Replies

central_va: "The Smoot-Hawley lie.
A vapid attempt at rewriting history.
Look at contemporary accounts of the Great Depression an trade isn't even much of an after thought as to the cause of the depression."

Now, now, get a grip on yourself, FRiend.
Remember your history.
The Great Depression began with a stock-market crash in October 1929.
In response, Smoot-Hawley was passed in June 1930, raising tariffs back near levels of the 1830 "Tariff of Abominations" -- which some blame for Civil War.
So, from 1929 to 1934, US imports fell $2.9 billion, while exports fell $3.3 billion, and US GDP fell 54%.
Overall world-trade fell 66% in those years, and US unemployment rose from 8% to 25%.

Is Smoot-Hawley to blame for all that?
Some say "yes", others say "no".
But here's what I know for certain: we were taught as children, and my parents believed, that Smoot-Hawley was largely responsible for making the Great Depression deeper and longer than it would otherwise have been.
That's the reason in 1992 they supported (82%) NAFTA, despite Trump the Elder's (Perot's) warnings of a "giant sucking sound" of US jobs going down the drain to Mexico.

So, now Trump the Younger promises to negotiate better deals for Americans, and bring jobs back.
Nobody should oppose that, and let's just hope Trump doesn't pull a Ross Perot on us.

Do you disagree?

central_va: "You lie about the Civil War and about the Great Depression.
Is their anything you get right? "

Of course I lie about nothing, zero, nada.
But obviously the truth hurts some people so badly they prefer more comfortable lies, and refuse to acknowledge what they so heartily dislike.

central_va: "My grandparents talked about the depression a lot .
Trade never came up as a subject-ever.
Buying stocks with borrowed money came up all the time."

Sure, for one reason, because FDR repealed Smoot-Hawley in 1934, after which the US economy began to recover, so trade was not an issue.
Today historians assign several causes for the length & depth of the Great Depression, with no single reason predominating.
I personally blame the Roosevelt administration's socialistic policies more than anything else, but still think Smoot-Hawley contributed something.