Brave Old World

While catching up on Ed Driscoll's ridiculously-prolific posting from over the weekend, I ran across this gem from CBS's Harry Smith, who asked in a guest-host stint on Sunday, "What about, say, something like a new WPA?"

I'm still waiting for somebody to notice that this suggestion, a favorite of the FDR Cargo Cultists, essentially calls for the government to break out of the recession by funding a lot of... manual labor.

Yeah, that's a great solution for a 21st Century economy. Let's get everybody out there digging some new ditches! That'll show the Chinese!

Hell, even in the Thirties it was a dumb idea. Mediot conventional-wisdom drones like Harry Smith haven't read enough history to know that outside of D.C., "WPA" was universally known at the time to stand for "We Piddle Around." Even in the midst of the Depression, Americans were smart enough to understand that make-work government jobs were good for a get-by paycheck, but not much else.