Agreed about the inflation-adjusted dollars but not about the % of GDP since GDP includes government spending. Debt % of GDP is a good measure for some purposes but not for illustrating government growth. A communist government might only have a 20% debt/GDP ratio but still have 100% of its GDP dependent on government spending. There’s a good graph of inflation-adjusted debt on this page, which still shows explosive growth starting in 1980 and having only a slight slowdown during the end of Clinton’s presidency before rocketing up again in 2000.

My only point is that Ronnie’s administration didn’t live up to that quote. They spent and spent and spent some more without worrying where the money came from…