Author’s Note: This series of posts is inspired and informed by last week’s wonderful EconTalk podcast, “John Cogan on Entitlements and the High Cost of Good Intentions.” I highly recommend it (and all EconTalk episodes for that matter). Mr. Cogan is the author of “The High Cost of Good Intentions: A History of U.S. Federal Entitlement Programs” (September 26, 2017).
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I suspect some of you cannot believe I’m going to write multiple posts about a president who was born in 1882 and died over 70 years ago—on top of the many of my earlier posts[i] that discussed Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Here’s the good news: I am not going to reel off a long series of back-to-back posts on FDR—just this one and two other short ones for now.
Why FDR? The idolized FDR (idolized primarily with myths that support the left’s narrative) continues to have a huge impact on what is going on today in America, and the world. All movements need compelling stories/narratives. Superheroes cause stories to be compelling. FDR is the superhero in the leftist narrative, i.e., stories they use to proselytize their faith. FDR is a big deal.
Given how long ago he lived, you might wonder if FDR is really as big a deal as I’m making him out to be. If you don’t believe me, consider this: The second endnote[ii] contains a list of 90 books about FDR that were published over the last ten years. Seventeen of those 90 were published in 2017. In addition, many books that focused exclusively or significantly on FDR’s administration were published during that period. Ones I found particularly interesting were: “Unprecedented Power: Jesse Jones, Capitalism, and the Common Good,” “The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression,” and Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Change. (I’m looking forward to reading Mr. Cogan’s book cited above.)
Articles that include references to FDR seem to be produced every hour.[iii] I just did a Google search for “Franklin Roosevelt” and Google reported 64.5 million results. Herbert Hoover and Calvin Coolidge, his two predecessors got 17.7 million and 0.7 million results respectively. Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower, his two successors got 35.7 million and 19.3 million results respectively. Eisenhower is the most recent of the group, and, unlike FDR, a war hero and a president, and a general who warned the country about the Military Industrial Complex. Yet Eisenhower is the only president in that era whose results were fairly high, at only 55% of FDR’s.
Also, note that most informed people today would know to whom I was referring when they saw “FDR” in the title of this post. I dare say that the same would not have been true had the initials been: “JCC,” “HCH,” “HST,” “DDE,” “RMN,” “JC,” “RWR,” “GHWB,” or “WJC?”
Though this post is inspired by the podcast mentioned above, it was spurred on by listening on December 18, 2017 to a Sirius XM POTUS channel (a left-leaning talk channel) longer than normal interview of the author of the new book, “The Last 100 Days: FDR at War and at Peace.” That lengthy, fawning ode to FDR confirmed my belief that over the last 90 years or so FDR has been and still is a really big deal. Just this morning (December 21, 2017) I listened to a “this day in political history segment” on that same channel. About seven presidents were mentioned. By far the longest portion of that segment was the replaying of a “fireside chat” FDR broadcast in the 1930s.
Why all this fuss about FDR? It is because, according to the left, what FDR did and the resulting positive results validate what leftists want America to do more of today. Convincing Americans that FDR was a superhero helps leftists make their case. For leftists, maintaining, if not elevating, FDR’s superhero status is worth the time, cost, and effort of the constant maintenance of that myth.
Maintaining the FDR superhero narrative is worth it because the narrative has been highly successful at gaining true believers over the last several decades. Winning the hearts and minds of ever-larger percentages of Americans provides comfort and encouragement to the far leftists who are dead set on imposing on all Americans the policy prescriptions derived from that narrative—by violence if necessary. The growing activity of Antifa is one manifestation of the success of the narrative.
During the Obama administration, great strides were made by the left toward a tipping point of no return from the horrors of the collectivist path I discussed in “Two Paths for America” and “More On Two Paths for America.” As my dear readers know, avoiding the leftist path for America is a primary focus of this blog.
Demythologizing and correcting the FDR narrative might be a way to slow or stop the successes of the left. Fortunately, the army engaged in the fight against the leftist narrative appear to be growing. Much of the backlash against leftists was spurred on by the progress of the Obama administration toward the collectivist path triggered. Through the efforts of libertarians and limited government conservatives (and their research, news, and information organs) push back against government overreach is on the rise. That somewhat effective competition in the arena of ideas is most unwelcome by those who hold dear the FDR as a superhero narrative. A redoubling of efforts to reenergize the FDR myths was to be expected. The fact there were at least 17 new books about FDR in 2017 alone is a sign that the reactionary left is mobilizing.
The election of Trump could be interpreted as the backlash against the left’s successes. While it is possible that the backlash is strong enough to grow and turn the country back from the collectivist path it has been on for decades, it is at least as likely that Trump’s election was a consequence of the flaws of Trump’s competitors.
If we, our children, and our children’s children… (and everyone in the world for that matter) are to avoid the horrors of the collectivist path, it is important to turn as many hearts and minds as possible away from the siren song of the leftist narrative. Because so many of the leftist myths about FDR are so fanciful or fabricated, it is important to highlight its weaknesses and fallacies. Consequently, my future posts will be sprinkled with discussions of FDR from time to time. I’m hoping that sorting out the flawed leftist FDR narrative will get us on a better path.
[i] “Obamacare – Repeal, or Repeal and Replace? PART II,” “’Progressives’ and the Constitution,” “Non Sequiturs on Parade – PART VII,” “More On Two Paths for America,” “Non Sequiturs on Parade – PART VIII,” and “Non Sequiturs on Parade – CONCLUSION.”
[iii] The Steve Roth article I examined in the series of posts that ended with “Non-Sequiturs on Parade – CONCLUSION” is a prime example.