[[The anecdotes (i.e., isolated, selective data points about debt percentages) were all yours, pal. It was left to me to put them into a more continuous context. And talk of instant gratification is about as insipidly rhetorical as anyone could come up with.]]
None are so blind as an entrenched ideologue. Your reply above is simply more of your hackneyed rhetoric. Claims without substance, distortion without facts. (i.e. debt percentages showed that it has been worse and the country did not self-destruct, yet you went off on a diversionary tangent with the typical 'But, but...' defense. Maybe you should comprehend what the definition anecdotal evidence is, instead of cutting and pasting a definition without understanding, before making yourself look more 'insipid' and sophomoric.) Reagan's debt percentage was equal to or greater than the 2004 debt ratio in 5 of his 8 years in office. Were conservatives like you screaming then ? Claiming Reagan wasn't a conservative ?
Pay attention and don't get 'stuck on stupid'.
For someone who likes to go off talking about the big picture, your view is very selectively narrow. We can handle large debt for a time, in order to accomplish something specific (like win WWII or the Cold War), and then bring it back down. Letting it just rise and rise on general principles in exchange for some vague assurance that it'll eventually come back down, is not healthy and definitely not conservative, either for a person or for a country. This really isn't that difficult a concept.