The good news about TIME?s latest issue-long ode to Franklin Roosevelt is that Amity Shlaes makes good use of her opportunity to deflate myths about the benefits of FDR?s economic policies:
As it turned out, F.D.R.’s tenacity did not suffice to get the economy back to where it had been before the Great Depression began, in 1929. Today we know that actions Roosevelt took to resolve the crisis may actually have perpetuated it. Especially during the period from 1935 to about 1939, Roosevelt’s moves kept recovery at bay.
The bad news is that no other writer tackling the topic seems to understand or care that FDR?s policies did not help the nation get out of the Great Depression. As managing editor Richard Stengel explains, Shlaes? article is included among the six (!) feature-length pieces on FDR solely ?to get a free-marketeer?s dissenting take.?
Historian David M. Kennedy apparently agrees with Shlaes? basic assessment, but dismisses it by saying:
It’s old news that F.D.R.’s New Deal did not end the Depression. On that score, there was little difference between Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover. But unlike Hoover, F.D.R. seized the occasion to shape a legacy of durable reforms.
If the ?durable reforms? didn?t solve the problem, why is that legacy laudable? While you?re trying to answer that question, consider how FDR?s misguided economic policy prescriptions ?laid the foundation for the greatest run of peace and prosperity in history,? in the words of history-challenged Peter Beinart.
But leave it to our 42nd president to miss the boat completely:
Besides having a deep personal connection to ordinary citizens, Roosevelt got the big things right. When he came into office during the Depression, he saw that the ills of the country could not be addressed without more aggressive involvement by the government. He ran for President as a fiscal conservative, promising to balance the budget. But unlike his predecessor, he quickly realized that, with prices collapsing and unemployment exploding, only the Federal Government could step into the breach and restart the economy.
Perhaps President Clinton needs to re-read the ?old news.?
