And yet, with careful, compassionate leadership in mind, FDR decided to sit down by the [virtual] fire, and calmly -- reassuringly -- just talk, like a neighbor -- to the American people, that Sunday night, 85 years ago. It was the very first of his radio broadcast "fireside chats" (a tradition he had begun in 1929 as Governor of New York, on a smaller scale, for the people of the Empire State), and in the main, they did the trick.
He spoke not to sow fear -- not to sow divisions -- and not to demonize one group of Americans as "less than" all other Americans. He sought to help the American people see that we were better off relying on one another, and leaving our money cooperatively inside the banks, to work for one another, in the form of lending capacity -- to rebuild:
. . . .The result, according to economic historian William L. Silber, was a "remarkable turnaround in the public's confidence. . . The contemporary press confirms that the public recognized the implicit guarantee and, as a result, believed that the reopened banks would be safe, as the President explained in his first Fireside Chat."
Within two weeks people returned more than half of the cash they had been hoarding, and the first stock-trading day after the bank holiday marked the largest-ever one-day percentage price increase. . . .
And so, bit-by-bit, coupled to his willingness to use federal dollars to put ordinary Americans back to work, we, as a nation, turned the corner.
I need not belabor what tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy are NOT doing to bring any meaningful gains for ordinary workers. I will say that 45's rally in Pennsylvania over the weekend highlighted just how small a twig he is, compared to real Presidential timber.
Go now, and help your neighbors -- regardless of their papers. It is. . . the truest American way. It seems this time, we will need to do it, for each other, in spite of our President.
But that is just exactly what we will do -- with smiles on our faces, regardless.
नमस्ते
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