What Warren and Sanders Get Wrong About FDR

[brooklynite]

Politico

Bernie Sanders has long cited with admiration the most famous lines of a speech given by Franklin D. Roosevelt during his final 1936 reelection rally in Madison Square Garden: “We know now that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob. Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred.” Sanders underscored his affection for this speech, given 83 years ago on Thursday, and its message in a new interview this week with CNBC’s John Harwood. Asked whether he embraced the part in which FDR welcomes their hatred, Sanders affirmed without hesitation, saying, “You can judge a candidate for president by the enemies they have.”

At the beginning of Elizabeth Warren’s presidential campaign, her fundraising team similarly linked her political approach to the same FDR quote. And after she repeatedly and eagerly shot back at any Wall Streeter with the temerity to criticize her in the press, several commentators have recently observed that she too welcomes their hatred.

But although progressives often return to this FDR quote for inspiration and guidance, they neglect to understand the speech’s place in the FDR story. The speech was delivered after the major New Deal reforms were enacted, not before. It’s not an example of how a successful president chose the right enemies and made those reforms happen. Rather, Roosevelt’s turn toward vilification at the close of the 1936 campaign marked the beginning of the end of the New Deal period, when excessive hubris and a diminished appetite for compromise led him to politically disastrous decisions that drove the conservative wing of the Democratic Party into the arms of obstructionist Republicans. Sanders and Warren should look to “I welcome their hatred” not as words to live by, but as a cautionary tale of progressive overreach.

Roosevelt began his presidency, in fact, with a conciliatory approach. “In his first 100 days, he was trying to unify and calm the country, which had been curled up in the fetal position,” Jonathan Alter, author of The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope, said. “So he was not delivering harsh attacks on business at that time.”

Just before Roosevelt’s inauguration in March 1933, when two progressive senators pressed him to nationalize the banks, he responded that wouldn’t be needed because, “I’ve just had every assurance of cooperation from the bankers.” Instead, FDR’s first order of business was stopping a run on the banks by passing legislation that permitted the Federal Reserve to back them up, and authorized the Reconstruction Finance Corp.—a Hoover-era agency—to infuse banks with capital by buying stock.

[LongtimeAZDem]

2. "in the absence of another Great Depression, you do not need to unify"

SMH

[Hortensis]

3. I believe FDR would have hired Warren and put her talents to

good use. As he did the amazing Frances Perkins. Warren wanted to be Hillary's VP with the assignment of some big goals to turn into reality.

Many historians see Sanders, though, as always having been more of a 1930s-type socialist. Extremism was sweeping over many nations at that point, both socialist and fascist. America's socialists passionately believed FDR betrayed the nation by declining socialist REVOLUTION! and they passionately opposed the New Deal as corrupt.

FDR did try to work with them and hired some into his administration, including one as VP, but that was pretty much a disaster. They formed a party and did their best to defeat FDR and keep the New Deal from being implemented, but of course completely failed at all goals.

Thank goodness. We know very well, of course, what happened to nations where they got power. This is what millions of Americans who grew old scrabbling to just get along looked like before the New Deal changed that for that a large majority. And of course it was followed by other "corrupt" Democratic advances, like the Fair Deal, the Great Society, the ACA, and many, many others.

[highplainsdem]

4. K&R