Where Have You Gone Franklin Roosevelt (and Bernie Sanders), Our Nation Turns Its Lonely Eyes to You (all)

Ahhh, I remember those primary days when Bernie people were vilified and mocked for supporting a "can't win" candidate by Hillary people. That we are sweating it out so close to the election shows that Hillary's flaws were way worse than Bernie. I know, he would have come under severe attack but he knows how to handle and deflect such attacks by focusing on policy and pointing the way to a better future. All we get from Hillary are desperate attacks on Trump. In discussion with people on the election I can give better responses to questions than Hillary ever gives. Somone said to me last weekend, "Why doesn't she say that?" Duh!

Here is the column I submitted to the Wave this week though they were short on space so it may not go. We need a New Deal.

Where Have You Gone Franklin Roosevelt (and Bernie Sanders), Our Nation Turns Its Lonely Eyes to You (all)
By Norm Scott

Nov. 1, 2016
I am writing this on a Tuesday, one week before the election but due to space limitations in the Nov. 4 edition of The Wave you may be reading this a week later. No matter who wins or loses our troubles are just beginning. As I head towards my 72nd birthday, it’s going to be touch and go as to whether the world as we know it comes to an end before I do.

But look on the bright side. Can it be worse today than it was in the years after the 1929 stock market crash on October 29 – Black Tuesday (ironically “Sandy Storm Day” 4 years ago)? Will Nov. 8 be know as “Black Tuesday II”? For half the nation it will.

Are we in that bad a shape considering the current 5% unemployment rate? Since so many conspiracy theorists don’t believe anything the gomint says, double that to 10%. In the years after 1929 we reached 30% unemployment and a catastrophic depression that lasted a decade until Hitler’s “Make Germany Great Again” campaign led to WWII in 1939, resulting in 60 million dead, roughly 3% of the world’s population. That’ll break the back of a depression. Hitler was also quite ingenious in cutting Germany’s unemployment rate. He began by ordering all women to stop working. Neat. Maybe with the war on women going on in political campaigns today we can revisit that and watch the economy boom.

In 1932, FDR was elected to the first of his 4 terms and due to the blame Republicans incurred for the depression – a whole lot of Democrats were swept into office with him, thus giving him years to work some Keynesian economics magic that put people to work (Civil Conservation Corps to deal with infrastructure) while also establishing a safety net (social security, support for unions) that is the basis of what we have today. FDR even tried to establish a health care system but as opposition from the Republican right grew he gave up. He was branded a communist when in fact he saved the nation for capitalism – New Deal regulated capitalism.

Bernie Sanders offered an expanded version of the New Deal and if he were out there as a choice today there would be entirely different discussions taking place. After the election, no matter who wins, the left must take Bernieism and reinvent FDR’s New Deal.

There is good news for supporters of one of the candidates. The Crusader, a prominent newspaper of the Ku Klux Klan, under the banner “Make America Great Again,” endorsed a candidate for president.

Norm blogs at ednotesonline.com