Fiscal Responsibility

On domestic affairs in my lifetime the conventional wisdom says that the most successful liberal was Lyndon Johnson and the most successful conservative was Ronald Reagan. I think that there is a major problem with that view. I think that if you advocate a major change and you do the easy part and ignore the hard part, then you can’t call that success. If Jefferson had signed that deal he made with Napoleon and then not gotten Congress to put up the money the whole Lousiana Purchase thing would have fallen through. Not a success.
Of course now we have a lot of sophisticated devices to put off paying the piper.

Johnson was able to convince Congress to pass Medicare and Medicaid. But he was not able to convince them to pass the taxes that would be necessary to fund it properly and we have an impending disaster in entitlements. That was the point at which the Democratic Party gave up any claim to fiscal responsibility.

Reagan was able to convince Congress to cut income tax rates but he was not able to convince them to reduce spending. There followed a dramatic increase in the deficit ( = the amount by which the government lives beyond its means.) The result was to end the post WWII decline in the national debt (as a percentage of GDP) and to begin a striking increase in that debt. That was the point at which the Republican Party gave up any claim to fiscal responsibility.

It would be nice if the left would acknowledge that their programs would require new taxes.

It would be nice if the right would acknowledge that their tax cuts would require program cuts.

But it ain’t gonna happen any time soon.