Many today refer to a Democrat in step with the party’s platform as “socialist’ and a few parallel history and Franklin Delano Roosevelt as “socialist.” I am pleased to elaborate on this.
Was FDR a socialist? I lived through part of the Great Depression wrought by corporate and banker greed. I know what Roosevelt did to help make the country “free from fear.” I saw TVA bring electricity and development to my home areas. I went to schools, libraries, museums, and parks developed by programs that otherwise would never have been. I know men and women, and most in my family, who helped create these miracles out of disaster. As a principal in Buckingham, Va., we were still using a building from those days when Republicans brought misery, much created out of a greed for a buck on the backs of the common worker, the farmer, builder or just plain laborer — most found a way to feed his family.
My father helped rebuild the agriculture of the South. My wife’s Dad, to make ends meet, hiked a ride on a freight car to find work, as did millions. Do not bleed facts to me about the good in having banks and Wall Street back in power. Barack Obama, whatever you judge him to be, kept this country from being on its knees.
Maybe Mitt Romney is centrist enough to keep the wolves from the farm and the home-but his reactionary backers will spell ruin to this nation if he allows the reins of sanity to go the way of 1929. If you lived through it, knew it, saw the misery of it, the President’s race and attacks on his place of birth and his so called Muslim connection are the real hidden issues for many in this election. His seeking the peace overseas and saving our economy at home are above these selfish prejudices. Be forewarned — the future is not to be what Mitt may say if the whacko far right gets its way and creates a 1929 disaster. So let it be said — God help us that it may not be done.
Finally, re-read Eisenhower’s speech as he left office, that of the “industrial and military complex” and the powers that are now a testament to that speech. The prophecy of the latter is the harbinger of history recycling, and a “maybe it’s so” just isn’t worth the prejudices therein.
JOHN T. HENDRICKS
Griffin
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