Economic Stimulus Quotes
March 4, 1933 was the date that Franklin Delano Roosevelt had assumed the Presidency from Herbert Hoover and used government to combat the Great Depression whereas Hoover would not take any of these steps as the conservative wing of his party and he regarded anything that government did was “creeping socialism”. Historically, it is useful to recall what steps Roosevelt took that were described as socialism. These include Social Security, Federal Deposit Insurance for bank accounts, aid to farmers, the Civilian Conservation Corps, Regulation of the stock market, regulation of banks and many other things that are key elements of modern capitalism which virtually every capitalistic nations has in one form or another. Long after Truman was out of office, the most conservative elements of the Republican Party have accused every Democratic President of “creeping socialism” when they were actually quite opposed to socialism. Even when their career before their presidency was full of criticisms of socialism and policies that are opposite, as in the case of President Obama, the President has been accused of being a socialist. However, it started with Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Harry S Truman.
The popularly elected president Salvador Allende was a left leaning socialist and Nixon wanted a right wing Government in place who would deal more firmly with the communists. General Augusto Pinochet thus came to power, murdered Allende, and instituted a reign of terror with death squads, torture and disappearances, that eventually led him to be indicted for crimes against humanity.
Reference to the British Economist John Maynard Keynes who advocated government action to manage the economy.
The alternative would have been for the colonies to borrow English money at high interest rates and use that. Or use money from private banks (which occurred later.) Many conservatives are today a little shocked that some of the American Colonies just printed money with no backing but it worked—at least at the local level. A Boston Bank for example, would take a large commission for a Bostonian to convert Pennsylvania money into Massachusetts money. So it was not a very good system for trade between colonies and International trade. But English money was used for that. The colonists pragmatically got the “best of both worlds” and paid as little interest as they needed to. This system is essentially what we use today on a national scale with no gold or silver backing of the money.
All the objections that Coolidge had in his veto message, were not convincing to modern Presidents and members of Congress as well as well the American people. Our Agricultural policy has had all these elements for years now.
The Progressive article was an interview with Movie Director and Screenwriter Oliver Stone who told the interviewer that he had learned of this quotation when he did his research for his film, South of the Border where he had several interviews with President Kirchner.
