An Armey of One

“Armey’s Axioms” is not a memoir, although reminiscence is in it; and it is not a treatise, although views are explained. Rather, it is framed as a series of forty lessons concerning the nature of power and image in human relationships. Along the way, three different themes become evident.

The first is a defense of the author’s conservative principles. The second is a list of the mistakes to avoid if one wishes a life inside politics. And the third is a list of the things to avoid if one wants any kind of a life.

One of the things that Armey will tell you is that political life is unfair. “Liberals tend to focus on outcomes,” he writes. “This is why they like big government in situations where they are not required to produce the means.” Liberals promise to take you to Disneyland while conservatives warn you that school is tomorrow–and that, anyhow, you may not have enough money to get to Disneyland. For instance, everyone wants to attain “social justice,” but no two people agree on its meaning, and efforts to force it, like affirmative action, always cause terrible rows and problems.

In similar mode, liberals tend to back “fairness” (which always means some kind of government program) while conservatives like to let people spend their own money, which liberals talk down as “greed.” To Armey, private spending is the path to a well-run society, as it tends to create a good life for more people by keeping costs under control. Spending privately, as he tells us, people spend carefully. “They shop. They compare. They ration. Everything they buy is considered against the next-best alternative. They understand the limits of their finances, and are careful not to waste. In so doing, they guide the country to an efficient allocation of its resources, and to that basket of goods that provides maximum happiness.” By contrast, he cites the cases of health care and college, both of which have come under the benevolent eye of the federal government–and seen their costs soar out of sight.

Armey views congressmen who back lavish funding for diseases suffered by their own friends and relatives as selfish in the extreme. “Many of these maladies . . . deserve the attention of the federal government. However, they should be weighed objectively against one another with regard to their overall benefit. . . . My point is that people elected to high office have no right to legislate their own heartaches. . . . Yet they do it, and when they do it, they fight like cornered rats.” Armey seems to know that for this piece of normative conservative thinking he will be savaged for being “hard-hearted,” although in reality he is looking out for the interests of others with different diseases and no powerful friends to plead for them, who will be shortchanged in the process. But this can be hard to explain.

IF ARMEY THE THEORIST is a predictable figure, Armey the mentor is not. But most of this book is a series of home truths–strictly nonpartisan–about the mistakes people make. He blames his own party for the James Jeffords defection, which temporarily cost it control of the Senate; and Newt Gingrich himself for most of Newt’s troubles. In the first case, Republicans misread the balance of power: Jeffords held all the cards in the power equation, and they themselves held very few.

Though nominally elected on the Republican line, he was wholly in tune with his liberal voters and through a defection would stand to gain everything: adulation, publicity, ego satisfaction, book contracts, and praise. In trying to either pressure or punish him, Republican leaders, standing on the narrow ground of a one-vote majority, had everything to lose, and they did. For Gingrich, Armey coins the axiom: “If you insist on center stage, you get the tomatoes.” Gingrich did not seem to realize he had made himself into an irresistible target.

In short, Armey advises politicians to under-promise and over-perform, not brag about triumphs until they develop and possibly not even then. He disputes the adage “Don’t get mad, get even,” calling vengeance a sad waste of energy. When you make a mistake, he advises, do not revisit it in an attempt to correct it; it will just revive bad old memories. (“When you run over a skunk, it is going to leave a terrible smell . . . but if you drive far enough, fast enough you can leave it behind.”) He tells us not to brood over slights, but to trust in the public’s good judgment: “Your audience is a world of third parties, and you must rely on their good sense.”

“Armey’s Axioms” is a book about politics–in the lower-case sense of the word: a series of lessons in life. “Some people don’t feel free unless they are free from responsibility,” Armey informs us. “If that is your misunderstanding, you will never be free and you will never be happy. You will live your life like a hapless child, being forever a victim in a world that seems too demanding and too cruel.” He tells us we can never be happy unless we live for something beyond our own comfort.

He also tells us not to rely on the kindness of strangers: “When you tell people your troubles, 90 percent of them don’t care and the other 10 percent are glad you have them,” he says. He warns us never to look for perfection in others, warns us that life can often turn “ugly,” and that when we are faced with a difficult problem, it is better to face it head on. He tells us that relationships can often end badly, and that we must be prepared to pay up when they do. “If you want the divorce . . . you give up the house,” Armey tells us. “Don’t expect to get out of the trap and take the cheese with you.”

Your mother may have once told you this, but you can’t hear it too often. Read this and learn.

Noemie Emery is a contributing editor to The Weekly Standard.