Quite frankly, I have never understood the religious observance that conservative Republicans (or at least Republicans who say they are conservatives) have paid to Reagan. (I especially don't understand the sometimes-bordering crypto-homoerotic rhetoric in which so many supposedly turbo-man, anti-gay Republicans describe the man. But hey-ho.) The Reagan legacy was not one of minimalist free market economics as is claimed, but rather one of the type of socialist planning firmly reminiscent of FDR. (Well, it's reminiscent of economic policy the U.S. has employed since Hamilton, but I digress.) The point of supply-side tax cuts is inherently to attempt to engineer market activity through manipulation of a variable, in this case tax rates. However, Reagan's form central planning went well beyond simply cutting taxes, but to run deficits that to this day compose record percentages of GDP expand government spending more than the Kennedy/Johnson and Clinton Administrations did in their respective 8 year tenures. (Although his record of expanding government has been blasted by King George II, and in just 6 fiscal years no less.) Sure, most of this expenditure increase went toward the military, but the necessity of doing this to "knock out the Soviet Union" was debatable, and much of it was just flat out corporate welfare. And for his famous (or infamous, depending on your perspective) tax cuts, he was a royal tax raiser, as well: the 1982 "rollback" of taxes is to this date the largest tax increase in U.S. history as a percentage of GDP (and is comparable in cost to the health care programs offered by the two Democratic candidates for President, for reference), and it pushed through a massive increase in Payroll Taxes to cover projected shortfalls similiar to the ones coming as the baby boomers begin entering retirement. (So much for the ideas of shattering the welfare state and promoting individual liberty.) The Reagan Administration was anything but a small government, its tenure was anything but fiscally conservative, and his economic policies where anything but lasseiz-faire.
Gov. Daniels: People need to get over Reagan, already Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels elicited several hushed gasps and raised eyebrows late last week as he lectured a conservative crowd that it was “time to let Ronald Reagan go.”
The governor delivered his remarks to a room full of fellow red-staters at the Fund for American Studies’ annual conference and donor retreat at the Newseum.
“Nostalgia is fine and Reagan’s economic plan was good,” Daniels said. “But we need to look towards the future rather than staying in the past.” Daniels added that the GOP needed to work on uniting behind Sen. John McCain instead of constantly comparing the Arizona senator with the Gipper.
While he prefaced his remarks with the disclaimer that his thoughts were “somewhat controversial,” he hoped that he “would not be misunderstood.”
Incidentally, applause was somewhat less enthusiastic as he left the stage than when he began by poking fun at Barack Obama.
In reference to Obama’s recent comments about “bitter” small-town folks, Daniels remarked that he had to “release the iron grip from [his] gun” in order to make the flight into D.C. from the Hoosier State.
That Reagan was a skilled politician is not debatable. I would even say his ascent provided benefits for camp seeking to reduce government and promote liberty, if for no other reason than that he provided an effective mouthpiece for a period. However, the consequences of his Administration abandoning the mission to reduce government (if that was ever their intent in the first place) are most of the economic problems the U.S. has faced since its tenure and will begin to face soon, and this has been quite harmful for this movement in significantly damaging its credibility. The numerous scandals plaguing the Reagan Administration, a history that has reared its head again in the Bush 43 Administration, have further contributed to this. But perhaps the most disastrous consequence of Reagan's tenure for conservatives fighting for small government the tight marriage of the Republican Party with certain members of the religious right, which has resulted in them essentially controlling the reigns of the Party. The Party is no longer primarily associated wiht less government, but rather with being the party that hates gays, feminists, and any aspect of culture that does not resemble that constructed by the Taliban in its fervent insistence on imposed religious fundamentalist code. Not only has this led uncountably many with pro-small government leanings who would otherwise vote Republican from quite simply being too fightened to do so, but it has left the Party under the contol of those who really love the government and seek to use it to promote their ends. In other words, the Republican Party has turned into exactly that which most members claim to hate. And voters sense this.
While Daniels did not go the next step and call out the Reagan Administration, he took a courageous first step in the public eye that needs to be taken if the Republican Party is to counteract the building of a storm that will lead to much, much larger government. If Republicans continue making reverance to a ghost as a primary aspect of their pitch to voters, its relevance will reduce to nothing. It is certainly necessary to jettison Reagan from their rhetoric if Republicans are to again be taken seriously as people who want to reduce the size of government.
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