For anyone who is questioning FDR’s whole game...I’d suggest to go back and review the Bonus Army, the Anacosta Riots, General MacArthur actions during the riot, newspaper coverage of the riots, and reaction by voters in the 1932 election. President Hoover never realized the news media machine he was against...until it was too late.
No high school or college history class will pick up the Bonus Army, or cover this critical summer period of the election.
How can FDR be at fault for the Bonus Army? The bonus march happened in the summer of 1932. FDR became POTUS in 1933.
When FDR heard how President Hoover/Gen. MacArthur handled the Bonus March, he remarked that he had just won the election.
And the Bonus March is touted by liberals.
I did a paper on the Bonus Army for an American History class in college, complete with some pretty disgusting photographs. Having taken a number of U.S. History classes in both elementary and high school, I was amazed that I’d never heard of this event before. I pretty much lost any respect I ever had for Gen. MacArthur.
I graduated from H.S. in 1964 so this selective teaching of our nation’s history, particularly its warts, goes back some years. Mr. Burns certainly isn’t helping much.