The goal of the anti-government “conservative movement” was to “starve the beast” by cutting spending and then cutting more and more and more. “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”

It was called “strategic deficits.” The strategy was to cut taxes in order to create budget deficits. Then whip up fear that “deficit spending” would ruin the country, until the public was convinced of the need to cut government’s budget. Once that was accomplished, do it again, and then again, ad nauseum.

Since Reagan the country has not modernized or even improved its infrastructure. Scientific research was defunded. Tax cuts changed the business model from building solid businesses to quick-buck schemes because you could make a fortune overnight and keep it. The education system fell apart. Wage stagnation combined with propaganda set people against each other. Etc etc etc.

Finally Trump came along. He drowned the country in a bathtub. The America we understood is gone.