President Reagan, We Hardly Knew You... And the Tea Party Hardly Remembers What You Did and Didn't Do

Presidential candidate Michelle Bachmann continues to cite Reagan and his "economic miracle" as something to be emulated.   But I believe that she, Sarah Palin, and other Tea Party members of the Government-Hating Ronald Reagan Fan Club must be talking about a different Ronald Reagan.
The Reagan I remember once said, "If an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes... it is his right to do so" and launched his presidential campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi - where 3 civil rights workers had been brutally murdered - with a nudge-nudge, wink-wink speech about state's rights, code word for the right to own slaves, later morphed into the right to segregation.  He's also the guy who coined the phrase "welfare queen" and popularized the notion - which would be witty if true - that government is not part of the problem, it is the problem, an interesting stand for someone who spent most of his life as a government employee in one form or another.  He even voted for FDR every time he could.   In fact, before he was against Democrats, he was a Democrat.  Not only was he for unions before he started to bust them, he actually was president of a large and powerful union, the Screen Actors Guild.
Bachmann perhaps didn't get the memo, but Reagan is not all that popular.  Reagan's popularity averages 52.8% (behind JFK, Clinton, Ike, LBJ, and even Bush I).  A third of Americans wanted him to resign after Iran-Contra.   Reagan said he hated taxes but raised them every year except for his first and last, and although he lowered the top marginal tax rate, it was still a "socialist" 50% by the time he left office (now Bachmann believes that raising it from 35 to 40% would be the mother of all tax hikes, unaware perhaps that Obama has the lowest income tax rates of any president going back to the 1930s, and the only real area where Reagan unquestionably was superior was in his propensity to tax.  If nudging tax rates up to Clinton levels is socialism, then Reagan must be an outright communist.  In fact, Reagan's 1982  Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act was the largest peacetime tax increase in U.S. history.
Even the nonsense that Reagan won the Cold War is revisionist history at its worst.  4 days after the Berlin Wall fell, a USA Today poll found far more people credited Gorbachev (43%) than Reagan (14%).   The Cold War did not end with the nuclear sword, but with the negotiating pen.  START would have been mocked as "appeasement" by the Tea Party today, but it worked.
Reagan had some oddly progressive views on terrorism, calling the death of civilians in anti-terrorism operations "terrorism itself."  He was foolish enough to put American Marines in harm's way in Beirut, but wise enough to withdraw them (cut and run) shortly after our country's first introduction to suicide bombing.  Had Bachmann been president, perhaps we would still be fighting and dying there.
Reagan's adviser, Paul Bremer, took the decidedly un-Republican position that terrorist suspects should be tried in civilian courts to "delegitimize them."
And let's not forget Reagan's strong stance against torture.  In 1988, he signed the United Nations Convention Against Torture, which stated that torture could be used under "no exceptional circumstances, whatsoever."  A Treaty signed and ratified becomes US law, so isn't it ironic that Reagan's action criminalized the behavior of Bush and Cheney decades later?
Oh, and that whole "smaller government" thing was as much a myth under Reagan as under Bush II.  Federal spending grew by 2.5% after inflation under Reagan.  Since he did not think it necessary to pay for his expansion of the size and scope of federal government,  national debt exploded, increasing from about $700 billion to nearly $3 trillion, a far greater proportional increase than even under Bush and certainly than under President Obama   For someone who hated federal employees, he sure created a lot of them, increasing their ranks by 200,000, from 2.8 million to 3 million;  government-loving Clinton, in contrast, trimmed that number back to 2.7 million.
Reagan violated a campaign pledge to get rid of two Cabinet agencies as promised - Energy and Education - and even managed to add a new one (Veterans).
Oh, and let's not forget that the "pro Life" (meaning abortion prohibitionist) Reagan legalized abortion in California as governor in the late 1960s (we all owe him a debt of gratitude for that), never sought a constitutional ban on abortion, and appointed Sandra Day O'Connor to the Supreme Court.
In short, Reagan (President Reagan, not the B Movie Actor Bachmann is obviously confusing him with) did some good things, but they are generally things the Tea Party hates, and the reasons they say they love him fit their faux populist pseudo-libertarianism far more than Reagan's actual record as president.  
As you run through his accomplishments, many of which should please Americans who are not on the far right, we might even like him if it weren't for his lying to Congress, selling weapons illegally to Iran (while openly supporting our Man in Baghdad Saddam Hussein (remember him?) in a bloody, US-supported war against the Great Satan du jour) then using the profits to illegally support terrorist groups in Central America, like the Contras in Nicaragua or those CIA-supported operatives in the Honduras who had a penchant for throwing nuns out of helicopters far out at sea.  If he didn't misrepresent his own actions and philosophy, demonizing the federal government while expanding it greatly, then he would not have legitimized a generation of overt "starve the beast" gubment-haters.   If he had stopped blathering about the importance of empowering this "problem" government to force a woman to carry an unintended pregnancy to term, instead pointing out to the religious right that he had neither the intent nor the ability to overturn Roe v. Wade, we would have all moved on to other topics (or they would have abandoned Reagan for someone even more right wing who would not have been electable).
I think Reagan should have stuck to his first impulse, remaining a loyal Democrat while dabbling in B Westerns.  He could have had a happy life with his second wife and none of us would be bothered if an occasional Republican would get confused as to whether he really was the Gipper or simply played one on the silver screen.

Adam Smith - What He Really Wrote in Wealth of Nations

Since so much faith, much of it blind, has been placed in the invisible hand of the free market to guide us and the ability of government only to impede economic progress, it's helpful to return, as always, to the source, in this case to the work that gave us these ideas and spawned some of the counter-intuitive ideas of liberal (free market) economic theory.   The Tea Party has been offering a watered-down version of what Smith actually wrote, but his work makes clear a few major points the Tea Party in its corporation-loving, government-hating rhetoric often ignores.   What follows are some choice excerpts from the 1775 work.
Note that Smith rails against corporations throughout the book, although to be fair the use of the term has drifted over time, and he was as concerned about the cornering of labor markets through guilds (which were also called corporations in his time) and local laws that artificially limited the supply of skilled laborers (by mandating long apprenticeships, for example, and quotas of numbers of apprentices per business), but the idea is the same.  Smith believed that whenever two businessmen got together, self-interest would compel them to collude to artificially drive up prices and keep out competition.
Smith also did not share the anti-government rhetoric of the Tea Party and nowhere suggests much less advocates the abolition of government.  Rather, he argues that some taxes can unfairly harm the poor (such as a window tax that would harm a lower income country inn owner much more than a higher income London landlord who might pay lower taxes because he has fewer windows (this is a stone's throw from advocating an income tax, something Smith does not explicitly do, but he argues against flat taxes that all must pay even though some would pay much more proportional to their income and property.
In fact, Smith often argues that government has a critical role to play in free markets.  Without the security provided by government, the rich few could never sleep at night knowing that the vastly greater many might be provoked into confiscating their property.   The only societies that do not need governments are poor ones, or ones in which the accumulation of wealth is trivial, only a few days' worth of labor.  In Smith's view, without government, there could be no secure accumulation of wealth.
Smith also makes clear that he feels government has a role in helping to shape the ethical, moral, and physical development of its citizens, especially the poor workers, who through the mindless repetition of their labor could become as "stupid as men can be."
Finally, in Smith's descriptions of ancient Rome,  the many poor who  became indebted to the rich few with massive debts that they could never hope to pay off  lost their independence and ended up having to vote for whatever candidate the creditor dictated, a situation eerily reminiscent of today's over-leveraged American consumer.  Put another way:  wealth inequality and manipulation of this situation for the benefit of the wealthy few can make the idea of a democracy a joke since the wealthy few can essentially by needed votes if the poor become indebted to them financially.

Excerpts:

Corporations … are a sort of enlarged monopolies
The exclusive privileges of corporations, statutes of apprenticeship, and all those laws which restrain in particular employments, the competition to a smaller number than might otherwise go into them, have the same tendency, though in a less degree. They are a sort of enlarged monopolies, and may frequently, for ages together, and in whole classes of employments, keep up the market price of particular commodities above the natural price.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 908-911). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

Corporation laws drive up prices which must be paid by everyone else
Corporation laws enable the inhabitants of towns to raise their prices, without fearing to be undersold by the free competition of their own countrymen. Those other regulations secure them equally against that of foreigners. The enhancement of price occasioned by both is everywhere finally paid by the landlords, farmers, and labourers, of the country, who have seldom opposed the establishment of such monopolies. They have commonly neither inclination nor fitness to enter into combinations; and the clamour and sophistry of merchants and manufacturers easily persuade them, that the private interest of a part, and of a subordinate part, of the society, is the general interest of the whole.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 1953-1957). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

An incorporation not only renders them necessary, but makes the act of the majority binding upon the whole. In a free trade, an effectual combination cannot be established but by the unanimous consent of every single trader, and it cannot last longer than every single trader continues of the same mind. The majority of a corporation can enact a bye-law, with proper penalties, which will limit the competition more effectually and more durably than any voluntary combination whatever. The pretence that corporations are necessary for the better government of the trade, is without any foundation. The real and effectual discipline which is exercised over a workman, is not that of his corporation, but that of his customers. It is the fear of losing their employment which restrains his frauds and corrects his negligence. An exclusive corporation necessarily weakens the force of this discipline. A particular set of workmen must then be employed, let them behave well or ill. It is upon this account that, in many large incorporated towns, no tolerable workmen are to be found, even in some of the most necessary trades. If you would have your work tolerably executed, it must be done in the suburbs, where the workmen, having no exclusive privilege, have nothing but their character to depend upon, and you must then smuggle it into the town as well as you can.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 1983-1987). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

Corporate laws limit the mobility of laborers much more than the circulation of the rich
Corporation laws, however, give less obstruction to the free circulation of stock from one place to another, than to that of labour. It is everywhere much easier for a wealthy merchant to obtain the privilege of trading in a town-corporate, than for a poor artificer to obtain that of working in it. The obstruction which corporation laws give to the free circulation of labour is common, I believe, to every part of Europe. That which is given to it by the poor laws is, so far as I know, peculiar to England. It consists in the difficulty which a poor man finds in obtaining a settlement, or even in being allowed to exercise his industry in any parish but that to which he belongs. It is the labour of artificers and manufacturers only of which the free circulation is obstructed by corporation laws.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 2083-2089). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

The main objective of corporate by-laws is to raise barriers to entry
The object, besides, of the greater part of the bye-laws of all regulated companies, as well as of all other corporations, is not so much to oppress those who are already members, as to discourage others from becoming so; which may be done, not only by a high fine, but by many other contrivances. The constant view of such companies is always to raise the rate of their own profit as high as they can; to keep the market, both for the goods which they export, and for those which they import, as much understocked as they can; which can be done only by restraining the competition, or by discouraging new adventurers from entering into the trade.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 11255-11259). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

But the reverence of the people naturally preserves the established forms and ceremonies of religion long after the circumstances which first introduced and rendered them reasonable, are no more.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 11727-11728). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

On Income Inequality : government is necessary to protect property
Wherever there is a great property, there is great inequality. For one very rich man, there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy to invade his possessions. It is only under the shelter of the civil magistrate, that the owner of that valuable property, which is acquired by the labour of many years, or perhaps of many successive generations, can sleep a single night in security. He is at all times surrounded by unknown enemies, whom, though he never provoked, he can never appease, and from whose injustice he can be protected only by the powerful arm of the civil magistrate, continually held up to chastise it. The acquisition of valuable and extensive property, therefore, necessarily requires the establishment of civil government.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 10831-10836). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

But in every improved and civilized society, this is the state [of neglected moral and physical development] into which the labouring poor, that is, the great body of the people, must necessarily fall, unless government takes some pains to prevent it.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 11954-11955). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

In several protestant countries, particularly in all the protestant cantons of Switzerland, the revenue which anciently belonged to the Roman catholic church, the tithes and church lands, has been found a fund sufficient, not only to afford competent salaries to the established clergy, but to defray, with little or no addition, all the other expenses of the state. The magistrates of the powerful canton of Berne, in particular, have accumulated, out of the savings from this fund, a very large sum, supposed to amount to several millions; part or which is deposited in a public treasure, and part is placed at interest in what are called the public funds of the different indebted nations of Europe; chiefly in those of France and Great Britain.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 12490-12495). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

The most opulent church in Christendom does not maintain better the uniformity of faith, the fervour of devotion, the spirit of order, regularity, and austere morals, in the great body of the people, than this very poorly endowed church of Scotland.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 12501-12502). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.

In Rome, as in all other ancient republics, the poor people were constantly in debt to the rich and the great, who, in order to secure their votes at the annual elections, used to lend them money at exorbitant interest, which, being never paid, soon accumulated into a sum too great either for the debtor to pay, or for any body else to pay for him. The debtor, for fear of a very severe execution, was obliged, without any further gratuity, to vote for the candidate whom the creditor recommended.

Smith, Adam (2002-06-01). An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Kindle Locations 14515-14519). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.