BCT Editorial – 8/31/10

Did you note what’s missing from this editorial?  If you answered there’s no admission all the so-called “stimulus programs” didn’t work, you are right.  Indeed, the editorial seems to indicate we need more government “stimulus.”

This is a good time to remind you what Henry Morgenthau, FDR’s Treasury Secretary during the Great Depression, said about FDR’s “stimulus.”  Testifying before the House Ways and Means Committee in May 1939, Sec. Morgenthau said, “We have tried spending money.  We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work.  And I have just one interest, and if I am wrong … somebody else can have my job.  I want to see this country prosperous.  I want to see people get a job.  I want to see people get enough to eat.  We have never made good on our promises … I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started … And an enormous debt to boot.”  With apologies to George Santayana, those who choose to ignore the past are condemned to repeat it.

Unless you read my critique of a recent article written by local lefties, have you heard of the depression/recession of 1920-1921?  Probably not, though most of us learned about the Roaring ‘20s.  So how did we get from a depression/recession to the Roaring ‘20s?  Presidents Warren G. Harding (R) and Calvin Coolidge (R) must have jacked up spending, taxes, and debt, right?  Not even close.  Using 1920 (the first year after World War I) as a base, the Harding/Coolidge administrations reduced spending 55% by 1927, reduced taxes 45% by 1925, and ran eight straight surpluses.  According to the BLS, unemployment for 1923-1929 averaged 3.3%.  Now you know why lefties like to brush over the 1920s; it provides proof Hoover/FDR/Obama “stimulus” programs don’t work but conservative principles do.