Illuminating.

Timely.

Eminently readable.

I read it because it's one of the books our new president is reading because, you know, our new president reads.

From the start, I was learning. There were many details of the Depression of which I was unaware. It was troubling how many of them mirrored today's headlines. But do the solutions attempted during the Depression have any applicability to today's circumstances?

Alter makes the argument that the key to the New Deal was the persona of the newly elected president and his willingness to basically just keep throwing darts at the dart board. According to Alter, Roosevelt didn't have so much a vision regarding what to do as a drive to simply do something. The appearance of activity went a long way in creating optimism.

Alter creates a revealing, well-balanced portrait of FDR. While his focus is the first 100 days of FDR's presidency, he provides plenty of lead in and follow up which gives the reader a solid overview of the entire era and a great deal of detail about the defining moment. ( )

Yes, this one one of those books Obama reported reading not long after getting elected: The Defining Moment, Jonathan Alter's account of FDR's first hundred days in office. A fabulous topic, and timely to boot...but though the book provides some welcome perspective on the current economic crisis, it's not a great read.

Alter hails from Newsweek and this tome often feels like a bunch of semi-glib magazine pieces strung together. The endings of chapters are often eye-rollingly awful: "Some new idea of how to respond to the Depression was slouching toward Washington to be born." Way to make FDR sound oddly ominous, Mr. Alter!

When Roosevelt took office, unemployment was at 25%, 2/3 of the banks were closed, and newspapers were openly urging the new president to assume dictatorial powers. He declined, and instead improvised his way out of the crisis. Critics called FDR a man of no fixed principle, but Roosevelt sold himself as a man of great "flexibility," and Alter accepts this term. FDR was, in fact, so elusive a personality that Alter has trouble making him a vivid character. The only fully fleshed person in these pages is Eleanor Roosevelt -- I could easily have read another 100 pages about the First Lady and her friend(/lover?) Lorena Hikock.

This book (published in 2006) was clearly written as a rebuttal to the Republicans who wanted to hand Social Security to the idiots on Wall Street. Alter did not want to see Roosevelt's greatest program destroyed. Amazing to see that the GOP is now claiming that FDR caused the Depression. They would never be able to get away with such nonsense if Americans only read more history.

An important book to read right now. The good years of the 1950s and 60s were built upon the foundation laid by FDR. Few people realize how close America came to complete collapse in 1933, or how crucial FDR's actions were in saving the capitalist system. ( )

The history of the U.S. is at another defining moment, as a new President prepares to take office who has the potential to be as transformative a leader as Lincoln or FDR. That is one reason I'm reading books about both FDR and Lincoln, to see what lessons their experiences provide us in another moment of national crisis.

Alter is a senior editor at Newsweek and analyst for NBC news. He has put together an excellent work here that concentrates on the first 100 days of FDR's presidency. He does cover Roosevelt's life before the inaugaration, briefly, but with an emphasis on traits that helped FDR be probably the only man in the running who could have made things better to any real extent.

Alter emphasizes some of the same things as others, including the effect the polio had in deepening Roosevelt's determination and compassion for others. Some things he talks about are not emphasized much in other bios, such as the attempted assassination in Miami in February 1932. Roosevelt was not injured, but Chicago mayor Anton Cermak was and eventually died of his wounds. At some point Cermak was put into the car next to Roosevelt who held and encouraged him until they reached the hospital. It had a galvanizing effect on public opinion of Roosevelt, who had been seen as rather weak and vacillating prior to this. Nevertheless, it was not an easy campaign and he almost did not get the nomination.

One of the other big surprises is that Roosevelt was at first fairly conventional, determined to cut government spending and raise taxes in order to improve the economy... the things almost everyone in both parties were saying to do. He didn't have strongly held convictions on what to do, and some of the legislation of that first 100 days were cobbled together at the last minute and wererather a hodgepodge of ideas. FDR's genius was in part a willingness to try anything and see what worked and what didn't, a conviction that action of any kind was better than non-action. That, coupled with his genius for communicating, helped people recover their belief that things would get better, which by itself helped make things better.

Alter's book is well-written, and incredibly well-researched. His bibliography is a masterpiece, and includes not only books, but document collections, interviews, and newspapers and magazines. He wrote this book as much as possible from primary materials, and found some resources in archives that haven't previously been used in works on FDR. Excellent and recommended book, with, in my opinion, good lessons for Obama.. ( )

This story of the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his first hundred days in office beginning in March 1933 seems more than appropriate as an historic inauguration occurs in about ten days.

Many pundits have compared Obama to Lincoln, but Alter draws many more parallels to FDR. First of all, he succeeded an unpopular president as the country was on the edge of a serious downturn, which would come to be known as “The Great Depression.” FDR was unlike any previous president in many ways. Some called him a traitor to his class because of all the social programs he started.

Hoover raised taxes and cut spending, which helped propel the nation deeper into the economic morass. FDR brought a message of hope and change to desperately poor and hungry people. He was also the first to address the nation in a casual, conversational manner in his “Fireside Chats” beginning almost immediately after his inauguration. The text of that chat, as well as his first inaugural address, are in appendices. The often quoted line, “the only thing we have nothing to fear, is fear itself – nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyses needed efforts to convert retreat into advance” (339). Considering the fear we have lived under for the last eight years, I can only hope the Obama administration will have the same attitude.

Also like Obama, FDR was “always willing to listen to someone smarter than he was tell him why his ideas were no good” (249). A president that does not hide his opinions and policies decisions will be a breath of fresh air after the smog of Bush 43. FDR also said, “It is common sense to take a method and try it: if it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something” (92-93). Refreshing when compared to a president unable to think of any mistakes, and who counts his greatest achievement as a failed attempt to privatize Social Security!

Alter’s style is smooth and eminently readable. His extensive quotes really bring FDR to life. One of my favorites is “Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement” (219).

FDR was the first to travel extensively by plane. Maybe Obama’s Blackberry is a close analogy.

Anyone who thinks the current economic crises is bad, should read this book and get a glimpse of what life was like in the US during the Depression. Today’s crisis doesn’t seem quite so bad, and not quite so hard to fix. Five stars.

--Jim, 1/19/08 ( )