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John B. OakesJohn B. Oakes
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writers on this general subject, on both Reagan politics and the environment, too, as we were talking about a moment ago, more than most other people who were writing for newspapers of general circulation, and who took a similar position. I guess I was maybe more outspoken, but I wouldn't try to claim that too much.

There is one incident, though, that might really, in a way be more responsive to your question. It comes to mind, particularly, as a result of the Op-Ed piece you were just quoting to me. Somewhere toward the end of Reagan's first term I was asked by Ken [Kenneth] Galbraith, Professor of Economics at Harvard, whom I'd been acquainted with for a long time, to join him as one of a team of three who were going to attack the Reagan administration against a team of three who were going to defend the Reagan administration on [William F.] Buckley's famous “Firing Line” program. Buckley and Galbraith were quite frequent antagonists on this program, run by Buckley, on radio. There was going to be a special, two-hour program of this, under Buckley's management that was going to be held -- this was a two-hour rather than the usual one-hour “Firing Line” program, on the radio -- but this one was going to be at Harvard in the big assembly hall, on the Harvard University campus. The subject was going to be defense or attack on the Reagan administration and how was Reagan doing? As I recall, it was toward the end of the first Reagan administration. In other words, this would have been probably in 1984. We were limited to six minutes each. I accepted this when Ken Galbraith called me about it. I accepted a little reluctantly, but anyway, he encouraged me to come on the program with him, and the third man on the anti-Reagan side was an economist from Columbia [University], I believe, whose name just at this moment escapes me.

Q:

We'll fill it in later.





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