To the Editor:

Re “G.O.P. Senators Embrace Plan for Tax Cut That Adds to Deficit” (front page, Sept. 20):

Republicans claim that a $1.5 trillion tax cut over 10 years won’t further explode the deficit because it will pay for itself through increased economic growth. Empirical evidence over the last four decades establishes the lunacy of such a claim. The cumulative deficit tripled under President Ronald Reagan and doubled under George W. Bush, while it grew more slowly under Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, under whom some tax rates were increased.

And yet here they go again. If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, then either the Republican Party is insane or it believes that the American people are incurably gullible.

MICHAEL K. CANTWELL

DELRAY BEACH, FLA.