And Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich deserves much of the credit, or blame. During the campaign season, Rep. Gingrich tirelessly visited 137 congressional districts elucidating and selling his vision of the future and renewal of American civilization. Time labels him the “GOP guerrilla” spreading the “politics of anger,” but Rep. Gingrich and other Republicans respond that they are the reflection, not the creators, of this anger. A recent New York Times/CBS News poll seems to agree, reporting that Americans trust the Republicans of the new Congress more than President Bill Clinton to change social policy.

At the same time, Rep. Gingrich and other Republicans have proven adept at making headlines for saying and doing things that, at least on the surface, belie the popularity of their beliefs. To help make sense of the implications and the source of the GOP sweep, the Harvard Political Review had the opportunity to conduct an interview with Rep. Gingrich.

HPR: Judging by the results of the election, the mood of the electorate has changed. In what way has the mood changed, and how do Republicans plan to either change or tap into the new political climate?

Gingrich: While the results of November 8 were a stunning victory, that does not necessarily mean the mood of the public has changed, except that the American people—who are generally centrist-conservative—realized that the Republican party best represented what they were thinking. The nation voted, woke up the following day, and was delighted with what happened. The nation voted decisively at every level, from state legislature to county commissioner, from governor to the House and Senate; at every level there was a Republican tide in every part of the country. We carry a much larger burden than we would have expected because of the country’s decision that it, in fact, wanted a new leadership team and that it wanted the president to compromise with the Congress. It did not want to the Congress to compromise with the president.

HPR: You have planned an intense legislative agenda when the Congress convenes in January. How will the Republicans pace themselves over the next two years, and do you see this Republican-controlled Congress as a one-shot deal or the beginning of a new era?

Gingrich: We are going to do everything we can—starting the opening day—to keep our word. We’re going to do everything we can to pass the Contract [with America] we committed to. And we’re going to recognize that you have to have the American people if you’re going to change anything. It can’t be done in Washington. It has to be done across the country. During the first 100 days, our commitment is to get a vote on everything that was in the Contract with America. We can’t guarantee we’ll pass it. We can guarantee a vote.

HPR: Critics have assailed the Contract with America as little more than a hodge-podge of politically popular and expedient proposals designed to make waves during the campaign season. What do you see as the underlying philosophy binding the Contract, and does this philosophical foundation represent the core agenda of the Republican party in the future?

Gingrich: A public confidence in Congress and other institutions reached an all-time low, we felt we had to restore the fabric of trust between the American people and their officeholders. We have made a promise, and we are going to keep it. That in itself will go a long way towards a continued Republican majority. At the same time, we have to engage in a deep, thorough dialogue with the American people on how to shrink the federal government to achieve a balance. We cannot replace the social engineering of the left with a social engineering of the right.

HPR: One of the provisions of the Contract is term limits. Given the massive turnover just witnessed, are term limits still necessary?

Gingrich: The country has sent the message that they want change, and we’re going to give every member of the House a number of occasions to vote on whether or not they want to vote with the country or whether they want to stand defiantly and say, “No, we don’t believe you’re serious.” So you’ll see every single thing in the Contrat voted on. We are looking at reform of Congress over the long term, not just the immediate problems, but preventing problems in the future.

HPR: Ronald Reagan and George [H.W.] Bush often pointed to the inability to overcome gridlock as an impediment to governing. How will the American people see Washington now, and who do you think will bear the brunt of the blame for the obstructionism—President Clinton or the Republican-controlled Congress?

Gingrich: The Republicans, who have not been in charge of the House for 40 years, have a pretty big interest in getting something done. The president has an interest in getting something done. Senator Dole, who may well be our presidential nominee, has an interest in the Senate in getting something done. So, in a funny kind of way, you may have a moment in ’95—for 10 or 11 months—all of us have a good reason to want to be positive and productive.

I have no interest in engaging in a debate with those who would raise taxes. That issue is over; it’s gone. We’re not going to do it. I have used the phrase: “Cooperation, yes. Compromise, no.” This country has been voting since 1968 against the Great Society. And the track record is unending. The only two Democrats to win since 1968 both ran as New Democrats. I mean, Jimmy Carter was an outside reformer, not a liberal, and proud of it; Bill Clinton ran as a New Democrat who favored middle-class tax cuts, reinventing government, and welfare reform. This is the most astonishing affirmation of the desire for a fresh, bold, decisive change in this city that I have seen.

HPR: What concrete changes will you make in how the House operates? How will these changes fit into your vision of what the mentality and culture of Congress should be?

Gingrich: On the opening day of the 104th Congress, the American people will see a real and dramatic change in the way things are done on Capitol Hill. On the opening day, Republicans will cut House committee staff by one-third. We will vote on the Shays Act, which will apply to the Congress all laws that apply to the rest of the country, and we will introduce the ten bills that make up the Contract with American to be voted on within 100 days.

Additionally, we will cut the budget for the House by downsizing and consolidating work to make the House operate more efficiently. The quality movement must make its way to Capitol Hill, so we can make the best use possible of every tax dollar.

Finally, throughout the year, the American people will see a more open and honest legislative process. As opposed to the Democratic Congress, a Republican House will greatly expand the ability of members to offer amendments to bills. We are trying to build a proactive House of Representatives, and discouraging changes has only stifled the House’s ability to solve the nation’s problems.

HPR: Your effective tactics for ensuring party unity have often been labeled coercive. As Speaker, how much dissension within the GOP ranks will be compatible with effective governing? How united are Republicans philosophically, and will the nation witness a quarrel between right and moderates now that the goal of Congress has been achieved?

Gingrich: The fact that 355 Republican congressional candidates signed the Contract with America shows that the basic philosophy of the Republican party crosses a wide range of members and ideologies. My obligation as Speaker of the House is to be speaker of the whole House, reaching out to all House members. I am not speaker for the party. Instead, I have an obligation to reach across party lines and reach out to the president. I will not compromise on a tax increase, but that doesn’t mean we can’t find other things to cooperate on. We will work together to find a common ground.

HPR: Though the 1994 elections just ended, many are already looking forward to 1996. How have the unexpected results of this past election changed the entire outlook for the GOP in 1996? Who do you think will run for the Republican nomination, and what are each candidate’s relative strengths and weaknesses? How difficult will it be for the Republicans to maintain their hold on Congress and regain the White House?

Gingrich: I think we have at least a year to prove that Republican ideas can be effective. We have got to prove to the American people that we can actually do something positive—not just be the opposition party. If we can do that, then the chances of a Republican win in 1996 are improved. I won’t speculate on possible party nominees, or even on who might be running. I’ll leave that to the political columnists.

Arvind Krishnamurthy ’97, a Social Studies concentrator, is Circulation Manager of the Harvard Political Review. The written interview was conducted in early December 1994

This interview was originally featured in the Winter 1995 edition of the Harvard Political Review. January 1, 1995.

Few social commentators are as notorious and prolific as Christopher Hitchens. Formerly of The New Statesman, a foreign correspondent for Harper’s, a columnist for The Nation, Vanity Fair, and the London Review of Books, Hitchens editorializes with biting wit and unremitting scrutiny. Whether indicting Henry Kissinger, doubting Elie Wiesel, or deconstructing Mother Theresa, Hitchens offers readers unanticipated insights. Without fail, Hitchens shocks, delights, and provokes, as he recently did in an interview with the HPR, after a debate at Harvard’s ARCO forum on the possibility of a just war with Iraq.

HPR: I imagine you think the new commission investigating the intelligence failures of Sept. 11 is dangerous, in that it tries to exculpate the U.S. from any blame.

Christopher Hitchens: Let me just say, I don’t believe that the attack was invited, provoked, or deserved. Any declension of any word of that kind, I reject thoroughly and energetically. It’s true, though, that the subsequent level of incompetence that’s been discovered of foreknowledge not shared, is so grave and so widespread that it has allowed some people to conclude that there might have been collusion. I’d call it the “Oliver Stone” read on it. I wondered when that argument would turn up—now it finally has. I’m completely sure it’s not true.

Now people are asking whether the administration just appointed the world’s best-known cover up artist to do the investigation. What were they thinking? I know what they were thinking, which is that the president said he didn’t want an inquiry. Ultimately, he changed his line, but only slightly: well, okay, we’ll have a commission and Henry Kissinger will chair it. Of course, that’s saying the same thing in a different way.

It’s obvious that there’s no kind of confidence in Kissinger, nor in George Mitchell, who was also a contender for chairmanship. He may be a good mediator—he certainly did some good work in Northern Ireland but he’s not at all a good investigator. The book he wrote with former Senator Cohen of Main tells about their failures as Senators to investigate the Iran-Contra matter. Mitchell is also convicted in my view as someone who is abnormally incurious, and relies too much on the presumption of innocence when it comes to the authorities, a presumption I don’t make myself.

HPR: What do you make of the mystique surrounding Kissinger?

CH: Well this is a country that, strangely, given how strong it is, and how many reasons it might have to be confident, is very insecure. Something about the demeanor of Mr. Kissinger convinces people that he is a sort of European intellectual of gravitas. Now, this really does show there is a crisis in our higher education system.

Kissinger’s three volumes of memoirs, if he had published them in the academy, would have led to the requirement that he resign because they are falsifications. It doesn’t matter whether you agree with me morally about what he did in Angola or China or Vietnam or East Timor, conclusive declassified documents have subsequently shown that the account he gives is fabrication. This scandal, therefore, involves the publishing industry, the academy, and the press. My own profession has colluded in this fabrication of his reputation. Really, it’s a cultural crisis.

HPR: Have you ever spoken with him?

CH: No, he declines. I’ve often given him a chance, but under no circumstances will he talk to me. I sued him for defamation and made him retract a remark he made in response to my book. But since this is an investigation of the ramifications of international gangsterism—we call it terrorism, nihilism—Mr. Kissinger is being sought in the courts of many countries now, not as someone who could be indicted yet, but by merely as a witness: for his knowledge of U.S. diplomatic channels being used as a means of smuggling, laundering money, and carrying out hit jobs against named individuals in democratic countries. Among other things, this means he can’t travel without consulting lawyers, though in some countries he can’t travel at all. Despite all of these defamations, he still chooses not to publish his client list, suggesting he has other interests in the Gulf.

The last major investigation using the American intelligence community was that of Senator Church. Its mandate was that it had been put in possessions of all the known facts, and he withheld crucial sections.

HPR: I’m curious about your own political development from socialism to now, kind of a Neo-Orwelliamism. That’s a pretty broad range.

CH: Yes. It would be conceited if I said I put you and myself in the safekeeping only of what I’ve written. That is the real answer. But it took me a long time to come to the point where I don’t identify with anything, any politics, let alone any political faction. In some ways I feel better for it. In other ways I miss some of my old allegiances, like an amputated limb. But working with the Iraqi exiles and the revolutionaries and the Kurdish rebels and the opposition—which I have been doing now for several years—reminds me a lot more of the better bits of my past. It feels like it. Most of the people I’m working with have similar backgrounds; I find that oddly confirming. It feels much more like being a revolutionary. I think it is more like being one than carrying a placard that says, “Hands off Saddam Hussein.” That’s a wannabe anti.

I like to think I didn’t waste my time on the Marxist idea. I learned quite a bit from it and would only be too proud to say I still had to consult it. But I can’t say it’s my guide. Eugene Debs, the only great socialist leader the United States ever produced, put it very well in a speech he delivered just before he was locked up, when it was clear to him that he had a big following. He said, “I wouldn’t lead you to the promise land even if I could, or if you knew where it was, because if you could be led in, you could be led out, or led anywhere.” In other words, you can’t ask for guides. That’s an extremely important principle for radicalism.

HPR: Do you think this war has been less or more politicized than those in the past, in Vietnam for instance?

CH: Well, in the case of the war in Indochina, the government seems to have thought that it could not risk telling the truth. So a huge campaign of falsification and lies had to be mounted, including very elaborate deceptions to get the war under way. It had to be kept secret. It was too disgusting to be admitted.

Now we have more information than we need. What’s very striking about this situation is that there isn’t anything the government is not telling us. Or that citizens can’t find out for themselves. Or that the government hopes you don’t know. The policy of this administration is to corner Saddam Hussein on the basis of resolutions that he’s signed, and to make it clear that his survival as a dictator is incompatible with those resolutions. The goal is to change his regime, making the promise that the Iraqi people will have more say in how Iraq is run. It’s worth arguing about whether this policy should prevail. With the Indochina war you couldn’t do that, because the whole war was a lie and in any case the cause was a bad one: the prolonging of French colonialism in Indochina. To a remarkable extent the administration says what it means or intends.

HPR: Some people anticipate that a war with Iraq would recapitulate the Gulf War of 1990. Do you see such a parallel playing out?

CH: I didn’t know what President Bush wanted from the first Gulf War. It was not clear to anybody, it was not clear to his own cabinet, and it wasn’t clear to me how it had got started. There was something very shady about the way you suddenly woke up and found that a former ally of ours had invaded another ally of ours. Apparently, Saddam had notified Washington in advance of his intentions, and was told, “We don’t care.”

HPR: Most people claim the reverse, of course, that the Gulf War was a legitimate campaign, and that now, George W. lacks a clear mandate.

CH: Well, yes, a member state of the United Nations had been taken off the map, even if you think, which I do, that ultimately, Kuwait is part of Iraq. I mean the original partition isn’t sacred. No one was consulted about making it a separate colonial state. Ultimately, many of the borders in the Middle East will change, especially in and around Palestine. But they’re not going to be changed by Osama bin Laden or Saddam Hussein, just for their own purposes, by violence.

Christine A. Telyan ’04, a Social Studies Concentrator, is the Features Editor.

This interview was originally featured in the Winter 2003 edition of the Harvard Political Review. January 16, 2003.

Gary Johnson is a former two-term governor of New Mexico and current candidate for the GOP nomination for President. He is known for his low-tax libertarian views and is an avid mountain climber and triathlete.

For an audio version of this interview, click here.

Harvard Political Review: Where do you differ with fellow libertarian-leaning presidential candidate Ron Paul?

Gary Johnson: I have the unique experience of leading a start-up business that eventually employed over 1,000 people. I also served 8 years as governor of New Mexico and, while Ron Paul got to register his principled “no” vote on issues he disagreed, I got to debate and discuss my vetoes for weeks on end. Lastly, I am not a social conservative. I would describe myself as a classical liberal, and I support a woman’s right to choose.

HPR: What is the Gary Johnson plan for economic recovery?

GJ: I believe we are on the verge of a monetary collapse. We’re not immune to the mathematics of continuing to spend more money than we take in. If elected, I will submit a balanced budget to Congress in 2013 that will reduce federal spending by 43%. I also promise to veto any legislation where expenses exceed revenue and to advocate for throwing out the entire federal tax system and replacing it with Fair-Tax. I share in the outrage of Occupy Wall Street protesters that government picks winners and losers, and implementing FairTax would fix this.

HPR: How do you explain being left out of nearly every primary debate?

GJ: No matter how you cut my exclusion, I think you just have to judge it as grossly unfair. CNN excluded me from the second debate after coming up with a rule that I had to be at 1% in 5 national polls, even though I met that criteria. During my last debate, Fox News Network chose to interpret the rule as the last 5 national polls where my name appeared and, as a result, I was included. I don’t want to claim to be ahead of others that have been given opportunity, but I just want to claim equal footing to those individuals and I’m not being given that equal footing.

HPR: What would you do today in the Middle East if you had the chance to reshape American foreign policy?

GJ: I would get out of Afghanistan and Iraq tomorrow. I would not have participated in Libya. I think involvement needs to start with a military threat and that occurred in none of these countries, including Iraq. I originally thought involvement in Afghanistan was totally warranted, but I think we wiped out al-Qaeda after the first 6 months. We’re building roads, schools, bridges and hospitals in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries and we have those same needs here.

HPR: Can you explain your policy on marijuana legalization?

GJ: I’ve advocated legalizing marijuana. Control it, regulate it, tax it. I’m opposed to the drug war but right now Republicans can’t grab ahold of the notion that half of what we spend on law enforcement, the courts and the prisons is drug-related, and to what end? We have the highest incarceration rate in the world, and this is America? I think if we legalize marijuana we will take giant steps as a nation to come to grips with rational drug policy in this country which starts with looking at drugs as a health, rather than criminal justice, issue.

HPR: Where do you view the viability of your campaign right now?

GJ: The viability at this point depends on being in these debates, so I’m not viable. This is a real uphill battle and just not being treated fairly, which is what I actually expected to be the case, leaves a real bad taste. I continue to be out here on the road talking to as many people as I can, but that doesn’t quite compare to the debates where millions of people can tune in.

Naji Filali ’14 is a Staff Writer. This interview has been condensed and edited.

Photo Credit: Ron Hill, Wikimedia Commons

Diana Henriques is a senior financial writer at The New York Times. She has been a Pulitzer finalist and was granted the first interview with felon Bernie Madoff upon his incarceration. She has authored four books, including “The Wizard of Lies: Bernie Madoff and The Death of Trust.”

Harvard Political Review: How did you first get interested in journalism?

Diana Henriques: I became involved at age 13 with my first newspaper with a local student group. I came to love the newsroom environment and my love for journalism followed. In college, I was a campus journalist at The George Washington University Hatchet in the late-1960s, which were exciting times to be a journalist in Washington. I eventually made the shift into financial journalism at the Philadelphia Inquirer and have worked for The Times since 1989.

HPR: What obstacles have you had to overcome to get to the bottom of investigative financial stories?

DH: My initial reaction was to say that actually financial journalism is easier, and here’s why. When I first covered government issues for different New Jersey newspapers, it was the era of “shmooze” reporting where you gathered information for political coverage by shmoozing with politicians and for crime stories by shmoozing with cops. I was a young woman, and it was a time when a young woman reporter had to navigate the landscape rather carefully. In contrast, next to the bureau where I worked was the county hall of records. I learned how to trace land records, ownerships, and deeds, and I started to get good stories about, say, county commissioners who were planning highway routes past land they had just purchased. This was my first introduction to document-based reporting, and I quickly realized a document doesn’t know if you’re a woman or a man. I started to focus on avenues of reporting where legal papers were the skeletons of the stories, and it was a breakthrough for me.

The financial corporate world is an intensely difficult place to develop sources. The document landscape is wonderful, but the source-building landscape remains the most challenging I have ever worked in. The current environment with so much hostility aimed at corporate America has intensified that challenge.

HPR: How did you establish such a strong level of trust with the Madoff family?

DH: The goal is to put the interviewee enough at ease so that you can see the real person and communicate that to your readers. Why Bernie agreed to talk to me is a mystery, but I have to assume that the only reason he would agree to talk would be that he had an agenda. He ignored my interview requests for six months and, finally, in August 2010, two months before my book was due, I got to sit down with him and witness his personality in person. You hear people say how charming and convincing he was, but if you haven’t met him, you haven’t seen it fully. The visit was not particularly factually helpful, and I was able to catch him in lies because of my preparation. But what I never could have prepared for was his ability to drift seamlessly between truth and lie, which is truly a master act.

My relationship with Ruth has been a little different. She is not a professional public figure and lived her life entirely as a private woman and, in dealing with people like that, any responsible journalist will tell you that it’s a different game. You’re dealing with someone who may not realize the power of the published word, and I think that in such a situation any journalist has an obligation to take care, and I did.

I felt that if I could help Ruth feel at ease then I could help the public see something remotely resembling the real Ruth Madoff. My aim was not to decide how the public viewed her but, rather, to say this was as close as I can get to showing you Ruth Madoff, and then let the reader decide whether she is a sympathetic person or not.

HPR: What advice would you give to females looking to pursue a career in journalism?

DH: I think women entering the field of journalism have a much easier path than they once did. They’re walking through doors that my predecessors chopped down with brute force and lawsuits. I think that to the extent that I succeeded in what most times was a men’s world was because I kept the chip off my shoulder. Anger is not a useful tool, diplomacy is. But if it’s really what you want to do, you’ll find common ground with the men for whom it is their dream job, and that’s really how I’ve been able to navigate.

The views expressed in this interview are those of Diana Henriques and do not necessarily reflect the views of The New York Times. Simon Thompson ’14 is the Interviews Editor. This interview has been condensed and edited.

Buddy Roemer ’64 is a former Louisiana Governor and representative to the US House of Representatives. He is currently making news with his campaign for President as a candidate in the Republican primaries, setting himself apart by focusing on campaign finance reform and refusing to accept any donation over $100.

HPR: So, to put it simply, what’s the current plan?

BR: Well, we’re boots on the ground in New Hampshire running in the primary, January 10^th, and we’re trying to qualify for matching funds in 20 states and we’re very close, so we’re spending time doing that, and then finally, we are looking at how to reach independent minded voters. People who don’t belong to either party. I mean, we’re clear in the Republican party that we’re going after the moderates there. But we’re trying to add to that, and appeal to, independent minded voter because our issues of corruption in politics is impactful to independent minded voters

HPR: I know that you’ve had a history of running from behind, including your gubernatorial race back in 1987. How do these experiences contribute to what steps you plan on taking to the future?

BR: Well, they keep you calm. You know, you don’t overreact, and you look at the people in the race. I mean, you have Herman Cain at two percent, and then he moves to thirty percent. You have Michelle Bachmann at two percent, and then she’s at 27 percent. You have Rick Perry at 0 percent, and then he’s at 32 percent. You’ve had New Gingrich go from four percent to fourteen percent. I mean, Republicans have not picked their leader yet, and it’s going to be volatile. You have to be patient, consistent, and begin to frame the race in the best interest of those who vote. That is a political system that helps to create jobs and is not institutionally corrupt. However, our system is corrupt. Big checks come before people’s needs, small businesses, and fair trade with China. We are a corrupt society at the top in terms of politics. More and more people don’t vote anymore. More and more people play the spectator and let the big boys run the country. Well, they can’t run the country, because they don’t know the country enough.

HPR: A lot of people note that when the media begin to back a candidate, the candidate goes a lot farther. Do you foresee this as part of your strategy, and if not, what do you feel you can do to bypass it?

BR: Well, I saw debates as a way to bypass media control. I thought debates were a way for a free person to freely express their views and show the connection of those views with solving our problems. But I was wrong. I failed to realize that the debates were controlled by the media. So I thought you could avoid media control by being in the debates and expressing your views, and the people could make up their own minds. But as it turns out, apparently the media controls the debates. I have not been invited to a single debate, and there’s been 9 or 10 nationally publicized debates. I’ve been to a debate or two in New Hampshire where there’s just 3 or 4 candidates, and I do very well there. But no national debates, and I’m scratching my head as to why. I’m the only candidate running who’s been a congressman and a governor. That’s the sort of the experience that could be valuable in a presentation to the American people, as I am the one with actual experience on how to build jobs. I deeply believe that Washington has been the capital of corruption, and then only an independent, free-to-lead president could turn this country around. I thought a debate would be the perfect forum for that, to contrast myself from the other candidates. They can ask me where I get my money from. I get my money from thousands of Americans who give me an average of $60 each. Then I can ask them where they get their money. And they don’t want to answer that. Mitt Romney doesn’t want to say, “Well, a friend of mine gave me a million dollars, which she did.” I mean, Jon Huntsman doesn’t want to say “Well, I formed an organization so that my billionaire father can give me as much money as I want. And I don’t have to tell you about it.” Newt Gingrich can say, “I’ve got a PAC with 9 people who gave 300,000 each, and I don’t have to report it.” This is why debates are important for me, yet I haven’t been asked to go to a single one, and it has been the most disappointing thing in this campaign.

HPR: So, if not through these media debates, what channels do you feel will improve your publicity?

BR: That’s a good question, yet I don’t have a good answer. We are exploring a variety of possibilities, and we have to keep centered on our mission. Our mission is to turn America in the right direction, with jobs and we feel it can only be done by standing up to corruption. And the people we need to win are independent minded voters who are Democrats, who are Republicans, and who are Independents. WE need to keep focus on that, and we’re trying to find ways to be a proud Republican, but to be a prouder American and reach across all parties and all peoples and say, “We can do this together”.

HPR: You’ve made huge splashes in the national media with your support for the occupy movement. Where do you see this movement headed and where do you see your campaign in relation to this movement?

BR: We’re going to keep talking. I went down to Wall Street and listened. I mean, I run because of my experiences in Louisiana with corruption, and I was able to see how much good we were able to do by throwing the corruption out. I see the same potential in Washington. I see in the occupy movement an acknowledgement of my issue. I mean, we were saying, “We can smell it”. Something is wrong with America, it is not healthy when the average bank CEO makes a thousand times more than the average bank clerk. They can smell it, and if they would go to Washington DC, the smell is even worse. They’re saying, “Something’s wrong with America and it is somewhere between Wall Street and Washington DC.” So I went to tell them that I heard them, to explain what I was trying to do to change it, to congratulate them on their involvement. I can remember the civil rights marches back when I grew up in the South, and young people changed the country back then. I remember the Vietnam march when I was at Harvard. Thus, I have a sense of history. Some people at Occupy Wall Street think the answer is a bigger government. No, the answer is a better, non-corrupt government. It needs to be filled with justice. That’s why I went to occupy Wall Street. That is why I am running.

HPR: What executive authority do you feel you would use to effect change if you are elected president?

BR:Well, by doing what you say you’ll do. Now that’s change. I mean, by actually running for office this way, now that’s change. By actually holding congress accountable for their actions, for their institutionally corrupt activities, for refusing to sign, in fact, veto, any bill that didn’t bring more reform or make America bill. By submitting as my first bill, campaign reform, and asking them to join me and create jobs in America. I have no ego here. I will work hard to present the power of reform. I will work hard to present the power of fair trade, rather than free trade. I will do everything I can to bring reform to a corrupt system, and then give the credit to others.

HPR: Looking at a specific aspect of your platform, you’ve taken a strong environmentalist stance in an age where many feel that working on the environment will hurt economic revival. How do you plan on balancing environmentalism and making it economical?

BR:There’s the word: Balance. There is no balance now. There were 81,000 pages in the federal registry of comments in the last year alone in regulations for small businesses. Regulations of small business costs small businesses more than taxes did. On all of these environmental matters, we need balance. Some conservatives say, “Do away with the EPA”. I don’t. Some liberals say, “Well, EPA needs to be stronger and we need to rely on green fuel” I don’t. We can’t do that for the next 20 years. It’s not practical. What I want are incremental improvements. Let’s go from oil to natural gas. Natural gas has 20% of the carbon footprint of oil. We would’ve improved our environmental emission of carbon by 400%. Build from the center. That’s how you build a nation, from the center. It can’t be exclusive to either Republicans or Democrats. That is the way the Presidents try to do it, and it is wrong. It needs to be America.

Photos courtesy of The Times-Picayune/Grant Therkildsen and ElectionTracker.com. This interview has been edited and condensed.

Harvard Political Review: What was your inspiration for entering politics?

Tim Roemer: Two things captivated me and sent me like a rocket ship toward politics. The first was the unconditional love and support of my parents. The second was a young senator by the name of Robert F. Kennedy. I’ll never forget in fifth grade class when the Sister asked for a volunteer to run a mock presidential campaign for Bobby Kennedy. My hand shot up so quickly that I think I dislocated my shoulder.

HPR: What inspired you to serve as Ambassador to India, and what experiences did you gain during your time in Congress to help you in the role?

TR: A very articulate, eloquent and convincing person asked me to do the job: President Obama. As ambassador, you work on many different issues, but one of the most compelling and consuming ones is national security. My time on the Intelligence Committee and other security commissions helped prepare me for building the relationship that we have constructed in the last couple years.

HPR: How do you balance all the different interests at play in working out export initiatives?

TR: I believe that since the late 1980s, Republican and Democratic administrations have not developed a compelling narrative for the American people so that they understand the importance of world trade and how exporting creates jobs and growth opportunities in America.  This is a win-win situation because, as you build this relationship economically, the middle class gets more opportunities to prosper and poor people are able to escape poverty.

HPR: How troubling an issue is corruption to India’s ability of succeeding as a democracy?

TR: Corruption doesn’t just affect the wealthy and high-level government people, it affects the common men and women. The middle class is getting fed up with it and they want changes. To be fair to India, she is only 60 years old and, when our democracy was just 60, we had a myriad of problems ourselves. We’ve come a long way in the last 100 years to cure those ills, to move in a better direction. India’s in the midst of that, and you’ve seen democracy at work in recent weeks with the anti-corruption campaign.

HPR: What do you see as the greatest risks in the security relationship between Pakistan and India?

TR: This is an issue of great concern to America and its national security policy. To address the problem we must first develop constructive, positive, bilateral relationships with both countries. Secondly, we must grow our strategic relationship with India and work to deflect the possibility of that next Mumbai attack by establishing ways to share more intelligence with India. We are working with India where they desire on border issues, technology, and helping to establish a new national counterterrorism center.

HPR: Are you considering ever running for elected office again?

TR: I’ve got four young kids and I’m spending more time trying to get my kids elected to the student council than I am trying to get myself elected to anything. But, when you’re at the Kennedy School…it puts the fire back in your belly to stay involved and maybe run again someday.

Harleen Gambhir ’14 is a Contributing Writer. This interview has been condensed and edited. 

Harvard Political Review: How did your business background help you as a political strategist?

David Muir: Coming from a background in market research, you learn a lot about people and how they interact. You also learn that what you want to say and how you communicate can actually be different. These elements of communication and engagement are important in the world of politics. The other thing is the role of emotion. Emotion drives people and markets, but too often political discourse is divided by emotion.

HPR: How did British politics change with Gordon Brown?

DM: The first two parliaments of Labour government, led by Tony Blair, were under fairly benign economic circumstances. The government was a clear beneficiary of globalization because, once China entered the market, there was massive downward pressure on inflation, and inflation has somewhat been the British disease. Globalization also created lots of jobs in the U.K., especially in the financial and technology sectors. Conversely, in Gordon’s time as political leader, globalization was no longer a benign force. China’s huge growth created resource constraints…We had been a massive beneficiary from the downward pressure on prices and now we were struggling because pressure was upwards.

HPR: How do you think Mr. Brown’s decision to step back affected British politics and the Labor Party?

DM: I think his decision to stand down was exactly the right decision. If you’ve lost an election, it’s time for somebody new to take over. But he and Tony Blair were absolutely giant figures within the Labour Party, and they dominated the field. I think it’s best for them to stay off the field in order for the new generation to build itself up. Blair and Brown cast a long shadow on British politics in a good sense, but it is imperative that the younger generation gets out from underneath that shadow.

HPR: What are your thoughts on the current economic crisis?

DM: It is clear with hindsight that Greece should never have become part of the Eurozone, but people have to be clear that, if Greece is kicked out of the Eurozone, you’d have not just a bankrupt state but also a bankrupt corporate sector. It wasn’t just the Greeks who wanted to be in the Eurozone, but was also the French and the Germans, thus making it an aggregate responsibility. Ultimately, I think the E.U. as it currently stands is actually incapable of solving this crisis; instead, the IMF must be brought in to solve the problem, but that may be plausibly unpalatable and is likely to be resisted by the European leaders.

HPR: What do you think is the role of the U.K. during the Eurozone crisis?

DM: The U.K. is definitely going to be affected, but at the moment is very much a bystander. I think this bystander status is definitely a big change and would not have happened if Gordon Brown was still prime minister. Instead, the U.K. is confined to being a spectator. It will probably pick up a big tab, since the U.K.’s biggest export market is Europe, likely causing its growth further decline and weaken. Therefore, there’s likely to be political controversy in the U.K. over the next six months about whether having a fiscal austerity at a time when demand is contracting is the right thing to do.

Alpkaan Celik ’15 is a Staff Writer. This interview has been condensed and edited.

HPR:

Shariar Mandanipour: I’m not a political man. I studied Political Science, and maybe because I know something about politics, I hate politics. I’m a writer, but, unfortunately, in a country like Iran, being a writer, not a governmental writer…being a sort of dissident or a writer that you write for the freedom of writing, that you want to write beautiful stories. At first…they look at you as a political or as an opposition person, opposition of the regime. There are times that Iranian writers, we announce that we are not…a political party, we just need freedom of expression, and, because of it, some Iranian good writers, some Iranian good translators were assassinated. They didn’t involve [themselves] in any politic[al] matter, and a few of them [were] sentenced to prison. So the way that a dictatorial regime looks at you as a writer, they see you as an opposition [figure]. And you have no choice…even if you announce it, if you declare it, that I’m not involved in politics, they can’t believe it, and I think they are right. Because when you write against censorship, and you write about freedom and freedom of writing, freedom of expression, it is something against the dictator.

HPR: As a writer, in that sort of environment, what sort of authority or responsibility do you have to convey stories that might not otherwise be told?

SM: You know, the history of literature…engaged literature or even socialist realism literature. And I’m sure that these kind of stories, they will kill stories, they will [be] against art. You are a writer, and your job is to write a beautiful sory. You shouldn’t say to yourself that you’re going to write about the suffering that a good man is taking in a prison…If I decide to write this story…that the regime imprisons our good students…it wouldn’t be a good story. You just want to write a good story. If you are living there, if you are a human being in a country like Iran, at last it comes to your story, if you want to write a love story. The suffer[ing] of people will come into your story somehow. I’m talking about the art, not any political engagement..or any sort of socialist realism that you will feel. In Russia, before the revolution, they had great writers. After the revolution, because there were purely socialist realism stories, you don’t see any good writers. [They] were censored and [had] to publish their work underground…I know that my engagement is to write a good story. If I suffer with my people..their happiness, the beauties, or the evils that they make will all be reflected in my story.

HPR: Many of your stories address major events in Iranian history, such as the Revolution and the Iran-Iraq war. Is there any context or background that you would want or expect readers to bring to your work?

SM: Of course, you know that I was at the war, for my armed service. For ten months, I was at the front lines in such an absurd, maybe foolish war between Iran and Iraq—two dictators, it was a war between two dictators. I went there to experience the war, and, as a writer, it was so dark and bitter, as a human being, being in war was so dark and bitter for me, but, as a writer, it was good for me because I could write about it…I think it’s so natural. It was so painful, being there, seeing your best soldiers killed, it comes to my nightmares here, even after many years, and it comes into my stories. Right now my story, the novel that I’m writing, it is just about the war, so I can’t get rid of it.

HPR: Would you describe your work as rooted in distinctly Iranian themes and experiences, or do you intend for it to have a certain universality that appeals to all readers, regardless of their backgrounds?

SM: Each writer is standing on his or her culture, is standing on his or her country, and there are writers that are looking maybe to the sky or their head over the clouds. It depends on how they write, it depends on how much artsier they are, or how much better writers they are. So no matter if, for instance, a writer is writing about a small village in his country,  his novel is a universal novel. For instance, let’s look at Faulkner. He’s an American writer, he made a sort of imaginary state…so he’s writing about maybe southwest Americans or somewhere there, but he’s everywhere. For instance in Iran, in an Arabian country, people understand him. So no matter [whether] a writer wants to write for the world or just for his or for her people, it depends on his art of writing. If he writes well, if the story works well, everybody could be his or her reader.

HPR: What elements of your work do you think were seen as objectionable or as challenging the authority of the regime by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance? To what extent would you consider yourself a political activist?

SM: I am a member of Iranian writers association, but it [was] banned after the Revolution. We didn’t have an office, the regime [said] that this association [was] dead, they denied it. We believe that, as much as we are writing, our association or organization is alive, even if we don’t have any publishing or magazine or even a room where we can get together to choose, for instance, our editors. Because of it and because of my talks here and there, against censorship, of course they picture me as a poitical writer. Although I don’t believe in any ideology, I’m not a religious writer, but this is the way that censors look at you. There were times that I couldn’t publish my book because censorship [became] worse and worse in that era. There were times when the censorship machine was a little bit better—then someone like me could publish his books. They didn’t even let me continue my studies in the university. I wasn’t somehow…at their standards. But it was wonderful that there were times when Iranian students could have a sort of NGO, and they invited somebody like me. And 700 students were sitting in the cellar listening to someone like me. After Ahmadinejad…came to power…or [was] elected in a fake election, they banned 99% of students or NGOs. They banned independent magazines. I was chief editor of one of them [and] they banned it. Right now in Iran, Iranian writers hardly could publish their books. But someone like me, I’m here. Of course it’s my job to maybe shout against censorship, write about censorship in my essays. If I get a good idea for a story, like what I got in my last novel, I write about it. Censoring an Iranian Love story…I’m a writer in this novel, or the writer would be a sort of alter ego of me. He wants just to write a love story, and he starts to say [why]  he can’t write just a small, simple love story in Iran…and he writes about censorship, how much it corrupts the language even. If you write a beautiful sentence, it would be against censorship, it would be against censorship. You know how dictators use language, to fool people, to fool their followers. Iran is a religious regime…the clerics [and] the supreme leader of Iran—they fool people with language..They use language in a way that I call corruption of language. They use the best words. For instance, Ahmadinejad …claims that Iran is the freest country in] the world. Imagine it—he is using the word of freedom. Someone like him. Thousands of students were arrested. Two of them were sentenced to [be] lashed. One of them just wrote a light [criticism] against Ahmadinejad. People [were in] the streets because they asked “Where is my vote?” in a peaceful protest…When somebody like him talks about freedom, it is the corruption of language. So, for writers, maybe it is their best job to make the language clean.

HPR: Identity and its mutability seems to be a prevalent theme in your writing. You are from Iran but have been living in the U.S. How has this change of setting impacted your sense of yourself as a writer and the focus of your work?

SM: Because of my style of writing, my stories, as the critics call it, it is complicated, and my problem of censorship in Iran was less tham my friends, because censorship couldn’t understand what I was writing about. Although there were stories, …that they didn’t let me publish in my books. For four or five years, I couldn’t publish any books in Iran. There were stories that at last you can get permission to publish. I tried not to make a sort of self-censorship…like a sort of virus that it lives in your body, in your mind, and you think that you are writing freely. Censorship controls your mind at last. That was my situation in Iran, to try not to self-censor, although I cannot claim that I was not under the influence of censors. I was born in a country [with a tradition of] censorship. I grew up with censorship, many kinds of censorship. When I came to the United States, I knew that …there aren’t any censors here. The first months, I was looking, ‘Who am I here?’ In Iran, it is a pleasure…it is just like fighting with dictatorship…you are on the front line when you are writing. They when I came to the U.S., I said ‘okay, who am I here?’ …For six or seven months, I was looking for what I could] write to find the passion of writing.. Then I found out that I was going to lie here, so I can write whatever I want to write, so I started to write Censoring an Iranian Love Story…Just reading fifty pages of it, a publisher accepted the book. Then I felt [that] yes, I can be a writer here as well. If I try to write well, it will help my culture. Although I couldn’t publish the Persian version of this novel in Iran—it is impossible—but it is published in eleven countries and in fourteen or fifteen languages—it is a message of literature. There are people who are reading about the the message of Iranian literature and about censorship…so I found my way here to write [and] I found the way that I can write. Alhough I miss my country so much…I can go [back], but there is no guarantee [that I wouldn’t] be arrested at the airport.  Some scholars and reporters…they arrest them at the airport, just when they arrive in Iran…And right now, they ban people to leave Iran—filmmakers, writeirs, reporters, journalists—it is a new kind of way to make dissidents suffer.

HPR: Where do you want to go next with your writing?

SM: Right now…I’m writing about the war. It is a man who lost his left hand at the war and even his memory. And he is going back after the war is finished, after many years, he is trying to get back to that place where he lost his hand…And it comes to me…I started to write this novel two times before, when I was in Iran. I started writing it. The first time I wrote about 100 pages, and then I found it doesn’t work…Two years later, I tried again…At last I found the form of narrating this story in America. Of course I found that it is from my experience in the war. It comes from me.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

As rocks hit the bus windows, Tad Devine hit the floor.

While seeking footage of poverty for an advertisement in the 2002 Bolivian presidential election, Devine, one of the campaign’s media and political consultants, was on a campaign bus that strayed from the heart of the city of Cochabamba. After veering down a gang-ridden back road notorious for its violence, the bus driver approached a security officer to ask whether the road was safe enough to travel down.

“Listen. If you go down there, you’re going to get killed,” the security guard replied. As the bus began turning around, a group of young people saw the camera equipment inside – and began pelting the bus with rocks. A few windows shattered and Devine, wary of broken glass, hid underneath a seat.

“Most of the time (my job) isn’t like that, but, yeah, it’s part of the show,” Devine said.

Devine is bringing two decades of anecdotes and political insight to the Institute of Politics this semester as a Fall 2011 Resident Fellow. His study group – “An American Abroad: An Inside Look At How American Consultants Run High-Level Political Campaigns Around the World” – is centered around discussion of his experiences in international political consulting. It meets from 4-5:30 in the IOP, room L166, on Wednesdays.

Seventeen winning U.S. Senatorial campaigns and John Kerry and Al Gore’s presidential campaigns aside, the study group focuses on Devine’s international political expertise. Devine has crafted advertisements, written speeches, and conducted debate prep for ten winning presidential or prime minister campaigns across the globe – including one for Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada in Bolivia, about which the documentary Our Brand is Crisis was made.

Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a candidate in Afghanistan’s first presidential election in 2009, was one of Devine’s clientele. Ahmadzai placed fourth, but suspicions of election fraud cloud the experience for Devine.

“What I learned from a distance is that democracy hasn’t taken hold there yet,” said Devine, who worked on the campaign while in America. “There was this claim of democracy that particularly the Bush administration put out afterward… I did not observe what I would consider to be a democratic election in Afghanistan. The fix was in. There were real questions about whether the voting was rigged.”

Working for such high-level candidates has forced Devine to grow thick skin due to accusations that are, at best, unique – at worst, dangerous. While working as a senior advisor and strategist for the Kerry campaign in 2004, Devine opened an email from his brother with a surprising message.

“He said, ‘Gee, I didn’t know you were an Israeli spy.’ And he sent me a link to a right-wing website trying to smear people who worked for John Kerry,” Devine recalled. The website traced Devine back to his work on Ehud Barak’s winning Israeli presidential campaign in 1999, surmising that he was in cahoots with the Israeli military.

Other noteworthy attacks include a slew of insults from radio personality Rush Limbaugh and an accusation of being a CIA agent from Bolivian presidential candidate Evo Morales – who ran unsuccessfully against Devine’s candidate, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada – in 2002.

“My view is that I just ignore it,” Devine said. “I’ve never felt threatened physically – except for the time, you know, I was stoned in Cochabamba on the bus.”

For all his experience on the international stage and at the highest level of American politics, the campaign of which Devine is proudest happened within American borders in the city of Jacksonville, Florida. Nat Glover was elected sheriff in 1995 – an election remarkable not for its office, but for the fact that Glover was the first black sheriff in a city where, Devine said, race was initially viewed as a nearly insurmountable issue.

He remembered an incident shortly after Glover was elected: An older white woman approached Glover and said, “I’ve never voted for a black man before, but I voted for you.”

“That story encapsulated the feeling that we had done something small in scale in terms of political geography, but enormous in terms of its consequences… To be able to go into a small laboratory of democracy like Jacksonville, Florida, and to demonstrate that race could be overcome, I think is very important,” Devine said.

But if the Gore-Lieberman campaign – to which Devine was a senior strategist – had won in 2000, it would have been his proudest work. That it did not left Devine disappointed.

“If you ask what I’m proudest of, it’s the work for Nat Glover. If you say to me, ‘Gee, what do you think is the best work you’ve ever done in your career,’ I would say – and a lot of people wouldn’t agree with this – it’s coming into Gore’s campaign when he was 17 points behind at the end of May and helping to lead it to the point where we actually won more votes than the other guy, although we didn’t win the election. It was quite a comeback… but, because of the result, I’ve never been able to take the kind of satisfaction in it that I would have liked to.”

Though highly experienced from both his work in America and abroad, Devine is still learning. Success, he said, is about finding the right mixture of positive and negative ads, of anticipating the right questions for debates.

“You learn by doing. There’s a lot of back-and-forth in campaigns to come to that right place, strategically,” Devine said. “All these campaigns are unique. If you try to go in and take a model – positive, negative, whatever – and stick it on a race, you’re probably going to lose.”

Photo courtesy of the Los Angeles Times.

Jimmy McMillan visiting Occupy Wall Street

One of the odder sides of Occupy Wall Street has been the significant celebrity support for the cause. Throughout the weeks-long protest names such as Michael Moore, Kanye West, and Chris Hedges have shown up to voice their sympathy with the causes being championed at the event, always drawing large crowds and enamored audiences. During my overnight stay at Zuccotti, I would be lucky enough to have one such encounter of my own.

My encounter was with an unscheduled visitor, unnoticed among the eccentricities of the occupation crowd. The man was none other than Jimmy McMillan of “The Rent is Too Damn High” fame, who received national attention last year following a series of flamboyant remarks in his campaign for the New York governorship.

He allowed me to ask a few questions, although it was often difficult to get through entire questions before being cut-off by the energetic McMillan. Although it is difficult to argue that he has had any effect on political affairs, it was an amazing experience to have a short conversation with one of America’s most colorful personalities.

Harvard Political Review: The events of #Occupy seem to represent a wide range of causes. What brings you here today?
Jimmy McMillan: Young people. I wanted young people to let them hear the difference between accessory and necessity, revolution and democracy. Accessory is why they are here, necessity is what nobody is talking about: jobs, taxing the rich… being rich is an accessory. Democracy is the constitutional values through the election process. Revolution is when you have a dictator running the country. So explain it right for you young people to understand that.

HPR: The general media has often characterized the current occupations as a series of divided movements.
JM: It’s not divided. I want you to turn around and look over there. There’s a sign that says Ron Paul. When I came in the very first night, in Washington DC when I made my announcement for president of United States, there was a man supporting Ron Paul, the same man holding the megaphone over there talking about this rally. This is the way the old politicians stir things up. In the weeks to come, Ron Paul is going to make a public appearance out here to make his vote look good for the American People. Psychological. They brainwash the old people. I imagine young people don’t fall for it. You can’t pay for college tuition, you don’t have nothing, you need a job. Let the old folk worry about that nonsense when they talk about the rich.

HPR: Are there opinions here that you particularly object to?
JM: I just said it clearly. I want all you young people to understand. It’s not the matter of agreeing, it’s the matter of right. Procedure. We have a democracy here in America. That don’t need a revolution unless you want to overthrow the democracy. That means the election, the way with the voting process… you’ve been voting wrong! You’ve been voting for the same people over again! Over and over and over again! I’m a good example. I ran for governor in the state of New York. Even the governor himself said I beat him in a debate. But you still voted for him. Those are the problems.

HPR: So…
JM: President of the United States. Wants you to pass a jobs bill. Barack Obama don’t know what he doing. Passing a jobs bill, taxing the rich is not going to hire the magnitude of people unemployed. That’s not going to do it. Only the governors of states have the ability to employ people, because the governor holds the workers. You sit down with all of the governors and tell them what they need to do to put the people to work. Let’s talk about something real. That’s what I’m talking about. Common sense.

HPR: People have noted the rise of political polarization in the current government.
JM: That’s because they watch too much television. The media, the people you vote for, are the only people you see on CNN. Moderators like John King, who said I wasn’t qualified, but he wasn’t qualified to moderate the debate, because he asked candidates questions based upon their accessories, not their necessities. On the necessities, you would be included as young people. But they talk about old people losing social security. They talk about things that didn’t matter. I don’t play games, you all know what I do. I get to the point. And that’s the difference. I’m hoping that you all can spread the message, give out your support. That’s all I can say. I’m here you get it right for you guys.

Photo courtesy of the author. Interview has been edit, condensed, and partially de-McMillan’d.