We need another FDR in perilous American times

ACHTUNG: The following is not a “fair and balanced” article. It is an editorial by the editor.

I hereby recommend all who read this to go to You Tube and watch “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street,” the brilliant “Twilight Zone” episode written by the late, great Rod Serling.

This “Must See TV” from 1960 serves as an allegory for the Coronavirus crisis we’re experiencing today. It’s set in a fictional suburb in which neighbors notice a series of strange goings-on, particularly the sudden loss of electricity. As time goes on, the citizens become suspicious of one another and fears mount about who is causing these calamities.

Serling seemed to be insisting that collective irrational fear too often has awful consequences, and the final scene has the neighbors scurrying around the neighborhood attacking and killing each other.

Also in the final scene is the closing narration, “In this time of uncertainty, we are so sure that villains lurk around every corner that we will create them ourselves if we can’t find them – for while fear may keep us vigilant, it’s also fear that tears us apart – a fear that sadly exists only too often – outside the Twilight Zone.”

The current health, economic and political crisis gripping us now also reminds me of another excellent video presentation, “Bitter Lake,” by documentarian Adam Curtis, who opened with the commentary:

“Politicians used to have the confidence to tell us stories that made sense of the chaos of world events. But now there are no big stories and politicians react randomly to every new crisis — leaving us bewildered and disorientated… Afghanistan is the place that has confronted our politicians with the terrible truth — that they cannot understand what is going on any longer.”

I refuse to hold only President Donald Trump accountable for the chaos and crisis we’re forced to endure. To be sure, he dawdled when the health warnings first appeared, and he even said things we’ve learned that just aren’t true. Things such as suggesting the Coronavirus is a Democratic hoax deliberately manufactured to make him look bad.

Trump actually is just the latest in a long line of politicians who say things they think we want to hear and to puff themselves up. And too often they’re lies. Even worse, we collectively put up with and forgive them. Remember Iraq?

So here we are, stuck in a horrible time when it seems everything is shutting down: Schools, sports, churches, entertainment events, in an effort to help prevent the spread of a virus that hasn’t killed very many people — yet. The real problem here is that we don’t really know much about this threat or how much of a menace it is.

I’ve seen far too many comments on Facebook by non-medical posters who insist far more people have died of more common foes, such as influenza, yet they know nothing about what lies ahead.

I submit we must use history and science as a way to examine the problem and propose solutions. When perusing the archives weekly at the Then & Now Historical Library, I was struck by accounts in the Wayland Globe in 1919 about closure of schools and sometimes even the entire village for between one and two weeks in attempts to stop the spread of the disease.

As you may remember, influenza killed a hell of a lot of people about 100 years ago in a pandemic exacerbated by troops coming home from serving in World War I. People back then were wandering through possible ways to contain a deadly disease that came roaring back in 1920.

I also look to history, 1933 to be exact, to recall what I believe to be one of the finest examples of presidential leadership ever exhibited, that of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who declared in March of that year at his inauguration: “The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.”

For Roosevelt, they were more than just pretty, catchy words. He embarked on a very aggressive program to fight against the Great Depression, this country’s greatest economic challenge ever. After declaring a bank holiday, he launched the first 100 days of passing legislation to try to improve the lot of the poor and hungry. He didn’t bail out Wall Street.

Not long afterward the nation’s unemployment rate was cut in half because he put many to work in government programs. His detractors said the government shouldn’t be the biggest employer, but he showed it was much better than letting Americans starve and die on the streets.

To be sure, FDR’s New Deal did not solve all of the problems of the Great Depression. That didn’t actually happen in full force until the national economy was transformed by the war effort — a good example of democratic socialism — everybody chipping in on behalf of a worthy cause.

This is a time for me to reflect on the legacy of Franklin Roosevelt, a man who did more than just give problems lip service, but instead aggressively attacked the economic problems and collective despair. He tried to solve problems, and he got results.

His approach was so successful that he was handily elected president four times, the only president to ever do so. The result was the groundwork was laid for creating the most prosperous society and largest middle class in the history of this planet.

But the “economic royalists” who opposed him almost immediately ensured we’d never see his like again by implementing term limits after his death. They’ve been successful in unraveling FDR’s work over the past 75 years, slowly but surely.

I believe deep in my heart that what we sorely need right now in this troubled country is another FDR.