Reagan? Now I remember some of what he pushed with his political capital: He called the Soviet Union an "evil empire" and stood at the wall in Germany and said

Reagan? Now I remember some of what he pushed with his political capital: He called the Soviet Union an "evil empire" and stood at the wall in Germany and said "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.". Then he pushed 'Star Wars' hard, had Ed Teller in the Oval Office explaining nuclear powered, orbiting X-ray lasers, etc. During his campaigning and his many rubber chicken talks for GE, he kept saying how important it was to have a balanced budget, but in office he told Stockman to "spend". And he spent big time on the US military. So, we got a lot of Abrams M-1 tanks. Leaders in the aviation parts of the US military were expected to fly and got their personal plane to fly, e.g., an F-16. When Reagan negotiated with Gorbachev in Iceland, Reagan would not give up on 'Star Wars' -- he was pushing hard. The difference is, Reagan had an agenda and used his political capital to push things. It's not clear what political agenda Obama has, beyond making the Federal Government bigger and richer to enable more on social justice, and he essentially never pushes anything. During the Reagan Admin, my wife and I were doing some consulting, and there was an issue in healthcare: The previous administration figured that if reduce the number of hospital beds, then will reduce the cost to the Federal Government for healthcare. So in each US county, etc., there got to be fights, with lawyers, for the available number of beds. I was involved as an expert witness on the statistics of how many beds were needed. Then Reagan came into office and right away cut out the group trying to regulate the number of beds; that was just part of Reagan wanting smaller government. Yup, I lost that part of my consulting business! Maybe one likes Obama better or Reagan better, but there are differences! The best the Federal Government does is terrific stuff -- NSF, NIH, DARPA, TVA, FAA, FDA. Otherwise I figure that any money the Federal Government doesn't spend it doesn't waste; any program it doesn't pursue does no harm. So, I'm for a more limited Federal Government. Then in a sense I should like Obama because from all I can see actually he isn't doing much, that is, is concentrating on his golf game and jump shot. He is spending a lot of money, but likely the economy still needs that. Otherwise I suspect that the next president will have lots of places to cut back. Oh, by the way, we should not miss that mostly or entirely, Obama has never had a Federal budget! So apparently he just spends money, and when he runs out Congress gives him some more. One effect may be that starting in 2016 real estate prices within 200 miles of the Washington Monument will head for the floor, e.g., from DC beltway bandit body shops no longer paying GED employees up to $200,000 a year. That area is now the third richest in the US, behind Silicon Valley and the hedge fund area of CT. I suspect DC's going on a diet, especially as interest rates start to rise!