Posted on 07/01/2014 3:45:03 PM PDT by Kaslin
There have been many truly awful presidents elected in the United States, but if I had to pick my least favorite, I might choose Herbert Hoover.
I obviously have disdain for Hoover’s big-government policies, but I also am extremely irritated that – as Jonah Goldberg explained – he allowed the left to create an utterly bogus narrative that the Great Depression was caused by capitalism and free markets.
Indeed, the Center for Freedom and Prosperity produced a video demonstrating that the statist policies of both Hoover and Roosevelt helped trigger, deepen, and lengthen the economic slump.
Building on that theme, here’s a new video from Prager University that looks specifically at the misguided policies of Herbert Hoover.
Hoover and the Great Depression
Amen. Great job unmasking Hoover’s terrible record.
As I explained when correcting a glaring error by Andrew Sullivan, Hoover was a big-government interventionist. Heck, even FDR’s inner circle understood that the New Deal was simply an extension of Hoover’s statist policies.
In other words, FDR doubled down on Hoover’s awful record. And with awful results. We have a better understanding today of how the New Deal caused the downturn to be deeper and longer.
This Tom Sowell video is definitely worth watching if you want more information on that topic.
And here’s something else to share with your big-government friends. The Keynesian crowd was predicting another massive depression after World War II because of both a reduction in wartime outlays and the demobilization of millions of troops. Yet that didn’t happen, as Jeff Jacoby has succinctly explained. And if you want more details on how smaller government helped restore growth after WWII, check out what Jason Taylor and Rich Vedder wrote for Cato.
P.S. I’ve compared Bush and Obama to Hoover and Roosevelt because of some very obvious similarities. Bush was a big-government Republican who helped pave the way for a big-government Democrat, just as Hoover was a big-government Republican who also created the conditions for a big-government Democrat.
The analogy also is good because I suspect political and economic incompetence led both Hoover and Bush to expand the burden of government, whereas their successors were ideologically committed to bigger government. We know about Obama’s visceral statism, and you can watch a video of FDR advocating genuinely awful policy.
The good news is that Obama will never be as bad as FDR, no matter how hard he tries.
P.P.S. It’s also worth mentioning that a very serious downturn in 1921 was quickly ended in part thanks to big reductions in the burden of government spending. Your Keynesian friends will also have a hard time explaining how that happened.
Coolidge should’ve served another term. His steady hand would’ve seen the Depression merely to have been the Panic of 1929.
Correct and Hoover gave America confidence in Democrats and look where that has lead.
When his son died, that pretty much took the wind out of his sails.
“That man has given me unsolicited advice for the past five years...all of it bad.” - Calvin Coolidge
Herbert Hoover was a great man but should not have been president. My favorite story about him is when he told Adolf Hitler to sit down and shut up, and Hitler did.
I offer no arguments in favor of Hoover’s policies after the crash, but on the basis of character, certainly an important part of the measure of a man, he eclipses the Obamanation.
Like what Eisenhower said about Nixon.
Rememember my 3rd grade teacher Mrs Kelly telling me the story - she was tennager when it happened
Saw me limping one day because of a blister on my heel
Told me story of how Coolidge’s son getting blister while playing tennis, blister became infected and turned septic
Coolidge’s son died of the infection (this was before antibiotics)
In spite of all the evidence to the contrary mindless progressives are still preaching this drivel today. Beckel spouts it daily on the Five and any other time he gets the chance. Then he goes home to his Manhattan apartment, or out to dinner with his Brie and Chablis swilling friends and bad mouths the whole nation that let an intellectual zero like him become successful.
He is worse in some ways
He's not done yet. He's got two more years to be every bit as bad. I'm counting on it.
Hoover was a lifetime loyal servant of financial elites, going back to his service on their behalf in China extracting raw materials.
He helped supply the German army to extend WWI so America could join in.
He pretty much always did exactly as his elite masters wanted him to.
There’s lots of opportunity for men who are ambitious, capable, and willing to work for the elites.
Hoover did not think much of a man who had not made his first million by the time he was 40.
Yes, this was pretty well known in the small town atmosphere of pre-FDR Washington DC. My mother was a lifelong Washingtonian and believed that this event crushed Coolidge. A good treatment of it is found in Margaret Truman's book First Ladies: An Intimate Group Portrait of White House Wives. She may have been a Dem loyalist but this is a fascinating book and discusses at length the impact personal events had on political events. Published originally in 1996 copies are available for as little as $.01 at Amazon. Buy a copy it makes very interesting summer reading as it is written in a smooth and effortless style.
That’s a Ripon Republican for you. Today it’s Mitt Romney, the Bushes, Karl Rove, John McCain and the like.
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