Quote:
Originally posted by Not Bob
No, actually Stockman was more of a deficit hawk than a supply-sider. He liked tax cuts because he thought that the deficits they created would force government to cut back on othwise untouchable programs like Medicare. He made the mistake of admitting this to a reporter, and was spanked by Reagan.
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My memory of it was that he critisized Weinberger for increasing defense spending too much after the tax cut. He said that if defense spending was increased as much as Weinberger wanted that the tax cut would have to be rolled back. In addition, in order to get the tax cut through Reagan had to add all sorts of additional tax breaks to buy off Democrats - Stockman complained about that because it screwed his numbers up. Stockman got Reagan to increases taxes in 1984 (many conservatives have conveniently forgot that), and when Reagan refused to veto a bunch of farm subsidies Stockman said publicly that either the farm subsidies had to go, or we would need another tax increase, and that was the final straw.
