Mainstream political discussion tends to create a lot of meaningless buzzwords and phrases. Lately, people have been talking about the “silent majority,” which by definition is not real, and “safe spaces,” which aren’t as damaging or pervasive as Fox News would have you believe.

But one of my favorite fake political terms people like to use is “fiscally conservative.”

Supposedly, fiscal conservatism equates to being fiscally responsible. Fiscal conservatism means you advocate for lower taxes, lower spending, etc. Republicans constantly claim to be “fiscally conservative,” but it doesn’t add up.

During his presidency, Ronald Reagan, the quintessential conservative hero and passionate tax slasher, had the largest budget deficits of any president since World War II.

You would think that the president who conservatives claim did wonders for businesses, and whose economic policies are still revered by the Republican Party, would have had enough tax revenue cover his expenditures.

George W. Bush turned a budget surplus he inherited from Bill Clinton into a gigantic deficit. The man appealed to Americans’ patriotism so he could send the country headfirst into a multi-trillion-dollar war and then attempted to fund it by lowering taxes.

That’s like going to a grocery store and trying to pay for $40 of groceries with a $20 bill, and when the cashier tells you that you don’t have enough money, you take back the $20 bill and hand him a $10 bill instead.

Republicans would have you believe that modern political debate pits a fiscally responsible party against a party that just throws money down the toilet with poor policies and improper monetary management.

But the fact is, Republicans are no better at managing money than Democrats are, and in a lot of cases they are much worse.

Republicans try to convince you that they can cut deficits by giving huge tax breaks to the rich by cutting funding for programs that help poor people, public schools, etc. You know, the “unnecessary stuff.”

But the programs they constantly propose to cut are crucial stimulants to the economy – that’s why they seldom make any cuts at all. It doesn’t take a Ph.D. in economics to understand what happens when you try to cut taxes without cutting spending.

Republicans aren’t fiscally responsible, they’re fiscally irresponsible. They aren’t spending your money any smarter than Democrats are, they just spend it on different things. They prefer tanks over textbooks, and aircraft carriers over unemployment benefits.

And they can’t continue to try to cut taxes without a real plan for cutting spending to match those cuts.