Some Thoughts On The Nation

 Admittedly, most of the people I know take very little time to keep up on current events, and virtually no time studying history. Unless of course Britney Spears or Lindsay Lohan is involved. That's big stuff,( I hope you can see the sarcasm in that, if you can't - please exit my blog now). Despite this, I do see that many Americans are alarmed at what they perceive to be happening to America. "We are in debt over our heads." " There are no jobs". Of course there are other things in which people are fretting about.  There are many who are concerned that the very nature of the Government is abruptly changing or being transformed into another type of Political Entity. You should know by now what I am referring to. Words like Socialism, Communism, Police State, Welfare State, etc... I am not surprised. I started doing research into the Great Depression when the current economic crisis struck. I knew that this was no ordinary recession right from the onset.

I made a remark one day to a friend of mine that what Bush/Obama was doing with TARP was a page right out of Roosevelt's New Deal Plan. He then asked me ," Wasn't that a big waste of money, I mean did what Roosevelt did back in the 1930's really bring us out of the Depression?" No, World War Two brought us out of the Great Depression. Then he said, " Didn't Roosevelt turn the country into a Welfare State with that plan?" That is debatable. Initially no, at least I don't believe that was his intention. I knew where this conversation was headed. He wanted to know if Obama was furthering the process of turning the country into a Welfare State - and wasting tax payer money to do it.
Back in the 1930's during Roosevelt's years the same words and concerns were echoed about the Social Programs that were put in place as a result of the Great Depression. Programs such as the Works Progress Administration (WPA), Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), Federal Emergency Relief Act (FERA) and several more. I will not list or expound on them all ,you can research them yourselves. FERA was an agency that provided relief to the poor. It was slated initially for
$500,000,000, but in two years the amount distributed to Home Relief Bureaus and Departments of Welfare for the poor totaled over $3,000,000,000. Obviously, whether you considered this a good thing or a bad thing depended on which side of the fence you were on. If you were a receiver it was a good thing, and I'm sure it helped many from going hungry. I will bring to light a few interesting facts that you might not have heard before. Under the guise of the WPA a few other programs materialized. Among these are the Federal Writers Project (FWP), Federal Theater Project (FTP), and the Federal Art Project (FAP). In 1936 the Federal Art Project employed more than 5,000 artists. In eight years (1935-43) the FAP produced 2,566 murals, more than 100,000 easel paintings, 17,700 sculptures and 350,000 fine prints. The cost of the FAP was in excess of over $35,000,000. As you can imagine, at the time there were many in the country that could not justify that kind of money for the Arts. To some (especially Republicans) this was viewed as sheer government waste. Never the less, it did not stop any Americans from going to the theaters. The FTP launched or employed many actors and actresses that would become household names like Arther Miller, Orson Welles, Will Geer, and others. The Arts programs were stopped after four years because there were accusations that they were a propaganda machine for the New Deal or worse yet - Communism. Congress brought them to a halt.


Many in that era accused the Roosevelt Administration of trying to end Democracy and make the United States a Socialist or Communist country. Historians to this day still take opposing sides in the debate about the Pros and Cons of the New Deal. I would rather not get into a debate about such things. I believe that some of these programs did what they were designed to do. However, like everything else that humans touch, they were abused over time. For some of these programs there were termination dates. However, even after the War ('41-'45) had stimulated the economy beyond any one's wildest dreams in the 1930's, some programs remained.
In 1962 Eward R. Murrow did a Documentary entitled, "Hunger In America". This was over thirty years after the onset of the Great Depression. Yet, some parts of the United States like the far South, Southwest, and the Southeast were living in rampant poverty. This documentary led Robert Kennedy to begin his "War On Poverty." So, some parts of the United States never did recover from the effects of the Great Depression, in fact, the South hadn't fully recovered from the effects of the Civil War. One of the weapons of The War On Poverty was indeed a Program that encouraged those that were eligible for Government Assistance to sign up. Generations have now grown used to dependence on Programs put in place decades ago. This is the reason that some have taken to calling the United States a Welfare State. Are we? Yes, without question. Lets not forget though - in all fairness, that there are many who have benefited or are benefiting from some of these programs today. For instance, the Social Security Act is considered a key component of every Americans retirement - even though it was not meant to be. Millions over the years have used Unemployment benefits. So there really exists Pros and Cons to the New Deal put forth by Roosevelt. If you have ever used any of these programs then you must admit that a good portion of society has benefited in one way or another - including you. Is it different today? In a nutshell - yes. While there are many similarities to the 1930's programs and what the government is doing today, there are vast differences. For example, you can multiply exponentially the waste that our government has propagated with the modern take of what I call, "The Raw Deal". We are not the 1930's generation - unfortunately.