Focus on the Past - "It's deja vu all over again!"

Don't Vote Stupid! - Vote Smart!

Learn What & Why - The Obama Agenda

A Short History Lesson by FDR

President Franklin D. Roosevelt - (1933-45), pushed his major legislation package and issued a proliferation of executive orders that instituted the New Deal with a variety of programs designed to produce relief (government jobs for the unemployed), recovery (economic growth), and reform (through regulation of Wall Street, banks and transportation). Unemployment fell dramatically in his first term, from 25% when he took office to 14.3% in 1937. However, it increased to 19.0% in 1938. So, the economy improved rapidly from 1933 to 1937, but then relapsed into a deep recession.  Why?

A Shorter History Lesson by Obama

Hate to say it, but if you don't look into the past, history has a strange way of repeating itself! Or as the NY Yankee's catcher, Yogi Berra, said, "It's deja vu all over again!" ...Hello Obama, you are not doing it?  The sad truth is that these lessons learned are useful.  In the case of this President of the United States, the people will suffer under his lesson lapse. Why?

 "Running by the Seat of your Pants" by FDR

These actual events and facts drawn from "Lords of Finance" (see our Rovalocity web site library) on pages 471-475 show a lesson learned, but not remembered or revisited today by the current Obama administration. This monetary manipulation is going on today BIG TIME as you read this history.

"By October 1933, though the dollar had fallen by more than 30 percent, commodity prices began to sink again and the economy started to stall once more.  Roosevelt decided that it was time for a new initiative. Roosevelt's former Harvard professor, George Warren, recommended that the government give the dollar another nudge downward by itself buying gold in the open market."

First FDR Fireside Chat - March 23, 1933"On October 22, in a Fireside Chat, FDR expressed that the U.S. dollar was too greatly influenced by internal policies of other nations and by political disturbances.  Therefore, the U.S. must take control in its own hands the gold value of the dollar.  This was a masterpiece of obfuscation."  FDR was intentionally clouding facts to hide the issues because this was not the real case due to the FDR Administration's own policy failures. "So, the following day the U.S. began to buy gold."  It was massive manipulation of the world gold prices to stimulate the U.S. economy with cheaper goods to sell to the world markets. Instead, it portended even further erosion of public confidence in the global financial markets.  It was a formula made up for disaster. 

Keynesian Economics

"Maynard Keynes was among few economists to applaud Roosevelt's decision to devalue the dollar.  In an article in the Daily Mail headlined "President Roosevelt is Magnificently Right," he hailed the message as an invitation to "explore new paths" and "to achieve something better than the miserable confusion and unutterable waste of opportunity in which an obstinate adherence to ancient rules of thumb has engulfed us." This was saying to throw the gold market prices to the wind to create arbitrarly set priceJohn Maynard Keyes - 62 (1883-1946). He and Obama would no doubt like each other. standards by the Federal Government, which benefits more spending programs.

Keynes is the economist that Liberals love and Conservatives hate. Keynes best known for his proposal that when national economies suffer a downturn, governments should borrow and spend money to boost economic activity. Part of the proceeds of the resulting economic growth should then be used to repay the debt. Obama loves "Keynesian Monetary Policies" as it demands more "Stimulus Spending" to expand by printing more money leading to theoretically paying for more government goods and services.  Just one problem, "Inflation", too much money supply around, devalues buying power and the ability to pay back debt and creates even more "National Debt" on the books ...Big Oops!

"The Gold fix is in" - "The Yolks on Us!"

In the following weeks, "every morning at nine o'clock, Henry Morgenthau, Secretary of Treasury, Jesse Jones, head of the Reconstruction Finance Corp, and George Warren, a Cornell economic advisor, would meet witGold Barsh FDR over his breakfast of soft-boiled eggs, to determine the price of gold for that day.  They began at $31.65 an ounce.  The next morning this increased to $31.54, then $31.76 and $31.82."

"No one had a clue how they went about setting the price, although everyone presumed that some subtle analysis of the world bullion and foreign exchange markets went into their calculations.  In fact, the choice of price was completely random.  All they were trying to do was push the price a  little higher than the day before.  The exercise brought out the juvenile in Roosevelt.  One day he picked an increase of 21 cents, and when asked why, replied that it was a lucky number, three times seven." And, this is who Obama says he wants to emulate?  I can definitely see why!

Ten More Years to Get Ahead - 1935 to 1945

"Again, many of Roosevelt's measures to boost prices or wages by government fiat raised the cost of hiring workers and hampered recovery.  Because the contraction had gone so deep, it still took ten years for the economy to regain its old trend."  It appears that it finally took a WW2 economy, not FDR's policies, to kick-start jobs and the manufacturing sector creating economic growth.  FDR, very sickly, died finally in 1945. FDR was three terms too long.  Obama is already one term too long.

"While the rebound was powered by an abundance of money at low interest rates, the Fed found itself ejected from the driver's seat.  Having made such a mess during the collapse, it had lost whatever prestige it once possessed."  That sure sounds like what has happened today ...It's deja vu all over again!

Are we doomed to repeat this sad History all over again under Obama?

 ~ VOTE Change in 2012! ~