Reagan looms over debt debate inspiring both sides

[Cancel 2018. 3]

Reagan looms over debt debate inspiring both sides

WASHINGTON (AP) — Ronald Reagan might as well be sitting in on the troubled debt talks, so frequently is his memory invoked by both sides.

But for vastly different reasons.

Conservative Republicans praise the 40th president's steely advocacy for smaller government and lower taxes.

President Barack Obama and his Democratic allies praise Reagan because, they say, he was the sublime compromiser, willing to work with Democrats such as House Speaker Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill of Massachusetts to forge landmark tax and Social Security deals and willing to raise the federal debt ceiling so the government could keep borrowing to pay its bills.
http://news.yahoo.com/reagan-looms-over-debt-debate-inspiring-both-sides-132912790.html

The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies.

Over the past 5 years, our federal debt has increased by $3.5 trillion to $8.6 trillion.That is “trillion” with a “T.” That is money that we have borrowed from the Social Security trust fund, borrowed from China and Japan, borrowed from American taxpayers. And over the next 5 years, between now and 2011, the President’s budget will increase the debt by almost another $3.5 trillion.

who said the above? a conservative?

 

[charver]

Surely Obama is merely following Reagan's example of raising debt dramatically?

Although if he mimicked the "small government" rhetoric Reagan was so fond of then he may have got away with it as well.