Phil Gramm’s departure from the McCain campaign is bad news for fiscal conservatives. It means that McCain may well end up getting economic advice from someone worse. And the strongest free-market argument for McCain was that someone like Gramm would be setting policy as treasury secretary in a McCain administration. But if the McCainiacs don’t want to associate with him as a behind-the-scenes adviser, they surely won’t appoint him to a high-level post that requires Senate confirmation.
Ramesh Ponnuru says that Gramm’s resignation appears to have happened because the former senator’s rivals in the McCain campaign were up in arms over this Robert Novak item. One hopes they were personal rather than policy rivals.
