Reply #70: Take it up with Richard Parker. [View All]

[1932]

The Fair Deal was a disappointment to New Dealers.

He addresses some of these issues. Truman's fair deal just helped people keep pace. It'd didn't dramatically increase wages. And granted there was a Fair Deal program (and Stevenson disagreed with everything it did) the halmark of Truman's administration was military Keynesianism -- a huge increase in defense spending.

Parker also talks about Kennedy's campaigning and that he did use Sputnik, as everyone did, to imply that Eisenhower wasn't keeping the US safe.

Parker also says that Kennedy increased military spending right away, but he also says it took Kennedy 17 months to become a full convert to (non-military, non-business) Keynesian economics. The result was a record 106 consecutive months of econmic growth (compared to a series of recessions during the Eisenhower years and a growth rate that was half what the russians achieved.

Reading this thread, I get the impression that a lot of people would benefit from reading this book.