Posted by
john on Thursday, November 13, 2008 2:41:59 PM
For reasons no one should be happy to experience, it seems that with each passing day, the sad saga, and the lessons, of President Herbert Hoover, a.k.a. "Wonder Boy", become more relevant. I graduated from college (UCD) in 1982, so it is likely due to this generational circumstance that I was surprised to read recently that Mr. Hoover, from 1948-1964, was a near annual member of the Gallup organization's Ten Most Admired American Men list. Apparently he invented the concept of the "ex-President", and made the most of it. As a self-proclaimed Great Depression aficionado, this is all the more surprising - I thought that all he ever did was cause the Great Depression. That's a heckuva way to become "Most Admired".
The real story, to the extent it can ever be known, is, as they say, more complicated. Certainly, the notion that Mr. Hoover was indolent, ignorant, or incompetent, or a tool of Wall Street, is categorically false. In fact, the man was hypercompetent, decisive, dynamic, and, if anything, "progressive". The "Wonder Boy" label was derisively applied courtesy Calvin Coolidge, who didn't always appreciate Hoover's peripatetic and reformist nature. Moreover, FDR's 1932 campaign accused him of "leading the country down the path to socialism" with his public works initiatives (this calls to mind Zhou Enlai's quip to Henry Kissinger in 1972 that it was "too early to say" what the consequences were of the French Revolution!). Indeed, New Deal "Brain Trusters" admitted that the New Deal was little more than a continuation of Hoover's initiatives.
Furthermore, in marked contrast to our "Wonder Boy" of the moment, Herbert Hoover had real accomplishments on his resume when he entered the White House. A genius engineer, he made a fortune in private enterprise, before rising to the Oval Office on the strength of his handling of the Mississippi River flood disaster of 1927 - not a surprising feat given his bravura performance as coordinator of famine relief efforts both in western Europe during World War I, and Russia in the 1920s, which accomplishments earned him worldwide acclaim as a humanitarian. Clearly, this man was no kind of "accidental" president.
And so, this "Master of the Universe", if ever there was one, was magnificently ill-suited to practice the art of "masterful inaction" (to borrow a phrase from Paul Johnson). Thus the financial panic of 1929 descended into the greatest depression in the history of modern economies. His confusing and contradictory panoply of initiatives (public works, or fiscal tight-fistedness; lower taxes, or Smoot-Hawley) is frighteningly reminiscent of the hyperactivity we see in Washington today. Alas, the lesson of Katrina is: Washington better do something. The lesson of economic history is: it's probably better if Washington does nothing.
Economist Thomas Sowell, in his IBD column yesterday, warns against placing thy faith in princes. Economies have been plagued since time immemorial by the folly of the expert: the notion that because one is spectacularly knowledgeable or skillful in some narrow pursuit, such person is expert in everything. I think Herbert Hoover believed - and not without good reason - that he could do anything, and that anything he touched would turn to gold. It always had! I also think that this is the essential conceit of the Obamessiah. His Will shall Triumph over the tides, over the terrorists, and over the economic affairs of billions. Because he wills it, the planet shall heal, and the economy too. I think he would be wise to recall the injunction of another president: "Government isn't the solution to our problems; government is the problem". Now is not the time to make government "cool again".