The New Deal started, and subsequent legislation expanded, various programs to soften the blow of a recession: unemployment insurance, Social Security, welfare, Medicaid and Medicare. On the banking side, the Federal Reserve and the FDIC were created to address banking problems (albeit the Fed caused the Great Depression of the 1930's with overly tight money and caused our current recession with obscenely loose money from 2001 onward).
So why were all these anti-recession tools not allowed to play out? Why are multi-trillion sums thrown at banks, auto makers, and for "stimulus"?
I submit one explanation is cultural/philosophical. We have lost our ability to see adversity and setbacks as a normal part of life, and instead see them as requiring intervention. The war in Iraq is a great example, where it enjoyed widespread support went things well, but when the enemy fought back, support vanished and turned to utter despair of defeat. Fortunately, and to his great credit, George Bush had the character and vision to see the war through to the success we are enjoying now.
Most politicians, except for the few who genuinely buck the popular trend and advocate difficult measures (Ronald Reagan being a great example of this), respond to these attitudes. By running from the Iraq war - and now by running scared on the economy.
But it's worse. Because of the presidential election, the press and the Democrats had an incentive to exaggerate the risks and overstate the need for intervention. And by intervening, the Democrats have cloaked the pursuit of long-standing domestic policy goals (more government control of health care, and more spending on education and the environment) under the guise of "stimulus".
I submit one explanation is cultural/philosophical. We have lost our ability to see adversity and setbacks as a normal part of life, and instead see them as requiring intervention. The war in Iraq is a great example, where it enjoyed widespread support went things well, but when the enemy fought back, support vanished and turned to utter despair of defeat. Fortunately, and to his great credit, George Bush had the character and vision to see the war through to the success we are enjoying now.
Most politicians, except for the few who genuinely buck the popular trend and advocate difficult measures (Ronald Reagan being a great example of this), respond to these attitudes. By running from the Iraq war - and now by running scared on the economy.
But it's worse. Because of the presidential election, the press and the Democrats had an incentive to exaggerate the risks and overstate the need for intervention. And by intervening, the Democrats have cloaked the pursuit of long-standing domestic policy goals (more government control of health care, and more spending on education and the environment) under the guise of "stimulus".
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