Reagan's Top Economist Says GOP Misled the U.S. and Tanked the Economy

by PRW Staff — August 13, 2010 - 12:58pm
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Reagan toastLost in the 24/7 news cycle has been a July 31, 2010 opinion-editorial by David Stockman, former director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Ronald Reagan. Stockman was closely tied to the development of the Reaganomics ideology, but now he points to massive failures by Republicans, while they were in power, to assure that financial accounts were balanced in government, international trade, on the ledgers of central banks and in the affairs of private businesses and households. Stockman excoriates modern Republicans, and particularly Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, for claiming the party's current economic doctrines are rooted in traditional GOP financial philosophy. He points to a list of misguided Republican actions that have led the country to economic disaster: the runaway growth of public debt resulting "not from big spending by the Democrats, but instead the Republican Party's embrace ... of the insidious doctrine that deficits don't matter if they result from tax cuts," the neocon's sky-high inflation of the military budget, the "warfare state," the removal of traditional restrictions on leverage and speculation by the financial sector which led to a "vast, unproductive expansion of our financial sector," and the steady sending of jobs and production offshore. Stockman charges that Republicans have strayed so far from their ideological roots that they have "made a mockery of party ideals" and led the country into adopting policies that crippled the economy.

Main Source: 
MarketWatch, August 10, 2010

Comments

Stockman in context

Submitted by thomachuck (not verified) on August 2, 2012 - 7:47am.

Your criticism is very evenhanded. That Stockman blames the "Repubs just mostly" seems enough for me (coming from a Republican insider). I would make the same comment and draw the same conclusion from John W. Dean's "Broken Government". It is the Republicans "just mostly." The span of history gives you a thread of sustained truth. It IS the Republicans just mostly.

So you are saying Reganomics worked

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 12:54pm.

So if you agree with this article you are saying that Reganomics was correct and worked, but that the George Bushes and the Republican congress messed everything up and then the Democrat Congress and the Democrat President that we have had (and 8 years of President Clinton)failed to fix things by using the proven working system.

I entirely agree with that sentiment.

FMP, if he didn't say it, it

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on July 14, 2012 - 6:34am.

FMP, if he didn't say it, it wasn't said. However, it would be an incredible leap in consciousness to come to the realization that the republican/democrat facade, is just that, a facade! One needs to look not only closer at real time events, but also at the bigger scheme of what history has produced and the corresponding effects or side effects that follow... Be them under the guise of republican or democrat, the results don't lie. As long as people are cognitively dissonant enough to be divided by artificial parties, perhaps they deserve the circumstances they find themselves in. Perhaps...

Reaganomics

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 11:06pm.

If you read the article you would know that he felt the problem began with Nixon and continued through the Reagan, Bush, and Bush redux administrations.

Re: So you are saying...

Submitted by Becky S (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 1:25pm.

I don't think that's what is being said at all. He's arguing that a lot of our debt is due to tax cuts and not unnecessary spending. He's mocking the Republican idea that debt doesn't seem to matter if it's a result from tax cuts. Even now, when we're trillions in debt, Romney is promising to grant more tax cuts. In contrast, Obama wants to extend the tax cuts to the middle class only, and he wants to end the tax cuts to people who make over $250,000/year.

Well...

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 2:32pm.

I think the issue here is over spending. Tax cuts will not make or break our current debt situation. We need to stop spending 200% of our budgets. Think if you make $1000 a month, however every month you spend $2000. It will not matter if you get a 25% raise next year, if you keep spending $2000 a month you will go further and further into debt.

Not quite

Submitted by watou (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 2:27pm.

Obama only intends to restore the higher tax on the part of income in excess of $250,000, not "end the tax cuts to people who make over $250,000," so rich folks still get to keep a big chunk of the "Bush tax cut". Of course, good Democrats are instructed to ignore this continued giveaway to the rich, and pretend Obama doesn't work for his rich donors like Romney works for his.

A little Reagen history lesson for those who forgot

Submitted by James Watt (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 8:06am.

Criminal:

* Iran-Contra treason.
* Lied about it.
* Likely encouraged Iran to keep US Embassy hostages until he was into office.

Fiscal:

* Supply-side economics.
* National debt tripled.
* $12 billion trade surplus --> $100+ billion trade deficit.
* Deregulated savings and loans, precipitated huge economic crisis.
* Tax raiser.
* Taxed the poor, cut taxes for the rich.
* SDI "Star Wars" boondoggle.
* Military spending increased to match imaginary spending in USSR.
* Deregulation caused oil bust.
* Broke air traffic control union.

Social:

* Gutted social welfare.
* Dismantled the mental healthcare system.
* Release of mental patients without recourse, homeless population up.
* Ignored AIDS crisis.
* Abstinence-only sex education.
* Strengthened ATF, banned automatic weapons, blamed Democrats for it.
* Privatized the prison industry and made incarceration a profitable industry.
* Increased spending for War on Drugs.
* National drinking age of 21.
* Underfunded NEA.
* EPA Superfund grants manipulated to help Republicans in local elections.
* Deregulated kids' tv, initiated 22 minute toy ads.
* Killed energy programs.
* Crack in the ghettos. (? Due to support for Contras and Noriega?)

Foreign:

* Wars all over Central America, incl Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras.
* Promoted Iran-Iraq war.
* Sent Marines into Beirut, abandoned mission after terrorist bombing.
* Broke detente with USSR until Gorbachev personally made things better.
* Backed Contras in drug running schemes.
* Supported right-wing dictators and movements everywhere, including:
* Apartheid regime in SA.
* Marcos regime in Phillipines.
* Saddam Hussein and Baathist regime in Iraq, even after Kurds gassed.
* Taliban in Afghanistan.
* Manuel Noriega in Panama.
* Augusto Pinochet in Chile.

Concepts:

* Welfare queens.
* Trees cause pollution.
* Ketchup as a vegetable.

Appointments:

* 30+ convicted appointees.
* Ed Meese at Justice, porn freak.
* James Watt at Interior, idiot, corrupt. (believed Christ would return after last tree died on earth)
* William Casey at CIA, religious nut, strikes into Uzbekistan. (? Uzb part of USSR, maybe mean Afghanistan?)
* HUD a corrupt mess in general.
* Politicised CIA.
* Robert Bork to SCOTUS (failed), segregationist and asshole.
* Antonin Scalia, same but he got in.

Personal:

* Unfit to serve due to Alzheimer's disease by term's end.
* Horrible excuse for a human being in general.
* McCarthyite.
* Backed Moral Majority.
* Pardoned Robert Walker, who went on to kill his wife.
* Started presidential campaign at racist murder crime scene in Philadelphia, MS.
* Laid wreath and made speech at SS cemetery in Germany.
* Vietnam War a "noble cause."
* Helped start right-wing noise machine, by promoting myth of liberal media and destroying Fairness Doctrine
* Hated sex, made Ron Jr. feel like a sissy and quit ballet.
* Believed in astrology and used it to run government.
* Innovated "talking points" cue cards.
* "I don't recall" to weasel out of press questions.
* Confused movies with reality.
* "Outlawed Russia forever, started bombing in five minutes."

I love to refer to his fiscal record as 'cutting the deficit in triple'.

And when you mention Contra and Central American wars you should also mention the phrase 'death squads': They were Ronald Reagan's 'freedom fighters' (his words) who slaughtered and raped thousands of innocent peasants.

Afghanistan: He helped build, train and finance what later became the Taleban and Al Qaida.

Personal: When the Gipper's Alzheimer's became obvious Nancy got more and more involved in day-to-day government business. Her chief advisor: An astrologer.

Also, during the McCarthy era Ronald Reagan was ratting on untold numbers of his fellow actors, his FBI informer code name was Confidential Informant "T-10". As president of the Screen Actors Guild, mind you.

Completely gutting funding for college grant programs. reagan is almost entirely the reason US students now go into astronomical debt to attend college.

Conservatives have always hated college because education at it's very core is a 'liberal' idea; learning, knowledge, and spreading information is a 'liberal' concept. reagan used the conveniently partisan study that claimed 'college grads will make $1 million in their lifetime' and decided that this is a perfect excuse for the US government to no longer pay to educate people too much. this served two purposes, it insures the future of the republican party because more education means = democratic voting tendency, and because it handled billions and billions of dollars directly to private banks aka campaign contributors and friends who now created burdensome loans for students to put themselves into indentured servitude, creating lifelong wage-slaves and pseudo-wealthier consumers.

Other than the holes in your

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on July 14, 2012 - 7:03am.

Other than the holes in your "conservatives & college" theory, excellent job on summarizing the facts. Facts that I feel certain would make for an evermore excellent read, if coupled with the compelling commentary made by an anonymous poster. "Don't forget however that the son ( John Hinkley Jr.) of G H W Bush's strongest Texas political backer almost killed Reagan which would have made G H W Bush President in 1981.

John's Dad John Hinckly Senior was president of Vanderbilt Oil which was partners with the Bush's and Vanderbilt was being investigated by Reagan's white house for defrauding the government on oil pricing.

(look it up. there is no "theory" this is all fact as was mentioned in the newspapers of the day - search Google news with old newspaper dates between 1980-1983))

Reagan never acted the same after the assassination attempt.

(Surgery and anesthesia and blood loss affect older people greatly and often affects their mind)

G H W Bush's policies became the Policies of Reagan after Reagan was almost killed.

I'll leave it to your speculation whether or not you think Reagan thought about it when making decisions knowing a supporter of his vice president with ties to his Vice President had almost killed him - how would you act? Especially if you knew that VP's dad had been working with the enemies of the united states during world war 2 and had been censored by the US Senate for it and everyone knew they were members of a secretive group with symbolism similar to Nazi death head symbols.

If you had grown up a midwest farm boy and actor how would that knowledge affect your later Presidential policy decisions?"

Reply to Jim Watt

Submitted by snickers413 (not verified) on July 10, 2012 - 10:04pm.

Man you nailed it. If I could just get a couple of my family members and a friend to read it. But unless its on Fox they dont believe anything. But thank-you so much for writting it down like that, I'd forgotten some of it and seeing it on paper like that blew my mind.TFL53