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Interview With Dick Armey

Aired October 20, 2003 - 15:19   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey was in the thick of the political action here in Washington for many years. Now, since retiring, he has time to look back on what he learned along the way. My colleague Candy Crowley talked to Army about his new book "Armey's Axioms: 40 Hard-Learned Truths From Politics, Faith and Life".
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICHARD ARMEY, "ARMEY'S AXIOMS": What I tried to do with my book is deal with serious subjects and to do it with a good-humored way. I did not want to abuse anybody in the book or do any of that sort of stuff. But I did focus a lot on the difference between the philosophical backgrounds or whatever of the two parties, and so there's a lot of contrasting of conservatives and liberals. And, as you might guess, coming from me, the conservatives are always the heroes.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Shocked. Well, look, one of the things that Bob Dole said about the book was that it was the best advice he'd read from anyone who wants to make it in Washington. So you can look at life from both sides now. Give me your best advice axiom from this book that would help Howard Dean.

ARMEY: Well, from my point of view, the best one for somebody in high office is, if it's about your power, you lose. Because I think what happens, especially in Washington, there's so much talk about power. There's so much of sort of a natural tendency to drag people into the notion that, hey, I'm a powerful person with a powerful position. Let me promise you this, promise you that, I can make this happen.

Well, it's just the road to heartbreak. And it also takes you away from the -- to me, the real joy of being in the position of high office, which is the chance to serve, to help people solve their problems and work with people.

CROWLEY: You know, when you were in Congress, you were known as a guy who was quite up front for the conservative side. Since you've written this book, looked back on what you've learned in life and faith and politics, and since you've been out watching it from afar, does anything look different to you?

ARMEY: Well, it doesn't really. When I was in Washington -- and a lot of people have the tough time with me saying this -- but I always thought it was too confrontational. My wife will tell you -- my wife the therapist will tell you that Dick Armey's biggest problem in life is his penchant for conflict avoidance. But it is too confrontational on the wrong things.

If it's a matter of this issue or this policy, or my policy and your policy, then that's a legitimate fight. But when it is about your political well being and my political well being, if it's about you and me, if it's about us, Armey's axioms. If it's about you, you lose. And that's what the fights are about.

I said Washington is like a dysfunctional marriage. Every fight is really about something else. And it's usually about, what am I getting out of it? Well, it can't be that way and still be service to the nation, in my estimation.

CROWLEY: And can you tell from afar? Is it always about power? And if it is always about power, what did you learn over the course of your nearly 20 years in the Congress about how to make it not about power?

ARMEY: It's not always. There are some people that are very dedicated to not being about power. But what I learned, I picked up, was, if you go into a meeting and you see one person that all of a sudden is really emotional and is really loud and is really insistent, then you begin to calculate in your head, this is about himself. He's personalized this in some way.

And it is not about the issue and the well being and the service of the lives of other people, it is about something with himself. And of course that means you've got to cut through that to get to (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

I remember in a fight between two senators, we were at a total impasse on a bill. And I watched this fight go on. And it seemed like such a trivial matter.

Then I realized it was really about a fight of something else that happened between them six months earlier. So I came in, and I said, well, let's try this, we'll call it the Armey solution. They could both agree to the Armey solution, but they couldn't agree with one another.

CROWLEY: Let me ask you, because we've got less than a minute left. But I wanted to ask you, between the politics and life, axioms for politics and life, are they interchangeable? Did you take something from your 20 years in politics that really helps you or helped you in life along the way?

ARMEY: I think the one that is most helpful to me personally in my own life, and I would hope maybe the readers could (UNINTELLIGIBLE), is "Insecurity and audacity in light of the lord's promise, I will neither leave you nor forsake you." If you can get insecurity out of your life you will be better, more productive, more able, more helpful, because 90 percent of mean and hurtful thing I ever did in my life was when I was acting out of my own insecurity.

And now that could be in politics, or it can be in my marriage, it can be at work, in can be at church, it can be at the PTA. If you let insecurity drive your behavior, you're going to be hurtful to someone.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WOODRUFF: Good advice for all of us. Dick Armey.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired October 20, 2003 - 15:19   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey was in the thick of the political action here in Washington for many years. Now, since retiring, he has time to look back on what he learned along the way. My colleague Candy Crowley talked to Army about his new book "Armey's Axioms: 40 Hard-Learned Truths From Politics, Faith and Life".
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RICHARD ARMEY, "ARMEY'S AXIOMS": What I tried to do with my book is deal with serious subjects and to do it with a good-humored way. I did not want to abuse anybody in the book or do any of that sort of stuff. But I did focus a lot on the difference between the philosophical backgrounds or whatever of the two parties, and so there's a lot of contrasting of conservatives and liberals. And, as you might guess, coming from me, the conservatives are always the heroes.

CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SR. POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Shocked. Well, look, one of the things that Bob Dole said about the book was that it was the best advice he'd read from anyone who wants to make it in Washington. So you can look at life from both sides now. Give me your best advice axiom from this book that would help Howard Dean.

ARMEY: Well, from my point of view, the best one for somebody in high office is, if it's about your power, you lose. Because I think what happens, especially in Washington, there's so much talk about power. There's so much of sort of a natural tendency to drag people into the notion that, hey, I'm a powerful person with a powerful position. Let me promise you this, promise you that, I can make this happen.

Well, it's just the road to heartbreak. And it also takes you away from the -- to me, the real joy of being in the position of high office, which is the chance to serve, to help people solve their problems and work with people.

CROWLEY: You know, when you were in Congress, you were known as a guy who was quite up front for the conservative side. Since you've written this book, looked back on what you've learned in life and faith and politics, and since you've been out watching it from afar, does anything look different to you?

ARMEY: Well, it doesn't really. When I was in Washington -- and a lot of people have the tough time with me saying this -- but I always thought it was too confrontational. My wife will tell you -- my wife the therapist will tell you that Dick Armey's biggest problem in life is his penchant for conflict avoidance. But it is too confrontational on the wrong things.

If it's a matter of this issue or this policy, or my policy and your policy, then that's a legitimate fight. But when it is about your political well being and my political well being, if it's about you and me, if it's about us, Armey's axioms. If it's about you, you lose. And that's what the fights are about.

I said Washington is like a dysfunctional marriage. Every fight is really about something else. And it's usually about, what am I getting out of it? Well, it can't be that way and still be service to the nation, in my estimation.

CROWLEY: And can you tell from afar? Is it always about power? And if it is always about power, what did you learn over the course of your nearly 20 years in the Congress about how to make it not about power?

ARMEY: It's not always. There are some people that are very dedicated to not being about power. But what I learned, I picked up, was, if you go into a meeting and you see one person that all of a sudden is really emotional and is really loud and is really insistent, then you begin to calculate in your head, this is about himself. He's personalized this in some way.

And it is not about the issue and the well being and the service of the lives of other people, it is about something with himself. And of course that means you've got to cut through that to get to (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

I remember in a fight between two senators, we were at a total impasse on a bill. And I watched this fight go on. And it seemed like such a trivial matter.

Then I realized it was really about a fight of something else that happened between them six months earlier. So I came in, and I said, well, let's try this, we'll call it the Armey solution. They could both agree to the Armey solution, but they couldn't agree with one another.

CROWLEY: Let me ask you, because we've got less than a minute left. But I wanted to ask you, between the politics and life, axioms for politics and life, are they interchangeable? Did you take something from your 20 years in politics that really helps you or helped you in life along the way?

ARMEY: I think the one that is most helpful to me personally in my own life, and I would hope maybe the readers could (UNINTELLIGIBLE), is "Insecurity and audacity in light of the lord's promise, I will neither leave you nor forsake you." If you can get insecurity out of your life you will be better, more productive, more able, more helpful, because 90 percent of mean and hurtful thing I ever did in my life was when I was acting out of my own insecurity.

And now that could be in politics, or it can be in my marriage, it can be at work, in can be at church, it can be at the PTA. If you let insecurity drive your behavior, you're going to be hurtful to someone.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WOODRUFF: Good advice for all of us. Dick Armey.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com