Photo: Naval Airpower

[ellisonz]

75. During the war years, yes defense spending boomed...

...but during the heart of the New Deal, not so much and it wasn't until Europe was already at war that we began to contemplate mobilization. I would argue that if we didn't invest in the citizenry during the New Deal, we would not have had a population as willing to fight.



Your bit about your grandfather is nice, and feel free to share in the http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1163" target="_blank">American History Group, but it has nothing to do with the question of Keynesian macroeconomics and defense spending as national priorities during the New Deal. Through 1941, the United States invested over $4 billion into transportation: roads, bridges, highways, airports, canals, and rail, not to mention development of our electric grid, power plants, sanitation projects, water supply, food supply, hospitals, schools, for total spending of about $13 billion -list of New Deal projects. The weapons that the American public made and the men that went to war in 1941 did so having heavily benefited from New Deal spending. Without it the nation would have been in even more dire straits, and much more slow in mobilization.

The amateur study of military history is no substitute for the academic study of American history

Do you honestly believe that the current generation could be mobilized as readily as the generation 70 years past? The willingness to ration and give up on everyday durable goods to support a war effort? Wouldn't even come close to happening today.

Your dim view of your fellow Americans is noted.