Brian Domitrovic author of econoclasts who claims to be “the only professional historian ever to have written on the topic (Enactment of Reagan’s Supply-Side tax cuts) writes “by the summer of 1981, the supply-side revolution was no sure thing.”
His article in Forbes states:
“In his first months in office, in early 1981, Reagan actually dithered on moving on his tax cut. He conceded to watering down Kemp-Roth, and he actually had to be convinced by Democrats that the top rate of the income tax had to be taken down all at once, instead of in phases.
Smelling blood, in spring of that year Democrats started to offer alternatives to Reagan’s tax cut, in the form of smaller, more “reasonable” tax cuts. Crucially, these did not index the tax code against inflation, as the Reagan bill would soon propose and has been a beloved staple in the tax code since indexing came into effect in 1985.
In stepped – Newt Gingrich. Gingrich, a second-term Representative, led an “Economic Recovery Working Group” in the House whose purpose was to show “what each member can do to help the Reagan tax cut” against its Democratic alternatives.
The group gave daily briefings and issued strategy memos on how to get the job done in the House. “Emphasize that the Reagan program is a real tax cut; and that the O’Neill/Rostenkowski program will mean a real tax increase for most Americans by 1984” was the gist of one memo. This particular point is the one Reagan would seize on in the famous chart (designed by Entin) that he presented to the American people in a televised address in late July, which closed the deal in Congress.
Had these actions not been taken:
had people like Newt Gingrich not acted in 1981, we would have had the alternative tax cut that would have been unrecognizable from any of Jimmy Carter’s tax shavings of the 1970s.
We have heard much in the last week or two about how Gingrich was a critic of Reagan, how he really had nothing to do with Supply Side policies, and how his claims to part of the Reagan revolution were false. I even mistakenly wrote that Gingrich learned from Reagan–that he was a back-bencher, a student.
Now it is apparent that Gingrich was not just a student, he was not a back-bencher. Gingrich was more like a colonel in Reagan’s Revolution. He fought for the Reagan revolution and the LIES that we have been told about his role, lead me to say:
Florida: You have been lied to. Now it will be up to future states and contests to correct for the misinformation you were given. I ask people in the states to follow to consider carefully when you hear the establishment claiming this or that about Gingrich– just remember they tried to rewrite history and leave out the invaluable contributions of one Newt Gingrich.
