Via Billy
Doing a Web search of “FDR critics” I ran across
this Cato Institute publication
that condemns FDR for having harmed “millions” of poor people with his
policies. Applying the same “logic” that is used by some people
associated with Cato (and the Koch-funded Institute for Humane Studies
and various
other nihilistic libertines who mislabel themselves
as “libertarians”), it is reasonable to assume that the author of this
article, and those who publish it, must be neo-Nazis. After all, when
people such as myself, Tom Woods, and Judge Napolitano criticize
Lincoln, these Cato characters smear everyone associated with the Mises
Institute and LewRockwell.com as “a bunch of neo-Confederates,” implying
that we must secretly wish to bring back slavery. If making critical
comments about Lincoln makes one a “neo-Confederate,” then making
critical comments about FDR makes one a “neo-Nazi” or a neo-Hitlerite.
Or perhaps the issue here is that too many people approach the study
of history as though it is like a college football game where one either
roots for the home team or the visiting team. If you cheer when
Alabama fumbles or throws an interception, then you must be an Auburn
fan, and vice versa.
An alternative way of looking at historical research is that it is a
search for learning about historical reality and not a sporting event.
As such, there are no winners and losers, as with sporting events. If
you look at it that way, then criticisms of Lincoln or FDR are just that
— criticisms of Lincoln and FDR, period, case closed. Unless of course
you are simply lying and deceiving in order to smear and slander those
with whom you disagree about public policy matters. The
modus operandi of the left-wing hate group known as the
Southern Poverty Law Center, in other words.
