Monday, October 29, 2007

You're always on the right side, When you're conservative


Paul Krugman, finally released from the shackles and chains of the NYTimes paywall, goes all peacenik on us:
In America’s darkest hour, Franklin Delano Roosevelt urged the nation not to succumb to “nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror.” But that was then.

Today, many of the men who hope to be the next president — including all of the candidates with a significant chance of receiving the Republican nomination — have made unreasoning, unjustified terror the centerpiece of their campaigns.

Consider, for a moment, the implications of the fact that Rudy Giuliani is taking foreign policy advice from Norman Podhoretz, who wants us to start bombing Iran “as soon as it is logistically possible.”

Well, yes. NoPod is clearly batshit crazy, goes without saying. But one minor quibble. I loves me some Krugman, but in 1933, FDR wasn't talking about the nascent Nazi threat, but the internal threat America faced from quarterly profits-driven business and investors too stingy to spare a dime to help the general economy:
Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply. Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.

True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.

The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.

Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort. The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow men.

Here's the audio of the famous speech:











Indeed. As the Right-wing machine grinds away against the sand in its gears, we are reminded, again and again, that the mantra of today's Right is profits, tax cuts, and . . . well, little else.

Where is the Republican party of Ike:



Update: NoPod's handle changed at the suggestion of a commenter.

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