his opinion, has betrayed many of Reagan’s principles.

While the White House portrays Bush as a conservative president with a conservative agenda, he writes that conservatives know better.

“He is simply a partisan Republican, anxious to improve the fortunes of his party, to be sure. But he is perfectly willing to jettison conservative principles at a moment’s notice to achieve that goal,” Bartlett writes.

[Bartlett] faults Bush’s tax cuts, calling them ill-designed. He finds his trade policy too dotted with protectionist moves, adding that he has the worst policy on free trade since Herbert Hoover. The Medicare prescription drug bill is “the worst legislation in history” because of his massive future costs, he says, and he has not vetoed a single bill as he increased the size of government. Two of the unkindest cuts in the book: Bill Clinton had a better record on controlling the deficit, he says, and Bush has the many of the same kinds of policies as Richard Nixon.

I think it is unlikely that the Bush administration will take this criticism to heart at this late date. Hopefully, the contenders for the Republican ticket in '08 will do so.

UPDATE: From the same Chicago Tribune site, could this be a related story?

Claude A. Allen, the president’s domestic policy adviser, turned in his letter of resignation today at the White House, the Bush administration acknowledged tonight.