Art of the New Deal: Trump is a 21st Century FDR
To be a great president, Joe must emulate Donald (and Franklin).
https://gregolear.substack.com/p/art-of-the-n...8SDk9hKSCI
Greg Olear
Dec 22
START HERE, lest there be any confusion by the (admittedly clickbait-y) title of this piece: Franklin Delano Roosevelt is arguably the best president in the history of the United States; Donald John Trump is inarguably the worst. Our current president is a bully, a Fascist, a psychopath, and an analphabetic box of rocks—so stupid that I wouldn’t be surprised if he retweeted this column.
As I wrote two years ago, in what remains my pinned tweet, Trump is a mob money launderer, installed by his Russian whoremasters to sow chaos and weaken the U.S. and our allies. Every single thing he’s done since taking office is to achieve those purposes—that and to enrich himself personally.
He is an abject, catastrophic failure. His singular “achievement” as president is the intentional sabotage of the covid-19 response, when he, Mike Pence, and Acting President Jared Kushner exploited the pandemic for what they wrongly believed was personal and political gain.
Already, more Americans have died of the novel coronavirus than fell in the Second World War—you know, the one in which Roosevelt guided us to victory.
But in one important way, Trump did indeed follow in the footsteps of FDR: he wasn’t afraid to try things.
When Roosevelt took office on 4 March 1933, the country was in the throes of the Great Depression. His predecessor, Herbert Hoover—a brilliant, earnest, go-getter of a man, but a stickler for precedent—had been reluctant to violate any norms, even when faced with crushing economic disaster.
FDR had no such qualms. He skipped the usual inaugural balls and went right to work, throwing pot upon pot of executive and legislative spaghetti against the wall to see what might stick.
He treated the presidency like an improv comedy show, always saying, “Yes, and—.” His First Hundred Days are the stuff of presidential legend. Historians dicker about whether any of this frantic activity actually pulled the country out of the Great Depression, which didn’t happen until we cranked up the war machine.
But the point is, FDR did stuff, and he oozed confidence while doing stuff, and on his watch, the United States beat the Nazis and climbed out of an unprecedented financial sinkhole.
During his four years in office, Trump made like FDR—albeit a Bizarro FDR.
He set fire to presidential norms. He upended tradition. He didn’t do anything he didn’t want to do unless it was expressly illegal—and even then, he often skirted the law. He made more Americans say, “But he can’t do that” than any president since…well, since the last guy from New York. He basically did whatever the fuck he wanted.
Whatever the fuck he wanted was, needless to say, always terrible:
• FDR established the Securities and Exchange Commission; Trump fired the FBI director because he didn’t show loyalty.
• FDR gave fireside chats, where he was frank with the American people; Trump tweeted, where he lied egregiously.
• FDR created the Tennessee Valley Authority, the largest public works enterprise in U.S. history; Trump installed a crony to destroy the Postal Service.
• FDR established Social Security to protect the elderly; Trump ignored the elderly dying in waves of covid-19.
• FDR established the Fair Labor and Standards Act, which among other things outlawed child labor; Trump caged refugee children after separating them from their parents.
• FDR ran for a third term, and then a fourth, which was then technically legal; Trump openly spoke of being president for decades, which was not.
• FDR kept the top marginal tax rate at 94 percent during the war, and wanted it even higher; Trump gutted services to give tax breaks to billionaires.
• FDR recalled General Douglas MacArthur to active duty, and gave him command of the armed forces in the Pacific; Trump named Mike Flynn national security adviser, begged the FBI director to ignore his crimes, and then, when Mueller convicted him, pardoned him and brought him back to the White House in the last weeks of his dying presidency.
• FDR made nice with Stalin, to fight the Nazis in Europe; Trump made nice with Putin, and also with Nazis in the American heartland.
The point is, Trump, cowardly as he is IRL, wasn’t afraid to mix things up as president. That is to his credit, ultimately. It is the only thing he did that could even remotely be construed as “presidential.”
When Joe Biden is sworn in four weeks from tomorrow, he will become president of a nation in crisis. By then, the pandemic will have killed some 400,000 Americans—a staggering number. The economic fallout will verge on catastrophic.
He will have a Democratic House but, in all likelihood, a Senate in the purple clutches of the obstructionist Mitch McConnell, who is more interested in Biden’s failure than the country’s revitalization. He will need to take swift, decisive action, but his hands will be tied.
At 78, Biden will be the oldest first-term president in history—eight years older than Trump when he took office, nine years older than Reagan. In his long political career, he was known as a middle-of-the-road Democrat, a centrist. For his presidency to succeed, the proverbial old dog must learn—must master—some new tricks. He must make like FDR and try stuff, and not be afraid to fail. He must out-Trump Trump.
His work, as the saying goes, is cut out for him: Joe and Kamala must end the pandemic—distribute the vaccine, implement federal mask regulations, provide relief to struggling families and businesses, handle any complications that may come.
They must safeguard the United States from further cyberattacks from Russia and other adversaries, and respond in kind to the audacious Russian attack on our computer systems. They must rebuild the State Department, reestablish good relations with our allies, and reassume America’s role as leader of the free world.
They must revamp the education system, broken by four years of Betsy DeVos and a lost year of slipshod Zoom schooling. They must fix the USPS. They must safeguard our election systems. They must stop the sclerotic obstruction in Congress, so bills can be voted on, so compromise can be achieved.
They must right—or, rather, “left”—the imbalance on the pro-dude, pro-landlord, pro-corporation, anti-little-guy Supreme Court.
They must root out corruption and prosecute Trump and everyone in his circle who sold out the country. They must go after organized crime, by exposing and seizing offshore accounts, shell corporations, and other dark money.
They must combat domestic terrorism, fomented by four years of white nationalist radicalization by Trump and his alt-right allies. And they have to do all of these things as quickly as possible, because all of them are blinking-red urgent.
To be a great president, Joe must emulate Donald (and Franklin).
https://gregolear.substack.com/p/art-of-the-n...8SDk9hKSCI
Greg Olear
Dec 22
START HERE, lest there be any confusion by the (admittedly clickbait-y) title of this piece: Franklin Delano Roosevelt is arguably the best president in the history of the United States; Donald John Trump is inarguably the worst. Our current president is a bully, a Fascist, a psychopath, and an analphabetic box of rocks—so stupid that I wouldn’t be surprised if he retweeted this column.
As I wrote two years ago, in what remains my pinned tweet, Trump is a mob money launderer, installed by his Russian whoremasters to sow chaos and weaken the U.S. and our allies. Every single thing he’s done since taking office is to achieve those purposes—that and to enrich himself personally.
He is an abject, catastrophic failure. His singular “achievement” as president is the intentional sabotage of the covid-19 response, when he, Mike Pence, and Acting President Jared Kushner exploited the pandemic for what they wrongly believed was personal and political gain.
Already, more Americans have died of the novel coronavirus than fell in the Second World War—you know, the one in which Roosevelt guided us to victory.
But in one important way, Trump did indeed follow in the footsteps of FDR: he wasn’t afraid to try things.
When Roosevelt took office on 4 March 1933, the country was in the throes of the Great Depression. His predecessor, Herbert Hoover—a brilliant, earnest, go-getter of a man, but a stickler for precedent—had been reluctant to violate any norms, even when faced with crushing economic disaster.
FDR had no such qualms. He skipped the usual inaugural balls and went right to work, throwing pot upon pot of executive and legislative spaghetti against the wall to see what might stick.
He treated the presidency like an improv comedy show, always saying, “Yes, and—.” His First Hundred Days are the stuff of presidential legend. Historians dicker about whether any of this frantic activity actually pulled the country out of the Great Depression, which didn’t happen until we cranked up the war machine.
But the point is, FDR did stuff, and he oozed confidence while doing stuff, and on his watch, the United States beat the Nazis and climbed out of an unprecedented financial sinkhole.
During his four years in office, Trump made like FDR—albeit a Bizarro FDR.
He set fire to presidential norms. He upended tradition. He didn’t do anything he didn’t want to do unless it was expressly illegal—and even then, he often skirted the law. He made more Americans say, “But he can’t do that” than any president since…well, since the last guy from New York. He basically did whatever the fuck he wanted.
Whatever the fuck he wanted was, needless to say, always terrible:
• FDR established the Securities and Exchange Commission; Trump fired the FBI director because he didn’t show loyalty.
• FDR gave fireside chats, where he was frank with the American people; Trump tweeted, where he lied egregiously.
• FDR created the Tennessee Valley Authority, the largest public works enterprise in U.S. history; Trump installed a crony to destroy the Postal Service.
• FDR established Social Security to protect the elderly; Trump ignored the elderly dying in waves of covid-19.
• FDR established the Fair Labor and Standards Act, which among other things outlawed child labor; Trump caged refugee children after separating them from their parents.
• FDR ran for a third term, and then a fourth, which was then technically legal; Trump openly spoke of being president for decades, which was not.
• FDR kept the top marginal tax rate at 94 percent during the war, and wanted it even higher; Trump gutted services to give tax breaks to billionaires.
• FDR recalled General Douglas MacArthur to active duty, and gave him command of the armed forces in the Pacific; Trump named Mike Flynn national security adviser, begged the FBI director to ignore his crimes, and then, when Mueller convicted him, pardoned him and brought him back to the White House in the last weeks of his dying presidency.
• FDR made nice with Stalin, to fight the Nazis in Europe; Trump made nice with Putin, and also with Nazis in the American heartland.
The point is, Trump, cowardly as he is IRL, wasn’t afraid to mix things up as president. That is to his credit, ultimately. It is the only thing he did that could even remotely be construed as “presidential.”
When Joe Biden is sworn in four weeks from tomorrow, he will become president of a nation in crisis. By then, the pandemic will have killed some 400,000 Americans—a staggering number. The economic fallout will verge on catastrophic.
He will have a Democratic House but, in all likelihood, a Senate in the purple clutches of the obstructionist Mitch McConnell, who is more interested in Biden’s failure than the country’s revitalization. He will need to take swift, decisive action, but his hands will be tied.
At 78, Biden will be the oldest first-term president in history—eight years older than Trump when he took office, nine years older than Reagan. In his long political career, he was known as a middle-of-the-road Democrat, a centrist. For his presidency to succeed, the proverbial old dog must learn—must master—some new tricks. He must make like FDR and try stuff, and not be afraid to fail. He must out-Trump Trump.
His work, as the saying goes, is cut out for him: Joe and Kamala must end the pandemic—distribute the vaccine, implement federal mask regulations, provide relief to struggling families and businesses, handle any complications that may come.
They must safeguard the United States from further cyberattacks from Russia and other adversaries, and respond in kind to the audacious Russian attack on our computer systems. They must rebuild the State Department, reestablish good relations with our allies, and reassume America’s role as leader of the free world.
They must revamp the education system, broken by four years of Betsy DeVos and a lost year of slipshod Zoom schooling. They must fix the USPS. They must safeguard our election systems. They must stop the sclerotic obstruction in Congress, so bills can be voted on, so compromise can be achieved.
They must right—or, rather, “left”—the imbalance on the pro-dude, pro-landlord, pro-corporation, anti-little-guy Supreme Court.
They must root out corruption and prosecute Trump and everyone in his circle who sold out the country. They must go after organized crime, by exposing and seizing offshore accounts, shell corporations, and other dark money.
They must combat domestic terrorism, fomented by four years of white nationalist radicalization by Trump and his alt-right allies. And they have to do all of these things as quickly as possible, because all of them are blinking-red urgent.
