Q&A Friday #95: Can We Ever Go Back To the Pre-New Deal America?

10 Oct, 2008 by John Hawkins

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Question: Will America ever stop subsidizing bad decision ie, will we ever get back the small fed that the founders envisioned, and we lived under until the New Deal?” — bthewolf

Answer: That is highly doubtful, my friend, because only a teeny, tiny percentage of Americans genuinely wants to do that today and explaining why it’s a good idea to make that radical shift to a majority of the American public would be impossible.

How do you explain the constitutionality of government programs to people who wouldn’t know the difference between phrases from the Constitution and Mao’s Little Red Book (That would probably be a large minority or perhaps even a majority of the American people)? How do you tell people who paid into Social Security for 40 years that the program is supposed to be unconstitutional, so they’re not getting a payout? How do you turn the 98% of the American public around on an issue where most of them will think you’re nuts and most of the people who genuinely understand what you want to do will oppose you?

Making that change today would require a radical shift amongst the American people in their attitude towards life, what they expect government to do, and their level of understanding of the Constitution. So far, there is absolutely no evidence we’re moving in that direction. In fact, we seem to be slowly but surely going in the opposite direction as a country. That, I am confident, we can change. Going all the way back to the pre-FDR golden days of yore, I don’t think we can accomplish as a nation.