Go to The Approaching Winter: The Next Great Depression
- Add a comment
- Go to The Approaching Winter: The Next Great Depression
Rebuild the Physical Economy or Open the Door to Fascism
I hope you continue this blog with posts such as this one. You do a great service and it is insightful.
In response to a previous comment: it is a myth that wars bring us out of depression. This myth is promoted by financial interests that have always opposed national strategies for economic stimulus -- strategies that actually worked.
Take the previous Great Depression, for example. Revisionist historians now claim that the Great Depression was not ended by the New Deal but by the Second World War. Think for a moment. Before the New Deal the United States' productive capacity had collapsed. We lacked ship building capability and much of the nation was with out electricity. The New Deal built our national infrastructure so that we were able to mobilize quickly for war.
We lived off of the vastly expanded productive capacity that the New Deal produced until late 1970s. We should have continued to build -- instead we have deindustrialized and allowed our productive capacity to deteriorate. Do you want to know what our future is if we continue on this course?
Consider what happened during the same period that the US was building under FDR's New Deal. Consider what was happening at the same time in Germany. The draconian conditions imposed upon Germany as a result of the Versailles Treaty prevented German reconstruction in order to pay off global bankers. This lead to hyperinflation and the rise of fascism.
There you have your choice; either build the physical economy (especially national infrastructure) or create conditions that are ripe for breeding fascism, which will make war inevitable.
The key to national economic recovery is building our national infrastructure, not going to war.
I encourage you to keep posting.
posted by
writersjourney
on December 18, 2005 at 8:04 AM
| link to this | reply
Your patterns are self styled - The War of 1812 was a huge event in our
history but depression didn't hit until the 1830's. What about the bust and boom of the 1890's with no major war? Then we had the Great War which killed 120,000 Americans in 18 months but it wasn't preceded by depression. War brings the US out of economic doldrums but economic doldrums isn't what always leads us to war.
posted by
FreeManWalking
on December 14, 2005 at 9:28 PM
| link to this | reply
You see patterns as do I. You see consumerism and materialism as causes I see them as symptoms. We are having an interesting debate. thanks
posted by
Bud-Oracle
on December 14, 2005 at 9:03 PM
| link to this | reply