FDR Was Fearless— Do You Ever Wonder What He Would Have Had To Say About Elon Musk?

Polls of historians show that only one relatively contemporary president gives George Washington and Abraham Lincoln a run for their money when it comes to greatness. He had some very inspiring things to say while he was president. One of my favorite was from a spectacular address he gave on October 31, 1936 in Madison Square Garden: “We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace— business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering. They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob. Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me— and I welcome their hatred." Not mealy-mouthed like today’s Democratic politicians. That’s why he broke every electoral record in the books. 

Earlier, in his first Inaugural Address, March 4, 1933, these were the first few paragraphs:

I am certain that my fellow Americans expect that on my induction into the Presidency I will address them with a candor and a decision which the present situation of our Nation impels. This is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today. This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself— nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. I am convinced that you will again give that support to leadership in these critical days.

In such a spirit on my part and on yours we face our common difficulties. They concern, thank God, only material things. Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for their produce; the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone.

More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great number toil with little return. Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.

Yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. We are stricken by no plague of locusts. Compared with the perils which our forefathers conquered because they believed and were not afraid, we have still much to be thankful for. Nature still offers her bounty and human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply. Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.

True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.

The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.

In his second Inaugural Address in 1937k, he said, “Let us ask again: Have we reached the goal of our vision of that fourth day of March 1933? Have we found our happy valley? I see a great nation, upon a great continent, blessed with a great wealth of natural resources… I see a United States which can demonstrate that, under democratic methods of government, national wealth can be translated into a spreading volume of human comforts hitherto unknown… But here is the challenge to our democracy: In this nation I see tens of millions of its citizens… who at this very moment are denied the greater part of what the very lowest standards of today call the necessities of life… The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”

During a speech in Oglethorpe University in 1932, he remarked, “I should like to have it said of my first Administration that in it the forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match. I should like to have it said of my second Administration that in it these forces met their master.”

In his 1936 State of the Union Address, he stated, “We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace— business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.”

FDR, Nazi hater, smote them good. But not good enough… they’re back and worse than ever. Yesterday, Puck’s Theodore Schleifer wrote that “On a brisk Friday evening earlier this month, David Sacks and Elon Musk convened a dozen or so of America’s most powerful business leaders for dinner at Sacks’ $23 million, 11,000-square-foot home in the Hollywood Hills. The dinner party, according to people familiar with the intimate gathering, comprised a veritable living room Milken conference: Michael Milken himself was there, in fact, as were billionaires Rupert Murdoch and Peter Thiel. A few government types, including Steven Mnuchin, scored invites. There were also some less politically active titans of industry, such as Uber co-founder and former CEO Travis Kalanick. But all were there as members of a burgeoning anti-Biden brain trust, united by a shared sense of grievance. The get-together, which hasn’t been previously reported, is the latest evidence of Musk’s growing power beyond Silicon Valley, as he’s evolved from political hobbyist to media owner and conservative icon. As I wrote last week, Musk has told associates that he’s interested in formalizing his running political commentary on Twitter into an official endorsement of some sort— either a statement against President Biden, or even something supporting Donald Trump. He has been encouraged to go deeper into politics this cycle by his friends Joe Lonsdale, the venture capitalist, and Steve Wynn, the casino magnate and Trump emissary. Both in public and in private, Musk has expressed feeling deeply unnerved by America’s migrant crisis— a fear that has driven his rush into Republican politics— and the issue was a key topic of discussion at the dinner.