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Originally Posted by The_Rorschach
High budget deficits and the resulting rise in the National Debt are traditional ways to get rid of 'entitlement programs'. Take for instance the huge change in Public Assistance [Welfare] since the soaring deficits of the Reagan and Bush Sr. Administrations.
Now, the target is Social Security and Medicare, previously untouchable but now with shocking large deficits and debt, a case will be made that these programs must be reduced. And they will be. Just watch ...
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On the first bit, you are right and wrong: Right in that you've nailed the tactic, but wrong in your classification of it as traditional. Reagan overspent, creating a deficit, but he did so on what he considered to be necessary defense spending. That's a very conservative thing to do. It was Bush Sr that started a trend, if one exists, toward fiscal irresponsibility in order to move the date at which the various entitlement programs will fail forward... and he paid the price of a second term.
Clinton was more fiscally conservative than either of the Bushes, at least in the short term. His methodology was to band-aid the problems in order to push the failure farther into the future.
It doesn't seem that traditional fiscal conservatives are understanding the long-term tactic this time, either, though. If not for the WOT, Dubya could have been beaten by anyone... even Kerry.