Not all federal deficits are equal.  If money is spent and there's a corresponding asset, the transaction takes on the qualities of an investment.  Much of the Trump deficit – like Reagan's – is for military spending.  Much of this will result in assets being created and new technologies being developed.  The aircraft carrier Carl Vinson was commissioned in 1982 and remains in service, as does the Theodore Roosevelt, commissioned in 1986.  And the money Reagan spent on missiles and missile defense has helped fuel the nation's technology sector – though lampooned as "Star Wars" at the time.  Arguably, defense spending pays dividends.

Additionally, as a recent Wall Street Journal editorial showed, it isn't the cause of runaway spending – transfer payments are.

Since the late 1940s, entitlement claims on the nation's output of goods and services have risen from less than 4% to 14%.  Surprising as it may seem, the share of GDP spent on national defense and non-defense discretionary programs combined is no higher today than it was seven decades ago.

The contrast between the long-term increase in entitlement spending and the long-term decline in defense spending reflects the profound transformation of the federal government's priorities from providing for the nation's defense to redistributing income.

Second, Adam Smith's free trade and competitive and comparative advantage could be in need of some rethinking.  Smith argued that the wealth of nations is attributed to what those nations produce better than others.  French wines come to mind.  France would do well to produce wine and import other items.  But now domestic wines from California, Michigan, and other states, and these wines rival the best of France.  Smith couldn't imagine a nation such as America that does – or is capable of doing – almost everything well.  Why should Americans buy much of anything from overseas?  Given the freedom to compete and innovate, America has been able to achieve an amazing degree of self-sufficiency.  That – as Trump thinks – can lead directly to prosperity. 

Short-term deficits that result in long-term investment and trade policies that encourage American innovation rather than pressure American wages might usher in another American century.