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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RMF who wrote (849973)	4/15/2015 12:09:42 AM
From: i-node	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1576619

If you actually knew the history you would not be confused about this. Long before he was elected Reagan had made clear that he believed there was a window of opportunity to end the Cold War by breaking the USSR in an arms race. That required spending money but it also generated massive savings in the 90s, which could never have occurred had Reagan not spent the money to end the Cold War: "Defense spending stood at 6.8 percent of GDP at the height of the Reagan defense buildup. But, beginning even before the breakup of the Soviet Union it began a decline, reaching below 6 percent in 1990, below 4 percent in 1996 and bottoming out at 3.5 percent of GDP in 2001, about half the level of 1985." So, over time, we more than got that money back. It was, without any question, the most sensible spending the nation has undertaken in our lifetimes. Nutjobs don't want to give Reagan credit for anything of course. But the reality is that he was responsible not only for ending the Cold War but for much (more than 1/3) of the budget deficit reduction in the 1990s.

To: RMF who wrote (849973)	4/15/2015 7:35:27 AM
From: jlallen	2 Recommendations Recommended By Brumar89 TideGlider Respond to of 1576619

Last time I read the Constitution I seem to recall it was Congress who had the purse strings....Reagan's problem was letting himself be rolled by Tipper....

To: RMF who wrote (849973)	4/27/2015 2:50:39 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1576619

Well, then let's say he only TRIPLED our national debt. You love focusing on that specific measurement, when its one of the least useful ways to measure increases in debt. Which is not to say that the debt didn't increase a lot when Reagan was president. You can blame him, you can blame congress, or whatever but clearly there was a big debt and deficit problem when Reagan was president. But percentage increase of the debt is a lousy way to measure it. If it was a dollar then became a billion dollars it would be a a much higher percentage increase then a mere tripling but the debt would be low and manageable. If the debt was twenty trillion, and increased to 21, then the increase would be only 5% but would still be an actual problem. When your looking at the politicians at a particular time, it makes more sense to focus on the deficit rather then the debt. The deficit is how much they are increasing the debt, the other parts of the debt aren't their fault. The best way to measure the burden of that deficit is percentage of GDP. A much larger economy can easily support a much higher real debt and real deficits than a smaller economy, and since both the debt, the deficit, and the economy are measured in the same dollars, inflation isn't an issue to worry about. (Unlike "when debt doubles or triples or increases by some other percentage)