Acerbic Politics

Reagan OMB Director: Republicans are 'Ideological Gangs' (Click on this headline to read more.

Chris Hayes: Now former Congressman David Stockman, Republican from Michigan. He was the director of the Office Of Management and Budget during the Reagan administration. He is the author of “The Great Deformation, The Corruption of Capitalism in America”. … You are someone who has kind of been in and out of the Conservative movement. You were a kind of a ‘purgee’ in certain ways. … How do you kind of understand this.

David Stockman: This isn’t surprising. The Republicans are no longer a political party. They are a gang, a coalition of ideological gangs. You have the neo cons, the tax cons, the social cons, and the just cons. … On the fundamental fiscal issues they don’t agree at all. It’s totally fractured. The neo cons want a bigger defense budget. We have a 650 billion dollar war machine. They did not get the memo that the cold war ended over 25 years ago. There are a few thousand terrorists left. You don’t need a war machine that big. By the way, when Clinton left the White House it was 400 billion dollars in today’s dollars. So they argue we can’t do sequester. We ought to be cutting much more. So that divides the party. Then you have the tax cons who still believe in the magic napkin. Just grow your way out of it. We’ve had 30 years to prove you can’t. … We have the social cons, the social issue people who don’t care. An then all the Republicans who have been talking about big spending who won’t stand up and take on social security means testing. Not cutting the people who need it. …