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Anti-New Deal Book Is GOP's New Bible

Republicans flock to The Forgotten Man in fight over stimulus

By Gabriel Winant, Newser User

Posted Apr 21, 2009 10:19 AM CDT

(Newser) – For the Republican Party, looking for any kind of traction for its opposition to President Obama’s stimulus spending, anti-New Deal book The Forgotten Man is a godsend, Politico reports. Author Amity Shlaes suggests, in what some call revisionist history, that FDR’s plan, pushed by government bureaucrats on a tottering economy, worsened the Great Depression. “Republicans are gobbling it up,” says an aide to Rep. Eric Cantor.

Rep. Steve King, who calls the book “definitive,” says, “Today we have a president who believes that the New Deal was a good deal, and would have been a far better deal if FDR would have spent a lot more money.” Adds Shlaes, a columnist for Bloomberg, “That’s why it’s called The Forgotten Man, not The Misspent Money— it’s about the people. The book is specifically about policy agony—when you do policy and you know that the policy that you’re doing is not optimal.”

[Images (3)]

[Quotes (2)]

In this 1933 file photo, President Franklin D. Roosevelt is shown signing the Wagner Unemployment Bill at the White House. (AP Photo)

This 1936 file photo Works Progress Administration (WPA) workers build a new farm-to-market road along Knob Creek in Tennessee. (AP Photo)

The Forgotten Man, by Amity Shlaes (amityshlaes.com)

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Definitive isn’t the word I would use. I just thought, ‘Maybe there’s more to the story, and if I find more, I’ll try to capture that in the book.' - Amity Shlaes

It’s discussed and it’s decided that we are going to help this individual or corporation out, we propose a law, and guess what, it’s the forgotten man today who always pays for someone else’s mistake.
- Rep. Spencer Bachus, R-Ala.

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Anti-New Deal Book Is GOP's New Bible