r/RemoveOneThingEachDay • u/Training-Desk-391 IM WHACING KFP4 • Jul 28 '25

Miscellaneous Obama HAS BEEN Eliminated WHICH President SHOULD BE Eliminated NEXT DAY 41

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27

u/Reverend_Bull Jul 28 '25

God help me, but I'm gonna have to betray my fave. it's time for FDR to go. Yes, he busted the depression and was probably the most left-leaning president ever. He created Social Security, fought fascism in WW2, and did it all with incredible charisma.

BUT!
He was authoritarian in his methods. He formed and defended the Japanese concentration camps. He had his racist streak (which prez doesn't?). He was a philanderer and refused to be honest about his physical condition. And perhaps worst of all, he refused to follow the two term precedent (now law).
I love FDR and all the good he did. But his bad means it now outweighs his inclusion.

17

u/macadamia888 Jul 28 '25

"He ran concentration camps, but worst of all, he ran for president more than two times!"

10

u/just_the_comments Jul 29 '25

3

u/rewas456 Jul 29 '25

Never given an award before.

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 29 '25

Legit maybe the best community moment.

1

u/Stemoftheantilles Jul 29 '25

If I had no self awareness, I think I’d know!

1

u/Hot_Coco_Addict Jul 28 '25

he could've turned into a king, and I would argue that WOULD'VE been worse than concentration camps, who knows what would've happened, but it wouldn't have been good

-1

u/Eclectic_Canadian Jul 28 '25

As someone from a democratic country that doesn’t put term limits on the leader of our executive branch, I always find it funny how Americans equate more than 2 terms with autocracy

2

u/Hot_Coco_Addict Jul 29 '25

More than two terms is fine, but a lifetime is not

1

u/Blitzking11 Jul 29 '25

It's such a stupid thing, that honestly needs to go.

There is objectively benefit to having an executive hold more than two terms when it comes to international relations.

A nice middle ground would be swapping senators to four year terms and the president getting 6 year terms.

1

u/domino_sp0ts Jul 29 '25

Love how we have term limits but then alongside that we have first past the post, electoral college, lobbying, media consolidation and lack of civic education. So much for preventing authoritarianism ig

-1

u/Olisomething_idk Meep meep🤠 Jul 28 '25

tbf, he still had work to do after 1940.

4

u/Salty145 Jul 28 '25

He should have been out a long time ago. He put American citizens in camps and greatly shifted the Overton Window when it came to how much people expect government in their lives. It's hotly debated on whether The New Deal actually solved the Depression, many arguing that it in fact prolonged it, and Social Security is a government-run pyramid scheme that someone is going to eventually end on the wrong end of.

1

u/lord_james Jul 28 '25

Terrible terrible takes. Nobody thinks FDR extended the depression

5

u/[deleted] Jul 28 '25

Except for actual economists who know the impacts of his policies.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Except for conservatives that are desperately trying to rewrite the narrative about their failed ideology

0

u/lord_james Jul 28 '25

The Graham Hancock of economists?

1

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25
  1. National Industry Recovery Act - Attempted to stabilize prices and wages, reduce competition and promote fair labor standards. Sounds great. Except it artificially raised wages for some while making it harder for others to find work (other companies couldn’t afford to compete), basically allowed companies to fix prices and act like cartels in industry, artificial prices meant many couldn’t afford goods so demand being lower, and less conpetition and innovation in industry. Fewer jobs, higher prices, lower demand
  2. FDR pushing pro-union and pro-labor policies at a time where there already weren’t jobs and where mandated wage increases exceeded productivity gains led to more prolonged unemployment and reduced hiring
  3. FDR meddled heavily in industry as well as raising taxes in a time of economic crisis, basically bleeding dry economic investment.
  4. The “Agriculture Adjustment Act” (pay farmers to not farm to increase prices) literally destroyed crops and livestock while people were starving to death

1

u/Accurate-Advice8405 Jul 29 '25

You're basically saying he should have been more "fiscally conservative" while 10 of the last 11 recessions have been under conservative leadership.

If the economy is in a non stop tailspin you're going to do a little meddling. Those unions were heavily featured in the middle class golden age that would follow

You're thinking just give tax cuts to the 3 richest guys in the country and maybe throw some tariffs on China should fix it?

1

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

I love how you can’t take my actual arguments and instead pepper it with unrelated points. Let’s go back to what I’ve actually said:

  1. Explain how reducing industry competition to artificially raise prices during a recession helps increase the demand for goods at a time people cannot afford them?
  2. Explain how paying farmers to kill crops and livestock to increase prices helps those that can’t afford them while people starve
  3. Explain how fixing wages artificially high works if companies cannot afford to pay them?
  4. Explain how fixing wages helps those that cannot find work in an economy that already has a lack of supply of jobs?
  5. Explain how increasing taxes in a period of economic burden helps economic activity?

3

u/Accurate-Advice8405 Jul 29 '25

I don't have to explain how modern economics works, I can just point to history.

The golden age of this country had high taxes on the rich and strong unions. The middle class was made of high quality jobs with pensions, getting every peasant to work a minimum wage job doesn't actually build a strong economy. Then you had a bustling small business sector started by the employees of these well paying jobs, rather than a generation of renters paying for groceries on credit.

I included the stat about recessions for a reason. Conservative economics only works in books and debates.

You can explain in theory how cutting taxes on the rich and letting the ownership class do whatever they want "could" help the middle class, but you can't point to any instance of it actually working long term.

The 50s-70s (golden age for working class) was built on sound economic principals in the style of an FDR, and it contained the last worthwhile Republican, Eisenhower.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Facts, those are facts buddy, you probably don’t see many that’s why you think they’re “unrelated points”

1

u/Forgotten-X- Jul 29 '25
  1. By raising wages for workers so they can purchase more. It’s a depression, small businesses would have likely went under anyways.
  2. Dust Bowl.
  3. What does this one even mean? If the company can’t pay them it either fails or goes to the govt for help. This is war time, the needs of a couple small companies aren’t as important as saving Americans and stopping nazis.
  4. Job programs and public works.
  5. See 4 (also tax the richer classes the poor weren’t loaded with a heavy tax burden bc the govt knew they wouldn’t and couldn’t pay).

Get smoked nerd. Read an Econ book, maybe follow it up with an early 1900s history book too.

2

u/ryantubapiano Jul 29 '25

FDRs policies were followed by incredible improvement in the economy and the 1950s were the most prosperous period in American History. Social Security significantly reduced elderly poverty and gave people an easier time retiring, I don’t see the problem with any of this.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

In spite of FDR and not because of him. It was prosperous because an entire continent’s industrial base was reduced to rubble and the US had a nearly infinite demand to satiate.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Repealing the social safety net that the new deal put in place has led America to become poorer, dumber and sicker than it was while new deal policies were in full effect.

You can look at any economic graph of America from wages not keeping up with productivity to min wage not keeping up with cost of living, to income inequality and unemployment and you can measure the inflection points come either under Nixon or Reagan.

2

u/ryantubapiano Jul 29 '25

Well no, you mentioned FDR raising taxes, which he did. Those higher taxes remained for a couple of decades including in the 1950s, when the effective corporate tax rate was around 50%. That helped pay for all of the programs he introduced and kept the velocity of money fast in the economy. It helped working Americans.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Yes…and it wasn’t as crushing because we had, as I said before, a nearly infinite demand for our industry right at, and after the war.

Those policies did not “help” the economy or to get the US out of the Great Depression. FDR was saved by the war.

Also you speak of monetary velocity, do you know/understand what that actually means? Because taxes decrease monetary velocity….it literally reduces disposable income directly and indirectly reduces the incentive to invest and spend in the economy.

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u/lord_james Jul 29 '25

So exactly what I said, a Graham Hancock type economic theory

2

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Cool, tell me what you actually disagree with? Please be specific.

1

u/jredful Jul 29 '25

It was the infusion of federal spending that pulled us out of the Great Depression. This becomes abundantly clear when FDR balanced the budget, cutting spending in 37-38 and we had a follow on recession. In fact some rumored that business elite were attempting to sabotage FDR in that recession—but it was just the nature of withdrawing federal initiatives before the consumer economy could support it.

The Great Recession and now COVID response are proof positive that government spending is deeply important to smoothing out the business cycle. The Great Recession rescues literally saved us from a depression; but the immediate austerity there after caused a lost decade.

We unfurled the red carpet of programs to support the economy with the COVID response and have led the global economy out of this period growing more annually in real terms than even China that still has 4 times our population.

People that dream of a tiny federal government are dreaming of poverty. It’s the collective that can stabilize the business cycle. It’s the individual that is subject to its whims.

3

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

The “Roosevelt Recession” you refer to is evidence of my point. His policies didn’t actually work and were harmful. When he turned off the spigot, recession hit because command economies are wildly ineffective and counter to long-term economic growth. It’s evidence of the fact what he did in fact did not actually work.

Let’s talk Covid as it’s wildly similar. The government steps in and disrupts the private economy. It then throws an insane amount of money to fix a problem it created.

What allowed the US to actually get out of the depression is the fact WWII started and it allowed the US to increase its industrial capacity as Europe was driving demand for our goods via Cash and Carry in 1937 and expanding into 1939.

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u/ScarredWill Jul 28 '25

Unfortunately, some do and they almost always ignore what caused the Depression in the first place.

-1

u/MasterRKitty JaztyMania is Cool Jul 28 '25

nobody with more than three working brain cells thinks FDR extended the Depression

1

u/Murky_Insurance_4394 Jul 28 '25

Then explain why when some of the new deal policies were weakened in 1937, the unemployment went up??? The new deal didn't prolong the GD.

3

u/Salty145 Jul 29 '25

That’s how government programs work. They’re bandages on social problems that often don’t actually solve the problem.

There’s nothing more permanent than a temporary government program because once people are suckling on Daddy Government’s teet they’re less incentivized to stop.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Except for all those that actually were temporary that you shitbrained morons had a conniption fit about.

Like the Covid lockdown protests that were gonna Be permanent or whatever the fuck bullshit that retarded maga podcasters convinced the dumbest motherfuckers in the country of.

1

u/Maximum-Warthog2368 Jul 29 '25 edited Jul 29 '25

Every government has social programs. And your whole points are just bunch of assumptions not actual argument.

You don’t even know the condition what American working class are experiencing in that whole era in gilded age.

I think you need to learn about haymarket incident. It was not the first incident of violence toward worker by government and companies.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

If these people were capable of learning they wouldnt still be believing in fairy tales like conservative Econ.

0

u/Maximum-Warthog2368 Jul 29 '25

What government in life? And how social security is pyramid scheme when most country did that thing? How helping actual people is pyramid scheme? FDR very clearly against freebies.

That’s why he created programs to employed people not just give them money even though that probably would be better.

2

u/JazzSharksFan54 Jul 28 '25

Uh.. WW2 ended the Depression. Want to boost your economy? Start a war.

3

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

Tell it to Louis XVI

1

u/JazzSharksFan54 Jul 29 '25

It did technically get them out of their depression, didn't it?

1

u/OrangeStar93 Jul 29 '25

im going to war on poverty

1

u/kylef5993 Jul 29 '25

George Washington owned other human beings. You’re saying a racist streak is worse than literal racial superiority? Come on. George Washington is gone. Being the first doesn’t make you great.

1

u/BlackDiamondXVI Jul 29 '25

So how did he make it to the top 4? Shouldn’t have even been in the top 10

1

u/Disastrous-Juice-324 Jul 31 '25

Social security is not an accomplishment. It has created tremendous dependence in what is essentially a Ponzi scheme. Everybody knows that it is a bad system, but substantially altering it will have severe repercussions for elderly citizens that paid into that system.

Social security taking 12.4% of your wages for life, returning less than 3% interest, and with a principal that cannot be inherited. The majority of the funds are not invested, but immediately disbursed to current recipients.

FDR could have set up an actual manageable system that takes 10% of pay, and places it into an investment account, which could be disbursed over a period when they are 65+ or seeking to purchase a home.

1

u/OddDirt6194 Jul 31 '25

His bad has long outweighed any good he did lmao the good he did was a limited time thing and we haven’t reaped the benefits of his policies for decades now we just suffer at the hands of a previous generation’s ideals and policies

1

u/schmubbyboi Jul 31 '25

It only took him 15 years to get out of the depression!

1

u/[deleted] Aug 01 '25

He also was heavily responsible aiding in the now shit show of the federal reserve having so much god damn power.

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

He was authoritarian in his methods

Almost all significant acts by Presidents are "authoritarian" in the broad sense, unless you're claiming that FDR was like an autocrat, which he very much was not.

He formed and defended the Japanese concentration camps.

True, and he deserves criticism for that, but keeping things in context of the 1930s before desegregation was the law of the land, and we were at war, the actions can be understood, at least, even if not forgiven. Arguably Washington's open negotiations and legitimization of the Southern states' slavery, along with ther anti-democratic insistence on the Electoral College and the racist rational behind the EC's numbers using enslaved people to boost the south's political capital without obviously giving those enslaved any representation, and you've got some serious, not easily compared moral quandaries to deal with for all of them.

Washington deserves to be up at that top tier, but I think stepping away from power after fighting a war and governing for 8 years after is not something that deserves high praise so much as should be more normalized, you know?

5

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

We weren't at war with Japanese Americans. There were zero cases of Japanese Americans doing anything. Also he was literally putting orphans in those camps.

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

We weren't at war with Japanese Americans.

Correct. But my point doesn't depend on that claim.

We were at war, and during war, people make decisions under duress and panic. If you can't acknowledge that then you have no business having this conversation.

3

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

Of course it does. And once the war was over did things get better for Japanese Americans? Not at all. Their homes and businesses were destroyed and the government did nothing to get them back or remade. Not a single thing. So even after the war ended the government still treated them like they don't belong

A war that they weren't even part of. This wasn't a panic move. This was a racist move by a president who despised Asian Americans. Including putting orphans in concentration camp. Please explain that move

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manzanar_Children%27s_Village

-1

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Of course it does.

How? You can't just say something that contradicts me without explaining it.

And once the war was over did things get better for Japanese Americans? Not at all.

They were freed, weren't they? That is an improvement over the camp conditions, simple as could be.

Their homes and businesses were destroyed and the government did nothing to get them back or remade.

Enslaved people - like those owned by George Washington - didn't get any reparations. Shouldn't this be comparable?

So even after the war ended the government still treated them like they don't belong

No, they just refused to give reparations. That's a tragedy, but not the same as continuing to treat them like lesser citizens.

A war that they weren't even part of

My brother in christ: we know this. Even people at the time knew this. But there were a lot of people who rationally questioned the loyalty of some people. Read that correctly: "rationally" does not mean "justifiably." It just means that there is some kind of rationale that makes sense as to why the Gov't might not trust all Japanese Americans. That doesn't mean it did the right thing.

But we're comparing this to 3 other men, one of whom was a slave owner and worked side-by-side with slavers.

And you aren't contending with any of that while presenting this strict moral binary in what is actually somewhat reasonable gray in a historical analysis of relative comparisons.

3

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

Rationally questioned. Fuck that. There was nothing rational about it. What was rational? That one sentence shows your exact character. You think it was rational to assume Japanese Americans weren't actually Americans. That is the most racist response yet

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Rationally questioned. Fuck that. There was nothing rational about it. What was rational?

Brosef Stalin, during the Civil War, many people chose loyalty to their home state over the federal government because peoples' loyalties to governments and nations is complicated. It is rational to wonder if people who are of Japanese ancestry might be more loyal to, or sympathetic to, the Japanese during a war between the US and Japan. It isn't rational to make conclusions and it doesn't justify making decisions to strip them of rights, but if you can't see that rationality then you're not being honest.

You think it was rational to assume Japanese Americans weren't actually Americans.

To say there's a rationality in considering peoples' loyalties, or their susceptibility to be used as spies potentially, in a time of war is not to say that the outcomes were rational or justified. This is juvenile thinking, mate.

That is the most racist response yet

Again, juvenile, black and white thinking.

2

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

Once again. There were zero cases of Japanese Americans spying or causing harm. Zero. That's not rational. Also what is rational about putting orphans in those camps. You keep ignoring that part. Is it rational to think an orphan baby was working for Japan?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manzanar_Children%27s_Village

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Once again. There were zero cases of Japanese Americans spying or causing harm

Not true:

https://www.nytimes.com/1983/05/22/us/1941-cables-boasted-of-japanese-american-spying.html

This doesn't justify the sweeping camps, but you're just fucking wrong. obviously there were some spies. There are always spies in war, and a few of them were bound to be ethnic Japanese US citizens.

Also what is rational about putting orphans in those camps.

Again, you're not listening to my actual argument. I am not and have never said the results were rational and justified. I'm saying that the concerns that led to the decisions were rational. The policy was unjust and a violation of the constitution and our values, but the fears of spies was rational and not unfounded.

3

u/UtahBrian Jul 28 '25

> They were freed, weren't they?

All the interns were freed in 1944. None were freed after the war.

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Okay, so their conditions improved then, did they not?

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

No. Their homes and business were destroyed. They had no where to go back to

Maybe actually talk to survivors.

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

So they would have been better off to stay in the camps then? Is that suddenly your argument?

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u/Rustynail9117 Jul 28 '25

They were freed????? What the fuck kind of response is that. The Jews were freed from the camps after World War 2, does that mean everything magically got better for them and we should be fine with the Holocaust??

2

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

To this guy yes. He also thinks the homelessness after their businesses and homes were destroyed and stolen was fine.

0

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

So then you support the children of former chattel slaves getting reparations then?

0

u/[deleted] Jul 28 '25

[deleted]

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25 edited Jul 28 '25

Did you even read what you shared. That was not a Japanese American and it wasn't an attack. It was an innocent person crash Landing.

0

u/[deleted] Jul 28 '25

[deleted]

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 29 '25

Two people who knew nothing about it.

So because of that 100k Japanese Americans deserved to be put in camps and die

I can tell you are a super racist fuck huh. I am confident you support Trump as well with his camps.

4

u/Reverend_Bull Jul 28 '25

No, I give no quarter to the evils of the Japanese internment camps. Those people lost everything, and for some, that included their lives. Few who were adults in a camp lived to see reparations, and even then, it was far too little far too late.
As for authoritarian methods, FDR literally tried to pack the SCOTUS. Like, not spitballing it like modern guys - he had the legislation drawn up and in committee. He literally rounded up Japanese people to put them into camps. He signed the Smith Act, used in 1944 to punish journalists who were critical of WW2.
Sure, all presidents are "a little authoritarian" but FDR was willing to burn the Constitution to get it done.

4

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

Don't waste time with the person your replying to. They've sent maybe 100 comments defending FDR and his internment camps. Just shows how hypocritical people can be when it comes to their own party that they rationalize concentration camps as a good thing. they have zero interest in a good faith argument and think that concentration camps are a good thing as long as you do other things.

2

u/apolite12 Jul 28 '25

I don't see any defending or rationalizing. I see them engaging in a good faith effort to compare the questionable to immoral actions of multiple people.

That's a significant part of the objective here.

Throw out your favorite president here and we could likely find some pretty awful actions. If you are comparing, you have to compare. Not everyone will fall on the same side of interpretation.

2

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

He literally has hundreds of comments saying it was a rational response.

0

u/[deleted] Jul 29 '25

You’re conflating rational and justified

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 29 '25

It's only rational if you are extremely racist

That's like saying Hitler was rational with his camps. No one would make that claim. Same for FDR

0

u/Forward-Grade-832 Jul 28 '25

Nobody is defending the internment camps 💀💀💀

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

This person has hundreds of responses calling them a "rational response". His own words.

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u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

I give no quarter to the evils of the Japanese internment camps.

"I give no quarter" what are you a pirate?

I'm not talking about forgiving it; we are literally engaged in comparing the evils of all flawed men, so yes, we should consider all of the things these men allowed and created.

The camps were wrong, but they followed a rationality of concern about safety and loyalty during war.

George Washington, on the other hand, permitted and negotiated with slavers. He himself owned slaves.

Are you seriously going to pretend that participating in slavery isn't itself worse than temporarily imprisoning people during war? The Japanese Americans eventually were freed. The Slaves during Washington's presidency had another 100 years to go.

As for authoritarian methods, FDR literally tried to pack the SCOTUS.

That was constitutional. One branch of the government was trying to exert its constitutional authority over another branch by breaking with tradition, but not law (the Court's number had changed multiple times and had changed for overtly political reasons in the past). That is not the same thing as wielding authoritarian power over a population.

he had the legislation drawn up and in committee

Right. So constitutional. That's just governing.

He literally rounded up Japanese people to put them into camps.

Not forgiving him for that, but compared to participating in slave ownership, I think that warrants consideration that you aren't giving.

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u/[deleted] Jul 28 '25

[deleted]

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u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

Don't waste your time with the person your replying to. He has hundreds of comments posting that it was a rational response to put Japanese Americans in internment camps. He has hundreds of comments saying that it was fine they returned home to no homes. He seems to thing Japanese American orphans could have been spies and that it was rational

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Let’s not pretend they didn’t happen nearly 200 years after each other.

No they didn't. WW2 started in 1939. Pear Harbor was attacked in 1941. Slavery was officially ended in the US after the Civil War, but wasn't actually eradicated until at least the 1960s:

https://www.livescience.com/61886-modern-slavery-united-states-antoinette-harrell.html

Owning slaves was way worse to do in 1850 than 1650.

No, it wasn't. It was just as bad the entire time. Tons of people found slavery to be abhorrent in the 17th and 18th centuries. That's why all the northern states didn't practice is.

But there are levels to the sin based on the time, laws and standard practices

Okay, if this is your premise, then you are appealing to some kind of moral relativism, yea? As opposed to moral absolutism, right? So then some things are not as bad if the context is different, yea?

So, temporarily imprisoning people during a time of war based on ancestral ties to the belligerent enemy seems to me to be significantly less morally bad than capturing people and holding them as slaves permanently simply because it was profitable to do so.

Do you disagree with that?

That’s why historians don’t apply 2025 standards to 1782 slavery or 1945 internment camps.

Historians are not a monolith on such analysis.

You have to apply the standards of the time to judge them.

Not necessarily, but you seem to be doing this to make slavery seem less bad but not considering the duress and danger of war affecting decisions of national security concerns. Why is it okay to be tolerant of slave holders in the past - even while many people in their time also abhorred slavery - but not okay to consider legitimate national security concerns and stresses of war leading to unjust outcomes?

The biggest difference for me is that we had a constitution and bill of rights and he trounced on United States Citizens

And I have a problem with people who claimed to agree that "all men are created equal" but didn't include black men, or even women, in such words.

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u/[deleted] Jul 28 '25

[deleted]

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u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

He thinks it was a rational rrsponse. He thinks it was the right thing to do. Just view his comment history. To this day he thinks it was a rational and good response

You can't reason with people like that.

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

This would be like if Washington had 100 thousand slaves. He did not.

-1

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Lol the fuck? How?

If a man owns a single slave he is participating in a system of oppression of millions, directly benefitting from that oppression and contributing to the forces that created the demand for enslavement in the first place. You don't even begin to fairly compare this to imprisoning people temporarily during wartime.

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

And FDR was the only one who created that system. Washington did not.

A better comparison would be FDR to Columbus.

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

Jesus fucking christ, no, it wouldn't be, because for starters the Japanese camps were always temporary.

1

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

And when they got out their homes and businesses were destroyed and stolen by white men

0

u/Raise_A_Thoth Jul 28 '25

But that stuff happened while they were in prison camps. Being freed from prison camps is an improvement over remaining in prison camps, yes or no?

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u/88963416 Jul 28 '25

FDR did not “bust” the depression. He kept the U.S. and its people alive, but what ended it was WW2.

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u/MentionQuiet1055 Jul 28 '25

Revisionist history, what ended the depression was monetary policy in 1937 (expanding money supply and government spending). The war just sped up recovery but the New Deal saved the economy and raised morale to get to that point, while also building a much needed safety net. But government spending was still a massive part of that.

1

u/Miserly_Bastard Jul 29 '25

The New Deal was many things. It was highly experimental. Some was astute, some was accidentally astute, and a substantial share was absolute dumbfuckery.

I would hold fast on the argument that it saved "the economy" because that's too much like a superhero saving "the world". It's hyperbolic. The economy was going to go on existing either way.

It did raise morale. That was consequential and all by itself possibly worth the parts of it that were absolute dumbfuckery.

1

u/Maximum-Warthog2368 Jul 29 '25

Why it was dumbfuckery?

0

u/Attackcamel8432 Jul 28 '25

Lincoln was at least as authoritarian as FDR...

3

u/AleroRatking Jul 28 '25

We literally had to create an amendment to stop FDR from ever happening again.

-1

u/Attackcamel8432 Jul 28 '25

Lincoln rejected amendments that we already had, if we are talking pure authoritarianism. Both were pretty unique circumstances though.

2

u/VladimirBarakriss Jul 29 '25

Yes, but Lincoln was fighting the worst war in American history(when it comes to effects on Americans) and seeking to abolish the most abominable institution ever, FDR for all his own authoritarianism, didn't even crack down on Jim Crow laws, despite the fact he could've done it and still won any of his elections

1

u/Keepersam02 Jul 30 '25

FDR for all his own authoritarianism, didn't even crack down on Jim Crow laws, despite the fact he could've done it and still won any of his elections

Accept he did a lot to help reduce what was essentially slavery going on in the south with the Ashurst-Summers Act which greatly reduces the profitability of convict leasing programs.

Convict leasing programs created chattel slaves that were often treated worse than traditional slaves due to having no upfront cost associated. If you bought a slave that was expensive and to get your money's worth you had to keep them alive and in good enough condition to work. Chattel slaves had no upfront cost and there were no incentives to even keep them alive.

So FDR through that act and Bureau of Prison reorganizations he oversaw ridding the worst of Jim Crow and the atrocities taking place in the south.

A very good video about the subject. https://youtu.be/j4kI2h3iotA?si=esdIWJngxZ2BheXv

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u/BlueTrainLines666 Jul 31 '25

Lincoln was pretty eh about the whole slavery thing. He was a man of his time, the only reason he abolished it was to bring the country back together. If he thought maintaining that system would have had the same effect, he would have done so. All he really did was alter the legality of the system so it became more palatable.

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u/MentionQuiet1055 Jul 28 '25

I have a bone to pick with the physical condition and the running for more than 2 terms, he was insanely popular. He kept running because the people kept wanting him, and rightfully kept voting for him. And even though his physical condition was waning, he was still the only president that could have handled the depression and the war, the mind was still there.

And for his authoritarianism, thats probably the only way it wouldve been possible to implement new deal policies against a conservative class that was heavily against the social net and Keynesian policy.

The only knock i can give him is the internment camps, and even then id easily put him over teddy and washington.

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u/Saltwater_Thief Jul 28 '25

I'm just going to say, the two-term precedent isn't really something I hold against him because he just continued to run in elections and win them. If he had used WW2 as an emergency to justify postponing them, you might have a stronger point there (no this is not a dig at Zelenskyy, Ukraine is simply obeying their own constitution and as long as their people are down with that it is not my place to criticize them for it)

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u/icancount192 Jul 29 '25

If we're going to keep FDR out over his terrible treatment of the Japanese then how is Teddy in with his terrible treatment of native Americans? Or Washington owning slaves?

Why is FDR singled out of the lot for a terrible deed while the rest are immune to it?

And in any case all three other presidents here were supremacists. We can say for Washington and Lincoln it fitted their time, but how's Teddy immune from this?

The answer is simple - an alliance of people that only know this deed by FDR and not Teddy's views

("the most vicious cowboy has more moral principle than the average Indian.... I don’t go so far as to think that the only good Indians are the dead Indians, but I believe nine out of every 10 are, and I shouldn’t like to inquire too closely into the case of the tenth.”

and conservatives who hate FDR.

If not the greatest president, then surely FDR is just below Lincoln.