The American Spectator : Stagflation’s Veep

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Stagflation’s Veep

By Jeremy Lott from the December 2010 - January 2011 issue

Every career has a low point, even Walter Mondale's.

The Good Fight: A Life in Liberal Politics
By Walter Mondale with David Hage
(Scribner, 384 pages, $28)

Every career has a low point: a time when things go so badly that you begin to wonder, what am I doing in this line of work again? For me, that point came while I was serving as the Warren Brookes Journalism Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C. On one particularly galling spring afternoon, I took to wandering the halls of the think tank's old headquarters on Connecticut and K, muttering to myself, looking to the world like I'd just had a near miss with a Japanese bullet train. When concerned colleagues asked what was wrong, I half yelled, "I got stood up by Walter Mondale, that's what!"

It was part of the research for my book on the vice presidents, The Warm Bucket Brigade. I'd set up an interview with Jimmy Carter's veep only to have the rug yanked out from under me at the last minute as work demands from Dorsey & Whitney, his 800-pound gorilla of a law firm, proved more pressing. Eventually we rescheduled and I rediscovered my sense of purpose as a writer of words and phrases. But it was touch and go there. I nearly cried uncle to a man who has lost statewide elections in all 50 states.

As readers will see in Mondale's memoirs, The Good Fight: A Life in Liberal Politics, that took determination and real hard work. The Carter-Mondale ticket lost 27 states and still squeaked out a victory over Gerald Ford in 1976. In 1980, they lost 44 states to Ronald Reagan. In 1984, as the bomber-in-chief of a kamikaze Democratic ticket, Mondale managed to improve on that historically awful performance, but not quite enough.

In 1984, Mondale stood for a nuclear freeze, the unpopular and never ratified Equal Rights Amendment, and raising taxes. He picked a running mate with the personality of a salad shooter. Her husband had tax troubles and mob ties. And they still only managed to lose 49 states. In the final weeks, the Reagan campaign could have taken steps to win Mondale's native Minnesota but decided it would be ungentlemanly to not at least let him have that much.

A lesser man might have conceded victory, but Mondale refused to let that small win stand. In 2002, Minnesota's "magnificent progressive" Senator Paul Wellstone had been heading toward likely reelection when he died in a plane crash. Mondale agreed to jump into the race with 11 days to go but couldn't really "launch the campaign immediately" because there was still the small matter of the Wellstone memorial.

"The story of that event...is now well known," writes Mondale. "It drew a huge turnout: Bill and Hillary Clinton were there, as were Bob Dole and about half the U.S. Senate, Democrats and Republicans." In other words, this was not the best time for partisan speechmaking.

To Mondale's chagrin, members of his party refused to take the hint. While the memorial "started off as a beautiful tribute to Paul and the people who died with him," insists Mondale, "speech by speech it gradually began to take on a political tone, and by the end it had turned into an unintentional rally for Democrats." As a result, "The Republicans who had come to honor Paul felt tricked and abused, and one by one they began to walk out."

In the former vice president's telling, they took a lot of voters with them as they left. Mondale neglects to relate that he called for the repeal of the Bush tax cuts in his debate with St. Paul mayor Norm Coleman, though he does admit that "Even in Minnesota, the message of the unfettered market had a lot of resonance." He admits that Coleman also managed to use his age against him, which would mark the second time the age issue stung him.

In the second Reagan-Mondale debate in 1984, the septuagenarian president did an expert bit of political jujitsu when he announced, "I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent's youth and inexperience." Nearly every American with a healthy sense of humor laughed at that line, Mondale perhaps loudest of all. It is credited as the turn of phrase that got the "Morning in America" campaign back on track. But in all the laughter, many people have missed the razor-sharp jab at the Carter-Mondale administration Reagan followed it with: "I might add that it was Seneca or it was Cicero, I don't know which, that said if it was not for the elders correcting the mistakes of the young, there would be no state."

THIS IS NOWHERE MORE EVIDENT than in Mondale's discussion of the Iran hostage crisis. He's honest enough to concede most of the things that critics charged against the Carter administration. Yes, they first refused any assistance to the Shah and then refused to allow him into America once he was deposed. Yes, they refused to help because they were worried about looking bad. Yes, they dithered. Yes, they had to abandon a military rescue attempt when they decided to go with the smallest possible force and there was an accidental collision. And yes, Iran refused to release the hostages from the U.S. embassy until the minute Reagan was sworn into office, but that doesn't mean that the Carter administration did the wrong thing.

Oh, no, says Mondale: "Some will say it made America look weak and emboldened our enemies. Some have said it revealed a pattern of poor decision-making in the Carter administration. But I take a different lesson, one I think is more important than ever: a caution against the belief that the easy answer -- the emotionally satisfying response -- is the right answer to every crisis."

Some might look at that evaluation and charge that Mondale here elevates diplomacy over national honor, which made him the perfect choice for ambassador to Japan during the Clinton administration. Some might dissect this for the first glimpse of how America would mismanage its relationship with radical Islamists the world over. Some might see in the White House back-and-forth an indictment of moralistic liberalism on the world stage. But I take a different lesson, one I think is at least as important as it was last November 2: thank God Democrats nominated this man in 1984.

About the Author

Jeremy Lott is editor of RealClearBooks.com and RealClearReligion.org and associate editor of RealClearScience.com.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (29) | Leave a comment

Lullabys, Legends and Lies| 12.6.10 @ 7:00AM

I hope the publisher of this book didn't give Walter Mondale too big an advance on this book, because I see this one falling off the bestseller list like a stone. $28 for this borefest? I wouldn't read this book for free, if it was sent to me in a care-package if I was back over in Iraq again (and you're really starved for entertainment over there).

loulou| 12.6.10 @ 9:26AM

Borefest is right.
Is there anyone on earth as boring as Mondull?

Alan Brooks| 12.6.10 @ 11:38PM

"Every career has a low point, even Walter Mondale's."

Lowest must have been when he eventually realized Carter was a dripping puddle of blood from the Watergate abortion. There are drops to this day.

Sarge| 12.7.10 @ 2:45PM

Don't worry about this book falling off the best-seller list. It'll never make it there. By the way, the author is a liberal writer for the Mpls. StarTribune editorial page.

Ken (Old Texican)| 12.6.10 @ 7:37AM

Lullabys,
You pretty much summed him up...a zero and a looser.
He did accomplish one thing though. He taught ALL Democrats that they must lie...and lie convincingly.

Larry| 12.6.10 @ 8:28AM

Walter Mondale? Is anyone supposed to know who this is?

donserge| 12.6.10 @ 8:36AM

I may be wrong but wasn't it Mondale who, while running for office, was caught off-mike saying to an aide: "We're going to tax their a** off". ?

sinanju| 12.6.10 @ 8:42AM

I remember the '02 Minnesota campaign follies quite well. What I saw of The Wellstone Bund rally went beyond tasteless--it was downright frightening. His debate with Norm Coleman, on the other hand, was pathetic. While Norm was polite and deferential "Mr. Vice President"... etc., Mondale came across as an angry, peevish, old fossil who had learned nothing. I was downright embarrassed for him.

Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 12.6.10 @ 8:49AM

Liberalism is never a good fight, not one soldier joins the service to fight for socialism.

WRTolkas| 12.6.10 @ 9:02AM

One historic accomplishment of Mondale: The only person in American Politics to lost an election in ALL FIFTY STATES. Now that is something to be proud of.

George1111| 12.6.10 @ 10:45PM

I guess we will have to wait until 2012 to see Obama repeat it.

Anthony| 12.6.10 @ 9:03AM

Once a clueless lefty, always a clueless lefty. Great, another $1.00 summer book bin sale selection to look for.

Petronius| 12.6.10 @ 9:31AM

My sympathy to the trees that died for this. That wood fashioned into toothpicks that do suspend olives in martinis hath met a more noble end.

Howard| 12.6.10 @ 9:45AM

Sadly, Mondale almost looks good next to the array of slugs the Democrats have nominated in recent years; Gore, Kerry, and Obama. The bar is set real low.

ACynic| 12.6.10 @ 10:29AM

I bet that Mondale uses, to the limit, every conceivable tax break that his tax lawyers can think of. I wll also bet that Mondale has placed millions of dollars in a trust fund to allow much of his wealthy to pass on to his kids and grandkids, bypassing the "death tax."
I have zero regard for this hypocrite. Like most "progressives" he talks the talk, but does not walk the walk.

Conservative_Monster| 12.6.10 @ 10:43AM

Who in hael is Walter Mondale??

Nunya| 12.6.10 @ 10:49AM

A sorry excuse for a politician, a retread loser who has little talent, and a liar.

Still, he's better than Obozo. ;-)

Conservative_Monster| 12.6.10 @ 4:37PM

Is he the one that had that Ferraro fellah on his ticket?

Alert1201| 12.6.10 @ 12:32PM

He was the guy who was instrumental in canceling the remaining Apollo moonlandings. He did it for the children.

Michael| 12.6.10 @ 2:34PM

His one good political goal (unmet), he tried to convince Alabama Governor George C. Wallace to appoint himself to the Senate when Wallace (briefly) retired from politics in 1978. Other than that, he was Carter's cheerleader for four years.

Chef Schnauzer| 12.6.10 @ 4:53PM

Walter Mondale, Edmund Muskie, Warren Christopher..... y'd think the elite's would understand by now insipid, insipider, insipidest don't sell. Who would round out the second pair of bookends, Kennedy? the books would have to hold him up........ hum.

J.C.Eaton| 12.6.10 @ 6:30PM

Fritz Mondale: Forgotten, but not gone.

TIM C| 12.7.10 @ 8:53AM

Again, the comments are even better than the articles. Brilliant!

james| 12.6.10 @ 6:51PM

Mondale is pretty much the last democrat who was simply incompetent; his successors are corrupt (Clinton), twisted (Dean) and evil (Obama.)
It almost makes me wistful.

EJM| 12.6.10 @ 9:12PM

I agree with the comment that Walter Mondale taught democrats that to win they had to lie. Mondale was an honest liberal, one of the last of a dying breed in politics. Dukakis was another. There is little doubt that both of these believe the claptrap they spout.

But after the shellacking they took, Bill Clinton was smart enough to realize that a liberal had to pretend to be a "New Democrat" and campaigned on tax cuts for the middle class, and getting tough with China--hardly liberal themes, in order to get elected.

Obama too had to be marketed by the press as a "moderate centrist" with a cool, detached, technocrat like approach, or he would never have been elected despite Bush's unpopularity and a financial crisis. Liberals even had to change their name to "progressives" to try to avoid the the stigma of liberalism. Obama has made it certain that they will be searching for yet another name two or three years from now.

joe| 12.6.10 @ 11:11PM

stagflation's veep was actually Nelson Rockefeller. 74 and 75, real GDP contracted -0.21% with a GDP deflator of 9%.

US
1974 to 1975
Consumer Price Index 9.14%
Unskilled Wage 8.61%
Nominal GDP 9.22%
Real GDP -0.21%
GDP Deflator 9.45%
Nominal GDP per capita 8.16%
Real GDP per capita -1.18%
S&P Composite -20.76%
Population (millions) 0.97%

Alan Brooks| 12.7.10 @ 2:54AM

For once we agree and have to tell the gullible public:
a) Carter was politically incompetent
b) smarmy
c) an accident (Watergate related).

If the public doesn't admire generally Andrew Johnson and Warren Harding, then there is no reason to admire Carter (please don't blame Mondale, blame his boss).

Todd Klimson| 12.7.10 @ 2:06PM

Walter Mondale and James Stockdale are the same person "Who am I, and why am I here?"

Sarge| 12.7.10 @ 2:49PM

Fritz Mondale is one weird duck. My brother sat behind him in church Sunday. And after the service, Fritz just got up and left his wife sitting there by herself.