Resumo de Locked In The Cabinet

Written in the form of a diary, Locked in the Cabinet is a highly readable and entertaining account of Robert Reich?s tenure as Secretary of Labor during the first term of the Clinton Administration.Reich?s purpose in the book is not so much to portray a series of events, but rather to portray his ideology in contrast to the ideologies of others inside and outside of the administration, and to portray the character of many of the people he served with.In terms of ideology, Reich is a pragmatic progressive thinker. He understands the need for free markets and free trade, but is painfully aware of the effects that they have on working people. He contrasts this with the labor unions and others who want to preserve existing jobs at any cost, including the cost of restricted trade. He also contrasts this with the free market ideologues who want free markets and trade at any cost, ignoring the livelihood of the American workforce. Reich?s central argument is that there should be a compromise between these points of view: America should pursue free trade and free markets for the prosperity they bring, but that prosperity should then be used to pay workers a living wage and provide them with training that will enable them to do the jobs most needed in the economy.Reich portrays a large array of characters in the book. They include Bill and Hillary Clinton; Al Gore; Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan; Reich?s wife and two sons, Claire, Adam, and Sam; Clinton?s two Treasury Secretaries, Lloyd Bentsen and Robert Rubin; White House aide Gene Sperling; the Democratic 103rd Congress; Speaker Newt Gingrich and the Republican 104th Congress; Reich?s two chief aides, Deputy Secretary Tom Glynn and Chief of Staff Kitty Higgins; union leader Lane Kirkland; and many others.Reich makes no effort at objectivity in his portrayal of these people. They are characters in a larger narrative constructed to make various points. Reich even creates some explicitly fictional scenes to make some of his points. This is not to say that the portrayals are falsehoods. On the contrary, these are the people that Reich remembers. The things they said and did informed his view of them and of the larger trends that existed during 1990s. But in the book, Reich includes only what is necessary to drive the narrative that he wants to establish.

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