It is one of the principal beliefs of the Reaganites that government is the CAUSE of most of the country's problems, and that government is incapable of solving any problem at all, other than national defense and a lack of weapons, which for some reason never specified, government does quite well with no tinge of incompetence or corruption (unless a Democrat is in office).
Naturally, this leads to the wacky belief that government, all government other than the military, is by nature parasitic. When UPS delivers a package, it is a noble achievement of free enterprise, but when the post office does the same thing, even to some trapper up the Fortymile River in Alaska where neither UPS nor FedEx would deign to go, well, that is parasitic and socialistic.
If Ken Burns does a documentary on the Civil War or baseball, with nary a commercial, that is parasitic, but when Directv runs 20 minutes of commercials featuring Beyonc? chomping on a gold bling reading 'UPGRADE' interrupting 40 minutes of dimwitted criminals getting caught by smartass cops on 'COPS'., again, that is an example of stirring Free Enterprise in practice.
It is an utter insult to the intelligence of the American public that PBS receive their 39? of tax money for a Burns documentary when so many more people would prefer seeing awful singers being insulted by Simon Cowell.
As JS states below, cutting taxes in order to supposedly boost revenues and stimulate the economy has NEVER resulted in anything other than massive deficits, which only have been mildly ameliorated by a following and more responsible Democratic administration. The country cannot afford more than 12 years of cost-cutting, borrow and squandering, warmongering Republican administrations. Even Olebush had to raise taxes to avoid utter disaster, because the Laffer Curve model does not work, It was better off as a cocktail napkin.
====================================
. The only times the theory of cutting taxes has led to increased government revenue in this country, the tax cuts where also met with massive increases in government spending and huge increases to the public debt. The United States has never attempted what economists term "shock therapy" which is a massive cut in taxes, large scale privatisation, and sharp and quick cut to actual government expenditures. Nations that have have experienced absolute economic disasters, which doesn't lead much credence to your theory.
------------------------------
Regarding Ronald Reagan, there are too things one must remember about him.
(1) He knew a lot.
(2)Virtually nothing he knew was actually true.