From David Sirota on Fox News via The Huffington Post.
As you'll see, on that latter issue, Fox News is starting its campaign to stop Obama's big spending plan by stating - as assumed fact - that "historians pretty much agree" that Franklin Roosevelt prolonged the Great Depression, and that therefore, Obama shouldn't try another New Deal.
When I say Fox News' assertion about historians is patently false, they literally laugh at me as if I've said something so clearly untrue, something Americans supposedly assume is so obviously stupid, that it's worthy of ridicule.
The Depression issue was brought up by conservative pundit Monica Crowley - not surprising since this is the conservative talking point du jour ever since the "center-right nation" meme started looking idiotic....
....
If the right wants to try to stop a serious economic recovery package and financial regulations by trying to vilify one of the most popular presidents and popular policy programs in American history, then I'll say what George Bush once said: Bring it on.
"Bring it on!" indeed.
Watch the Fox News clip here. The comments on Roosevelt's policies during the Great Depression begin at about 3:14 minutes into the clip.
When I say Fox News' assertion about historians is patently false, they literally laugh at me as if I've said something so clearly untrue, something Americans supposedly assume is so obviously stupid, that it's worthy of ridicule.
ReplyDeleteMimi dear,
to what kind of uneducated half-wits does "they" refer? I am a Historian of the New Deal, of sorts, and have read a great many more. "Patently false" is a clear and succinct description of what the scholarly concensus on the New Deal would say of this ideological quackery Fox "News" is attempting to spread.
I suggest you spend more time on the innertubes for sensible talk, and limit your conversations with "them" to the weather and the activities of grqandchildren, lest you slip into name calling, however accurate such names may be.
OK, OK; I shoudda followed the link first. It's Faux News, spewing some rightwing Feckwit's attempt to change the record. None of these people would have been out of place in Goebbels' Ministry.
ReplyDeleteBizarre.
ReplyDeleteI want the names of the historians who "pretty much agree" that Roosevelt's polices made the depression worse. Doesn't matter if it's not true. They'll continue to use it as a talking point.
ReplyDeleteThis is when I find it terribly inconvenient not to believe in hell for the lying liars...
ReplyDeleteSirota's post is half true. There were plenty of things wrong with the New Deal, for the simple reason that FDR's approach was essentially pragmatic--if it sounded like it would work, try it and see. So some of it was a major disaster--the NRA being the prime suspect. That was essentially a wage and price control scheme into which businesses were forcibly corralled, with the intention of forcing prices (primarily, and wages secondarily) to stay artificially high. (FDR's economists saw this as a means of ensuring higher employment.) This meant that a merchant couldn't lower his prices to adjust to the fact that his customers couldn't afford his goods at the higher price, so he would end up not selling them, and the customers not buying them. Everyone lost out there.
ReplyDeleteWhere the New Deal succeeded was in establishing permanent programs that ensured buffers against economic downturns would always be in place--the FDIC to insure bank deposits and Social Security to make sure the elderly had some sort of income are of course the best known. Those are probably the main reasons that, while we've had plenty of recessions, we've had no depressions since then.
But it did require WWII, with the impetus given to industry and the mass diversion of manpower into the armed forces, to get the USA out of the Depression fully and finally.
And those employment statistics are dependend on how you view programs like the CCC. Does government make-work count as a true job, or should we count as "real jobs" only those found in the private sector, with only permanent government jobs (like the police and bureaucrats) included?
Have you ever noticed the Meghan Kelly person actually snears as she spews? I only flip Fox on for a minute or two usually...it´s more than enough regardless of content...whew, they really ought hire some well-adjusted folks to spread their vicious party line...it would work better without all the failed Hollywood blonds.
ReplyDeleteAnd those employment statistics are dependend on how you view programs like the CCC.< b>Does government make-work count as a true job, or should we count as "real jobs" only those found in the private sector, with only permanent government jobs (like the police and bureaucrats) included?
ReplyDeleteKishnevi, an emphatic, "Yes! When it's used to repair dangerous bridges and roads which have been neglected for many years, of course it counts. Those are real jobs. When the jobs are cleaning up despoiled environments, they count. I could go on. If that's make-work, then yes, let's do it.
How about new construction of mass transit? Lets do those make-work projects, too. I'm not saying that everything that Roosevelt did worked, but we are in a desperate condition in this country. We are in a depression, IMHO, and it's probably going to get worse before it gets better. What policies do you suggest?
Let's give everyone the safety net of the same access to health care that the elders in the country have.
Leo, I never watch Fox, unless I'm directed to a video clip by someone else. If Melanie was a fruit, she'd be a prune. I don't think that the folks on Fox believe half of what they say. The script goes out in the morning, and they follow the script.
This is one of the most important things about Blogs - Fox News has been repudiated over and over again in them. Whatever evil they have done and can do has been seriously minimized by Bloggers who get right on the case and circulate a counter point, or, in the case of Fox - the truth.
ReplyDeleteOh, there's a lot negative to be said about Blogs, but this is one of the good ones.
Thanks, Mimi, for spreading the Good News.