Spring Break
'Fireside Chats' to YouTube, the public needs reassurance
Briana Monasky
Issue date: 11/19/08 Section: Opinion
Everything is cyclical. Or at least it seems that way in what we wear, what we drive and whom we elect for the highest office.
I keep on coming back to those Fireside Chats, a series of 30 informative and informal speeches Franklin Delano Roosevelt began in the beginning of his term. In 1933, the world was in shambles, the economy was right there with it, and people were panicking over it.
Sound familiar? It should.
Listening to the first one, entitled 'On the Banking Crisis,' showed parallels of Obama's charismatic style of leadership, like a daddy that sits his children down to calm them about something they don't quite understand.
"We had a bad banking situation," Roosevelt said. "Some of our bankers had shown themselves either incompetent or dishonest in their handling of the people's funds. They had used the money entrusted to them in speculations and unwise loans."
The first chat alone broke down how deposits to a bank actually work, that they are merely investments into larger things, and that the panic withdrawals were one of the reasons the banks collapsed in the first place.
The way Roosevelt calmed the nation worked in 1933 and all the way through 29 other Fireside Chats. Here we are in 2008 with a situation quite similar, with even our Big Three automakers looking dismally close to ending their reign as American auto kings.
Are these fireside chats applicable to our nation now? Will President-Elect Obama bring back this retro form of reassurance?
Obama announced Friday that his radio addresses would appear on to YouTube.com starting Jan. 20.
Every president has some form of a weekly radio address to the nation. I've never heard them. What station are they playing it on?
The answer is White House radio. The addresses are recorded in the Cabinet Room, just feet from the Oval Office, according to the White House's website.
Obama seems to be the first to try to reach the nation with his weekly addresses, certainly the first to enable his words to end up embedded on a Myspace page.
It's like we're all in this together. This nation is ours. The problems surrounding us in this troubled time apply to all of us. And we all have a hand in making it better.
President Roosevelt ended his first chat remarking, "It is your problem no less than it is mine. Together we cannot fail."
Now what will Obama say?
Briana Monasky can be reached at bmonasky@statehornet.com
I keep on coming back to those Fireside Chats, a series of 30 informative and informal speeches Franklin Delano Roosevelt began in the beginning of his term. In 1933, the world was in shambles, the economy was right there with it, and people were panicking over it.
Sound familiar? It should.
Listening to the first one, entitled 'On the Banking Crisis,' showed parallels of Obama's charismatic style of leadership, like a daddy that sits his children down to calm them about something they don't quite understand.
"We had a bad banking situation," Roosevelt said. "Some of our bankers had shown themselves either incompetent or dishonest in their handling of the people's funds. They had used the money entrusted to them in speculations and unwise loans."
The first chat alone broke down how deposits to a bank actually work, that they are merely investments into larger things, and that the panic withdrawals were one of the reasons the banks collapsed in the first place.
The way Roosevelt calmed the nation worked in 1933 and all the way through 29 other Fireside Chats. Here we are in 2008 with a situation quite similar, with even our Big Three automakers looking dismally close to ending their reign as American auto kings.
Are these fireside chats applicable to our nation now? Will President-Elect Obama bring back this retro form of reassurance?
Obama announced Friday that his radio addresses would appear on to YouTube.com starting Jan. 20.
Every president has some form of a weekly radio address to the nation. I've never heard them. What station are they playing it on?
The answer is White House radio. The addresses are recorded in the Cabinet Room, just feet from the Oval Office, according to the White House's website.
Obama seems to be the first to try to reach the nation with his weekly addresses, certainly the first to enable his words to end up embedded on a Myspace page.
It's like we're all in this together. This nation is ours. The problems surrounding us in this troubled time apply to all of us. And we all have a hand in making it better.
President Roosevelt ended his first chat remarking, "It is your problem no less than it is mine. Together we cannot fail."
Now what will Obama say?
Briana Monasky can be reached at bmonasky@statehornet.com
Viewing Comments 1 - 2 of 2
Meghan McNamara
posted 11/19/08 @ 10:23 AM PST
insightful as always-- especially for a girl who prefers entertainment news over politics :). i think you've joined the political news side, my dear, despite your greatest attempts not to. (Continued…)
Robert
posted 11/25/08 @ 11:05 AM PST
I think Obama's plan to speak directly to the nation on a regular basis is a fantastic idea. Perhaps now more than any time since the Great Depression, the nation needs reassurance and strong leadership--and President-Elect Obama is off to a good start. (Continued…)
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