slideshow

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was "Born to the Manor" on his

Family's Pantation! He was provided everything he ever wanted!

There are two types of Plantation Owners, malevolent or

benevolent. The malevolent owner physically and mentally

abuses his slaves, while the benevolent owner takes care

of his slaves by providing them with food, clothing and

shelter. By doing so, the benevolent plantation owner's

slaves are not apt to run away and they are a lot more

contented (dependent upon him for all their needs).  As a

member of the Plantation Owner's Association (Fictional),

FDR was elected to be their representative in 1932.

Ask the Politically Correct!

Question?

What was FDR's First New Deal during the Great Depression?

Politically Correct Resolution:

The "First" New Deal (1933-35) aimed at restoring the economy

from the "top down" (trickle down  - hmmm, sounds familiar)

(History 1302)

FDR remained vague while running for President in 1931.

He promised if he was elected, that under his presidency,

government would act decisively to end the depression.

Once he was elected, he said yes to every plan Wall Street

came up with. The Congress approved every proposal that

FDR presented to them.

The Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), passed in

1933, accepted the long-held premise that low farm

prices resulted from overproduction.  Thus, the

government sought to stimulate increased farm prices

by paying farmers to produce less.  While the original

AAA was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court,

a new act correcting for the Court's concerns was passed

in 1935.  Critics pointed out the irony of reducing food

production in a society where children already went hungry. 

Of course, those children's hunger did not represent "demand "

in the marketplace.   Indeed there were agricultural surpluses;

as usual, the problem of the American farm was demand and

distribution, not supply.   "Acreage allotment" (the backbone

of the crop reduction program) helped the largest and best

capitalized farmers.  It did little for smaller farmers and

led to the eviction and homelessness of tenants and sharecroppers

whose landlords hardly needed their services under a system that

paid them to grow less.  Further, it failed to address the

fundamental problem of the Depression:  weak consumer demand due

to falling wages and unemployment.  In the long run the effect of

the AAA was beneficial to large operators.

The 1933 National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) set up the New

Deal's fundamental strategy of centralized planning as a means

of combating the Depression.  Industrial sectors were encouraged

to avoid "cutthroat competition" (selling below cost to attract

dwindling customers and drive weaker competitors out of business)

which may have been good for individual businesses in the short-run,

but resulted in increased unemployment and an even smaller customer

pool in the long-run.  The government temporarily suspended

enforcement of anti-monopoly laws and sponsored what amounted to

price-fixing as an emergency measure.  Similar efforts were made

to stabilize wages within industries as well.  Again, the basic

problem left unanswered was "overall weak consumer demand".   The

NIRA did address this in a limited way with the Public Works

Administration which funded various public employment schemes;

however, the number of jobs created by the PWA were miniscule

compared to the number of jobless workers.     

The "First" New Deal's Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) reflected

the future liberal methods of the "Second" New Deal.  The TVA (1933)

provided millions of dollars to transform the economies of seven

depressed, rural Southern states along the Tennessee River.  The

program included dam-building, electric power-generation, flood

and erosion control.   It provided relatively high-wage jobs in

construction in a region the president called "the nation's number

one economic problem."  Critics saw creeping socialism in this

venture;  liberals saw it as a successful example of government

solving social and economic problems.

The Politics of Right and Left push and pull FDR toward

the Left

The right-wing of American politics convinced Roosevelt

he had nothing to lose on that end of the spectrum.

Chief among his critics on the right was the Liberty

League, a speaker's bureau funded by the Du Pont family

and other business interests.  The League leadership

sought to fuse a partnership between the segregationist

governor of Georgia Eugene Talmadge and other conservative

leaders to create a grassroots opposition to the New Deal.

Liberty League speakers toured the country accusing Roosevelt

of instituting creeping socialism.

Right-wing radio personality Father Charles Coughlin

denounced recipients of government assistance and claimed

the New Deal led the country toward a Communist dictatorship.

(He suggested Nazi Germany would prove to be America's correct

model) and blamed the Depression on a Jewish conspiracy (when there's

a lingering doubt give the Jews a clout).  At the height of his

popularity millions of Americans listened to his radio sermons

each week.

This was a prime example of how the media of the time was used

to propagandize the minds of the people to fulfill an agenda.

(in this case it was right wing propaganda).

The Liberty League convinced Roosevelt that he had lost any hope

of support from the business right and Coughlin's popularity

convinced him that people must be suffering indeed to listen

to such rhetoric.  In a sense, both the Liberty League and

Coughlin (for different reasons) pushed FDR further to the left.

Roosevelt was pulled toward the left by both the traditional Left

(The Socialist Party of America) and the unconventional left

(Dr. Francis Townshend and Sen. Huey P. Long of Louisiana).

In 1932 the Socialists' presidential candidate Norman Thomas had

tripled his 1928 showing as hard times rejuvenated the Socialist

critique of the system.   Nobody thought Thomas posed an electoral

threat to FDR; the president was sensitive, however, to the

Socialists' rising popularity.

Dr. Francis Townsend, a California physician, argued in favor of

a federally-funded old-age pension as a means of ending the Depression.

He argued that turning the nation's elderly population into robust

consumers would solve the underlying problem of weak demand.  Dr.

Townsend's clubs began springing up across the country as his message

of care for the elderly meshed with people's desire for a rapid end

to the Depression.    

The colorful senator from Louisiana, Huey P. Long, joined Roosevelt's

critics on the left with his "Share Our Wealth" plan.  Long proposed

a guaranteed household income for each American family paid for by high

taxes on the wealthiest Americans.  Long's rising popularity (before his

assassination in 1935) further demonstrated to FDR the discontent of the

people.   Convinced that Americans were suffering more than he had

realized and believing he had already forfeited the support of the

business right, FDR headed left in the "second" New Deal.

(History 1302)

Now we know where the phrase "I was for it before I was against it"

originally came from after FDR stuck his finger in the air to see

which way the political wind was blowing.

Make no mistake about it, the Wall Street (International) Bankers were/are

playing both sides (Left and Right) against the middle!

"NOVUS GLOBUS FUNDA"

(New Global Foundation (Plantation))