This page was last updated on November 8, 2011.
Essential to know history; Lauren Beck; Beaver County Times; November 6, 2011.
Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.
“Why, are we not taught the importance of our nation’s history? Any day we could walk down the street and kids would not know the significance of Pearl Harbor or even the Holocaust.
“Our ignorance has led to these events repeating, and our leaders are so arrogant they dismiss that there have been historical events in our nation that they could have learned from. If we look back on history, we see many events that in differing situations repeated themselves.
“One example in an economic standpoint is the Stock Market crashing in 1929, causing the Great Depression, and the Bank Crisis of 2008. In each situation banks had borrowed too much and could not back up their money causing economic turmoil, yet our leaders did not take that lesson to heart, leading to our current recession.”
[RWC] Wow, where did Ms. Beck learn history?! The “Stock Market crashing in 1929 [did not cause] the Great Depression.” Economies are cyclic and stock-market “crashes” are a normal part of that cycle. Government interference in the form of “progressive” policies enacted by the Hoover and FDR administrations in the wake of the 1929 crash caused the Great Depression. The Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 was the first. Heck, I learned that in grade school during the 1960s.
As for “the Bank Crisis of 2008,” please read my critique of “Let us have some of the $700 trillion.”
“To understand our time today it is essential to look back in history and examine what has happened and learn from it. Children and even adults should be learning the significance of our nation’s history and its affects [sic] on our nation today. History is something that we assume has nothing to do with us, but holds a special place in our lives today.”
[RWC] Ms. Beck would do well to take her own advice.
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