PRESTOPUNDIT -- A Good Blog at a Great Price. Guaranteed.

Bruce Bartlett on George Bush, the anti-Reagan:

despite the need to rebuild America’s defenses, Reagan never let it be an excuse to give up on controlling domestic spending. It would have been a lot easier for him to buy the votes needed for national defense by loosening the domestic spending reins. But he never did and fought hard to bring domestic discretionary spending down from 4.7 percent of the gross domestic product in 1980 to 3.1 percent by 1988. That is equivalent to reducing spending by $165 billion per year in today’s economy.

By contrast, George W. Bush has raised domestic discretionary spending by 0.4 percent of GDP in just his first 2 years in office — equivalent to $630 billion over the next decade if sustained.

A key reason why Reagan made his effort is because he understood that the health of the U.S. economy was critical to national security and the defeat of Soviet communism. He knew that big government is a drag on the economy — not just because of the high taxes that go with it, but because it preempts resources that the private sector can use more efficiently. Thus, an increase in government’s share of GDP will eventually reduce growth even if taxes don’t rise.