Stockman reduces his credibility when he blames it on Reagan. He apparently is not cognizant of the fact that Obama has wriiten twice as much debt in just two years than Reagan did in eight. And Obama is in charge now so why blame Reagan, who’s been dead for years?
I’ll give you the answer: Stockman is still bitter because Reagan “took him to the woodshed” 30 years ago.
Like almost everybody else in DC, Stockman thought Reagan was a mediocre intellect who needed help to see the Big Picture.
Stockman understood fiscal policy, and saw that the USG could not perpetuate the Welfare State and ramp up defense spending by simply cutting tax rates. Eventually the piper would have to be paid for racking up deficits year after year.
Unfortunately for Stockman, he did not understand that fiscal policy is only part of the Big Picture, which Reagan in fact understood much better than his critics. In the Big Picture, there was a Cold War, an existential threat from the USSR and international Communism, that was an overwhelming priority.
Reagan understood that defeating international Communism required deficit spending, and had faith that future Congresses would recognize that they had to pay off Cold War debts as they had after wars in the past two centuries. It was also argued at the time that these deficits would “starve the beast” and constrain future expansion of the Welfare State. Unfortunately, Reagan was wrong about that. Even Ronald Reagan overestimated the the USG’s potential to be good and responsible. But he’s still by far the best president of the past century, especially when you consider the Congress he had to work with.