[Patrickov]

FDR gets rated as one of the top three presidents.

In terms of difficulty, he was basically climbing one mountain after another, the whole time he was in the office.

In the early years, the conservatives were attacking him with everything they had, even the Supreme Court went too far opposing him. Sound familiar? Looking back, if you haven't studied the era, it looks easy. It wasn't.

I never see FDR's presidency easy, especially as he took up the job during both the Great Depression and the rise of Totalitarianism elsewhere in the world.

Both FDR and Winston Churchill were regarded as great only because they fought and won a great war (not totally to their credit, I have to say), and they are still held in high regard today because the nations they saved have not gone awry like the Soviet Union did. In particular, I see Chiang Kai-Shek be an extremely unlucky guy compared with FDR / Churchill, as well as Charles de Gaulle and Joseph Stalin.

[SpecialOlympian]

FDR created Social Security you dumb motherfucker.

[JohnRawls]

FDR created Social Security you dumb motherfucker.

He also prolonged the great depression until the WW2 so he is not everything good and just and so on...

Patrickov is not exactly incorrect at saying that FDR is considered "great" because he was one of the WW2 victors. Obviously he had more going for him but WW2 victory can not be understated.

[SpecialOlympian]

He also prolonged the great depression until the WW2 so he is not everything good and just and so on...

How does a president prolong the failures of a boom or bust capitalist system? Tell me.

Unless you think Hoover, who was literally greeted by people who spat on his motorcade while holding nooses in their hands because he refused to interfere with the economy, was better.

Patrickov is not exactly incorrect at saying that FDR is considered "great" because he was one of the WW2 victors. Obviously he had more going for him but WW2 victory can not be understated.

This is also moronic, because it was Truman who defeated Japan with nukes by nuking all their gundams. Rendering Japan defenseless by turning all of their giant robots into ash with nuclear light.

[JohnRawls]

How does a president prolong the failures of a boom or bust capitalist system? Tell me.

Unless you think Hoover, who was literally greeted by people who spat on his motorcade while holding nooses in their hands because he refused to interfere with economy, was better.



This is also moronic, because it was Truman who defeated Japan with nukes by nuking all their gundams.

By 1945 everyone already had a full understanding that the war is over so it is bullshit that you trying to put the win on Truman. FDR was president for most of the war so he gets almost all of the credit for the victory on the US side. FDR died in April 1945, by that time the Soviets were already in Berlin while the allies have already occupied the Rhineland. The Japanese were pretty much fucked in most places besides the core island and Manchuria.

As for prolonging the depression, there are many CREDIBLE, PEER REVIEWED economic studies on the subject by economist from all over the world that the reason the great depression lasted so long in the US was the policies under FDR. If US didn't do anything then the country would have recovered faster. And this is not about the employment program and the aid, that was actually one of the good things economically that FDR did. The problem is the other programs that were implemented like self-regulation and removal of all regulations if the industry manages to get a deal with the industry union who then assumes the role of the main recruiter of the industry. (So basically, the union becomes a collection of nepotists who get payoffs from the companies so the companies don't get regulated and then push any people they want in to those companies for employment). This is but one example, there are more.

[Patrickov]

I admit the use of the word "only" was a mistake.

I did not mean to say FDR was not great for his leadership other than WW2, but this was probably his biggest merit for foreigners like me.

This mistake is minor and does not merit rant though, and considering the rant to be from a member renowned for his short temper and violent expressions I sadly decide to reject it.

[late]

Both FDR and Winston Churchill were regarded as great only because they fought and won a great war

Churchill was mostly terrible except for that one year which seemed like he was born to do.

FDR is a completely different kettle of fish. I'd need to write a book length post to cover what he did. Many books have tried, few cover all of it.

Look at it this way, the day he took office the country was flat on it's back. The day he dies we were on the brink of becoming a superpower. That's pretty good by any standard that doesn't come out of a comic book.

[late]

He also prolonged the great depression until the WW2 so he is not everything good and just and so on...

He had no such intent, the idea is childishly absurd.

No one, and I mean no one, knew what to do. Meanwhile, the Right was constantly fighting him. What a lot of historians like to ask, what if we sailed into WW2 and the reforms had not been done. Which means many of the millions that fought would have entered service malnourished and dispirited. Not a good way to start.

That's one of those Right wing goofball ideas I find quite annoying.

[Patrickov]

Churchill was mostly terrible except for that one year which seemed like he was born to do.

FDR is a completely different kettle of fish. I'd need to write a book length post to cover what he did. Many books have tried, few cover all of it.

Look at it this way, the day he took office the country was flat on it's back. The day he dies we were on the brink of becoming a superpower. That's pretty good by any standard that doesn't come out of a comic book.

Please read my second post right above yours.

[JohnRawls]

He had no such intent, the idea is childishly absurd.

No one, and I mean no one, knew what to do. Meanwhile, the Right was constantly fighting him. What a lot of historians like to ask, what if we sailed into WW2 and the reforms had not been done. Which means many of the millions that fought would have entered service malnourished and dispirited. Not a good way to start.

That's one of those Right wing goofball ideas I find quite annoying.

Having good intentions and doing bad is not a good excuse.

As for "nobody" knew, well this is an excuse that everyone uses. There were economists who were saying it and explaining it. The leadership choice went the other way. For example, the EU countries also didn't want to extend the 2008 recession but they did. And Greek debt crysis and so on is the fault of that. Only Mario Draggie managed to fix the situation finally. The difference is felt not when the mistakes are made with good causes but when you are manage to fix your own mistakes.

[late]

As for "nobody" knew, well this is an excuse that everyone uses. There were economists who were saying it and explaining it.

BS.

There were real limits on what he could do. Yes, in general terms there was Keynes. Translating that into actual programs you can get passed was an entirely different story.

[SpecialOlympian]

By 1945 everyone already had a full understanding that the war is over so it is bullshit that you trying to put the win on Truman. FDR was president for most of the war so he gets almost all of the credit for the victory on the US side. FDR died in April 1945, by that time the Soviets were already in Berlin while the allies have already occupied the Rhineland. The Japanese were pretty much fucked in most places besides the core island and Manchuria.

As for prolonging the depression, there are many CREDIBLE, PEER REVIEWED economic studies on the subject by economist from all over the world that the reason the great depression lasted so long in the US was the policies under FDR. If US didn't do anything then the country would have recovered faster. And this is not about the employment program and the aid, that was actually one of the good things economically that FDR did. The problem is the other programs that were implemented like self-regulation and removal of all regulations if the industry manages to get a deal with the industry union who then assumes the role of the main recruiter of the industry. (So basically, the union becomes a collection of nepotists who get payoffs from the companies so the companies don't get regulated and then push any people they want in to those companies for employment). This is but one example, there are more.

Are these CREDIBLE, PEER REVIEWED studies in alternate timelines from test universes done by the Von Mises Institute or some shit?

Beause nothing stimulates the economy faster than the government paying people to goldbrick or just straight up spraying ash like a firehose.

You sound like you are regurgitating propaganda from the Bell End Thinktank for Economic Progress, buddy.

[JohnRawls]

Are these CREDIBLE, PEER REVIEWED studies in alternate timelines from test universes done by the Von Mises Institute or some shit?

Beause nothing stimulates the economy faster than the government paying people to goldbrick or just straight up spraying ash like a firehose.

You sound like you are regurgitating propaganda from the Bell End Thinktank for Economic Progress, buddy.

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?star ... as_sdt=0,5

If you don't like some authors then don't choose them. As I said, this is a very studied subject.

There is literally more than 50 pages of works on the subject even if you exclude anything else that got in to the mix.

[SpecialOlympian]

50 pages? I'm not gonna put in that work, they win.

[B0ycey]

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=0&q=prolonged+great+depression+economics&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5

If you don't like some authors then don't choose them. As I said, this is a very studied subject.

There is literally more than 50 pages of works on the subject even if you exclude anything else that got in to the mix.

COME ON @JohnRawls. You have literally just googled this and I doubt you have read any of them.

Apart from 1938, every year was fucking growth up to WW2... not to mention that building infrastructure takes time to stimulate growth in any case. The only critics of Keynesianism economics are those of Heyekism economics and those fuckers are solely to blame for Reaganomics - which incidentally is to blame for the current crisis which has the potential to be worse than the stock market crash of 1929 given the amount of bubbles ready to go off.

[late]

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?star ... as_sdt=0,5

If you don't like some authors then don't choose them. As I said, this is a very studied subject.

There is literally more than 50 pages of works on the subject even if you exclude anything else that got in to the mix.

It's still kook territory.

FDR could not have gotten more. That's the reality.

The other reality is that a lot of countries were part of this, and as a rule, the more robust the stimulus from the government, the quicker they got out of it.

One of the ironies is that Right wing types level this sort of accusation, but as a rule, they don't go for Keynesian spending. Which is no way to deal with a deflationary spiral...

[JohnRawls]

@SpecialOlympian @B0ycey @late

I am not an economist so I can't really provide you specifics. But i know some economists who are far from US or the usual suspects in the US. They also say the same thing that FDR policies extended the great depression and not everything was conducted correctly. Most of the critique is NOT about the government employment programs as I understand.

The main problem was that Roosevelt policies interfered in to the whole economic cycle that both cushioned the impact but also stagnated the recovery and rebalancing. Basically, cushioning the impact is fine but stagnating the recovery is not something good for obvious reasons. As much as I understand the infrastructure spending is NOT something that economists are against and even explain why it was needed and necessary at the time.

I am not sure why are you so hostile about it. I am not advocating that FDR screwed everything up

[B0ycey]

@JohnRawls, FDR didn't screw anything up. He had to bring in legislation given people were buying shares they couldn't afford at inflated prices at a 10% down payment which was in essence bad practice. He also had to get people back to work. And he also got America started again to being the powerhouse of the 50s by BUILDING key infrastructure. Those three things were WHY people elected him 4 times. You don't get reelected on failure. You are always going to get people trying to speculate that FDR prolonged the depression because there are economics, especially from the Austrian School, who believe in Liberal Heyekism economics. The truth is the New deal created growth in all but one year and it worked. Any other theory that could have been better is merely hearsay and most likely fucking wrong.

[wat0n]

The best case I've seen for claiming FDR's policies extended the Great Depression is that his pro-union measures effectively made hiring more expensive and this served to extend the crisis, the other one theory I've heard actually blames the Fed for becoming more restrictive in 1937. But honestly, just as one can mention those two examples of restrictive policies, one can also point out that FDR left the gold standard in 1933 and carried out a big devaluation before going back into it, and that this was pivotal to finally stopping the stage of contraction of the first years of the Depression. The Fed has something to say about this:

https://www.federalreservehistory.org/e ... ld-program

So in all, I think FDR's monetary policies helped end the crisis and plenty of evidence suggests this is the case.

[JohnRawls]

@JohnRawls, FDR didn't screw anything up. He had to bring in legislation given people were buying shares they couldn't afford at inflated prices at a 10% down payment which was in essence bad practice. He also had to get people back to work. And he also got America started again to being the powerhouse of the 50s by BUILDING key infrastructure. Those three things were WHY people elected him 4 times. You don't get reelected on failure. You are always going to get people trying to speculate that FDR prolonged the depression because there are economics, especially from the Austrian School, who believe in Liberal Heyekism economics. The truth is the New deal created growth in all but one year and it worked. Any other theory that could have been better is merely hearsay and most likely fucking wrong.

Mises and Hayek ideas are also valid ideas but nobody is talking about heavy cuts here and dismantling of social spending that FDR introduced. I will repeat it for the 3rd or 4th time: the problem was not the social and infrastructure spending, the problem was that some of the legislation that prevented firing of people, introduced price controls, prevented proper recruitment and so on.