What Was The Reagan Revolution About?

'Today would Reagan be arrested and indicted for endangering US national security by trying to make peace with Russia?'

By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts: It depends on whether you were part of it or viewed it through the eyes of the liberal media.

I was a part of the Reagan Revolution. Reagan adopted the Kemp-Roth bill and the supply-side policy it represented as his economic policy to cure stagflation. As I had written the bill and had built as a member of the Congressional staff support for it among House Republicans and Senate Republicans and Democrats, Reagan reasoned that I had a stake in his economic policy and would get it unmolested out of his administration so that Congress could vote on it.

Reagan explained to me that he had two goals. The first was to end the “stagflation” that forced the US economy to pay for economic growth with higher inflation. Once the US economy was repaired, Reagan’s second goal was to use the power of the US economy to end the Cold War.

The Soviet economy was dysfunctional and within its paradigm could not be repaired. Reagan’s plan was to fix the US economy and then challenge the Soviets to an arms race in order to bring them to the negotiation table to end the Cold War. Reagan thought that the destructive power of nuclear weapons was too great to risk distrust and tension between the US and the Soviet Union.

Reagan accomplished both of his goals, and he has not been given credit.

I was involved in both. I got Reagan’s supply-side policy out of his administration, and Congress passed it. Next as a member of a secret presidential committee I helped to move the CIA out of the way of Reagan’s intention to end the Cold War. The CIA argued that the Soviets would win an arms race because their economy was centrally planned and could put more resources in the military than could Reagan. Reagan believed the Soviet economy was broken and could not be fixed. The secret presidential committee, after reading the CIA’s analysis and interviewing CIA officials, concluded that Reagan was right. The committee told Reagan that the CIA was protecting its budget and power by trying to prevent the end of the Cold War.

Americans do not understand how many influential institutions have an interest in war and how few have an interest in peace. What do you think the political campaign contributions from peace groups are compared to those of the military/security complex?

Ask yourself why Washington has wasted billions and billions of dollars in such immoral uses as funding a proxy war in Ukraine against Russia and in funding Israel’s attempted genocide of Palestine when, all the while, US infrastructure is hurting, when homelessness on our cities’ streets is growing, when health care is substandard and unavailable to many, and when Washington’s open borders policy is bringing in 3.6 million people annually that need support for housing, food, medical care, and education. The war lobby rules over every other budget category.

Look at the eight years of Hell the military/security complex put Trump through just because he said he was going to “normalize relations with Russia.” The last thing the military/security complex can afford is to have their enemy taken away.

War has a grip on America. It is Washington’s main purpose. Every tension-reducing agreement 20th century US presidents made with the Soviet Union was repealed beginning with Clinton in the 1990s and completed by George W. Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden.

It is extraordinary that the United States rapidly disintegrating into a tower of babel is simultaneously provoking conflict with Russia, Iran, and China. Clearly, Washington’s priority is the same as that of the military/security complex. Washington’s agenda is war. The Cold War that Reagan ended has been resurrected and is entering a hot phase.

An afterthought: Today would Reagan be arrested and indicted for endangering US national security by trying to make peace with Russia?

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