Reagan May Skip Stockman’s Book--’No Time for Fiction’

President Reagan said today that he may not bother to read a new book by his former budget director that portrays him as an uncertain conservative led through decisions by pragmatic politicians.

“I don’t have too much time for fiction,” Reagan quipped when asked what he thought of the book by David A. Stockman, his brash young former budget director.

Stockman’s book describes the President as “a consensus politician, not an ideologue,” whose closest aides “knew nothing about the true substance of domestic governance. . . . They were illiterate when it came to the essential equation of policy.”

Asked at a photo session if he thought he and his aides had been stabbed in the back by Stockman, Reagan said, “I won’t comment.”