FDR Quotes

(1)A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned how to walk forward.

That's my favorite. You simply can't beat it. Unfortunately, FDR has recently been cooped by the Republicans. Have a read from Media Matters for America.

(2)On the February 3 edition of FOX News' Hannity & Colmes, Bennett declared: "Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the guy who established Social Security, said that it would be good to have it replaced by private investment over time. Private investment would be the way to really carry this thing through."On the February 3 edition of FOX News' Hannity & Colmes, Bennett declared: "Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the guy who established Social Security, said that it would be good to have it replaced by private investment over time. Private investment would be the way to really carry this thing through." .... But Roosevelt was not advocating that the present system of guaranteed Social Security benefits "ought to ultimately be supplanted by self-supporting annuity plans." Rather, he was proposing that both guaranteed Social Security retirement benefits and voluntary annuities would eventually eliminate the need for a different fund which was established to provide pension benefits to Americans who were already too old in 1935 to contribute payroll taxes to the Social Security system.

While the guys over at Media Matters for America have done a decent job of debunking this, I've got some stuff that I've been meaning to say. I'll start with the following quote from the four freedoms speech:

(3)In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression - everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way - everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want, which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants - everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor - anywhere in the wold. That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation.[my emphasis]

If you read the speeches and fireside chats that FDR had then I think that you will realize exactly what you should. He was a man of the people. He cared for those in Society that needed help the most. He envisioned a society where nobody would go hungry and nobody would be impoverished and his vision for those of us who are older in this plan was Social Security. The bush plan cuts guaranteed benefits in favor of a chance at a better return. This is not, I repeat not, what FDR would have envisioned. This new system would leave certain people who opted in high and dry when their private investments flopped and that is not only irresponsible but it goes against Roosevelt's third freedom. Before I leave the subject, I'd like to add my opinion. This plan is ridiculous. The Great Depression, the era in which Social Security was designed, was punctuated by the Stock Market crumbling. It was so bad that investors were literally jumping out of windows on wall street. "Black Thursday," as it was then called, set off a worldwide depression. Have we, as a nation, forgotten this? In this age of Enron is it really possible that our faith in the market is so strong that we don't perceive a risk associated with betting our retirement on it? The entire point of Social Security was that it was secure because it was in the government's hands and not that of wall street. Sources: (1)BrainyQuote (2)Distorting FDR: Bennett and Hume claimed father of Social Security system wanted privatization Media Matters - February 4 (3)Four Freedoms Speech January 6, 1941 More on: Social Security FDR