The hard left of the time called FDR a millionaire sellout. They called him a slick politician. It’s bizarre how ahistorical this is. FDR would be a billionaire today. You think he’s be accepted on here?
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Replying to @neeratanden
Hard left? Like the cpusa, which formed a popular front with the Nee Deal? Like Norman Thomas, the democratic socialist successor to Eugene Debs? Not sure what your point is, or what you’re even criticizing, but I’m pretty sure I know the history better than you.
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Replying to @yeselson @neeratanden
The modern left’s depiction of FDR as a consistent progressive (contrasting with modern neoliberal sellouts) is at odds wi th FDRs actual record and the lefts frequent hostility to him during his presidency
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Replying to @jonathanchait @neeratanden
Of course he wasn’t a consistent progressive! The failures and inadequacies were many. But he’s the best we’ve ever had. And that is what she’s extolling. Which of course is the right and smart thing to do.
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Replying to @yeselson @neeratanden
Whether or not it’s politically shrewd, the strategy of romanticizing the past to create an invidious comparison with the modern version is ahistorical. The continuities in Democratic Party orientation overwhelm the differences.
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Replying to @jonathanchait @neeratanden
Jon, her very point was to point to the continuities. That what her list was—continuities she wished to attach herself and Sanders to. Not really following this.
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Ah, you think her point is to criticize centrist Dems today. No doubt true. But everybody constructs their “usable past” and her summary is perfectly fine for just a few sentences. And most Dem candidates don’t mention FDR, even in a more nuanced way. Maybe they should.
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Replying to @yeselson @neeratanden
I'm not making any points about the political usability of her claims, merely stating that her "usable history" is a myth. It denies the reality FDR mediated between labor and business and was frequently (though not continuously) hated by the left.
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Replying to @jonathanchait @neeratanden
I mean—sure. But it’s campaign rhetoric, not an academic article. She’s taking that tradition and grafting it to her politics (and Sanders, who has done this many times, so many times that it’s clear he’s a social dem/21st century new dealer when he talks about “socialism.”)
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If more mainstream Debs want to connect to FDR and the civil rights movement, they ought to extol them too. What is the problem here? She doesn’t have to footnote campaign rhetoric. FDR is available to all.
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I'm just here to note that "mainstream Debs" is a glorious Freudian slip in this context ;)
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Damn, I did that again! I try to catch them, but this one slipped thru.
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