So what do you do when the cornerstone of your economic plan is obviously a shambles? Use the stimulus cash to buy votes.
When Roosevelt was set to lose his first re-election campaign to his Republican rival in 1936, he knew he needed a serious trick to save his run. The strategy that evolved was essentially a subsidies for votes program, another in a long line of pay-to-play scams in Democrat politics. WPA was out of money, but Roosevelt told Henry Morgenthau Jr., his Secretary of the Treasury, not not lay anyone off, and that he didn’t care where they got the money to keep the program going. Similar marching orders went out to Secretary of Agriculture Henry Wallace, who was told he had to fix commodity prices until November 5th, a.k.a. after the election.
Republicans, who did not have access to the unconstitutional (at least, according to the Supreme Court) levels of power Roosevelt had insulated himself with, could not compete with this tactic. All they could do was draw attention to this obvious pay-to-play ploy, but when they did so they were lambasted as being against regular Americans. Roosevelt’s expert understanding of how to wage class warfare all but guaranteed him a victory.
So history records Roosevelt’s first reelection as an avalanche of popular sentiment supporting FDR’s abuses of power, but what it really shows is that bribing people with money buys votes, a policy that the Obama administration understands greatly.
The most frightening aspect of Obama’s comparison to Daley and Roosevelt is the brutal efficacy these policies have in keeping such thieves in power. Since 1955 Chicago has been ruled by a scion of the Daley family (or, as I sometimes refer to them, the reborn Irish Mob) for all but about 12 years. Richard M. Daley is the longest-running Mayor of the city, his father, Richard J., was second longest (his reign was cut short by his death). Roosevelt’s unprecedented four terms, an unheard of abuse of presidential power, was also only cut short by his death.
4 Comments
Great piece Theo!
Good Piece. However, what Theo is really saying is that nothing has changed, in fact it’s gotten worse. It goes beyond Party Politics. It doesn’t matter whether it’s Republicans or Democrats. Obama, Bush, Cheney, Daley, Democrat, Republican, African American, Irish American, Italian American, it doesn’t matter. This Country is in the middle of a DEPRESSION just like 1929. It’s not a Recession, it’s a DEPRESSION. This Country needs to be overhauled like the Roman Catholic Church. What we need is a fucking REVOLUTION! We need to take care of America first and foremost. Forget about trying to Police the whole God Damn World. Worry about America and AMERICA FIRST. Love begins at home! I don’t give a God Damn about Democracy in Iraq or anywhere else in this world. Fix America and forget about everything else until America is fixed with decent Health Care, A lot more Job Opportunities, a Decent Income Tax Structure ( like abolishing it altogether) and just charge a flat 10% sales tax on all goods purchased, Better Schools, Better Banking System, Stop corruption on Wall Street, Help people from suffering foreclosures etc. FIX AMERICA and then worry about what the people in Iraq are doing!
Well someone just read Burton Folsom.
This is frankly a highly bias, one-sided, unfounded use of hearsay and conspiracy and a severely paranoid cobbling of the facts…FDR’s “New Deal” lifted us from the toilet and whether you like it or not, fiscal stimulus and interventionism in the face of disaster is supported among most fiscal experts from Wall Street CEOs like Blankfein, Pandit and Dimon to economists at ratings agencies and financial services firms throughout the country and here in Chicago like Mesirow. They don’t refer to themselves as Keynesians or socialists either…and I’d be willing to bet they know a bit more about capital markets than you.
The fact is that after FDR, Federal Taxes continued to plummet and the role of the government only increased with the population of the American people, under conservative Presidents and liberal presidents. FDR’s stimulus was supported by tax increases, specifically excise tax increases that affected all classes equally. We actually didn’t turn into Stalinist Russia or any other conservative nightmare following FDR, your piece really lacks a strong thesis. Its clear you are a conservative who doesn’t like Obama. There is nothing wrong with that and nothing wrong with expressing your frustration. There is something wrong with using a string of facts to mislead people and present a paranoid conspiracy that we are headed towards Stalinist Russia. Idiotic and a classic symptom of the severe polarization happening in this nation…its no longer “I disagree with you” its “You are the anti-Christ.” The fact of the matter (and I’d welcome you to explain this to me) is that Obama made his fortune in the capitalist system and Wall Street firms including Bain Capital (The firm Romney co-founded) continue to donate more to Obama’s reelection campaign than any GOP candidates campaign combined. Obama continues to hold Wall Street close…and Wall Street is capitalism…and this frankly is a well-known fact among the non-Glenn Beck watching rational minded.
We get it Theo, you’re a Republican and you hate Democrats.
Well, you know what? Nobody gives a fuck about bullshit right vs. left political gamesmanship.
A new poll shows that the middle-class thinks that Republicans in Congress are a bunch of do-nothing obstructionists whose only goal is to beat Obama. For Republicans, if the economy sucks, they are ecstatic because they think it will improve the GOP’s chances in 2012.
Republicans have overplayed their hand. They gleefully defend tax cuts for the 1%, subsidies for oil companies, and then tell the middle-class that we have to cut social security and medicare. They refuse to pass a jobs package and become giddy when public workers are thrown out of work.
There is not a chance in hell that voters are going to turn the reins of government back over to more do-nothing Republicans.