This clip is from President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First Inauguration in 1933. It contains the famous line that has been recited over and over in history. Roosevelt’s optimism in 1933 was hard to come by. The nation was in the midst of the Great Depression. The nation was looking for leadership in a time of despair.
What is your assessment of the United States right now? What is your impression of the nation’s policies regarding social issues/the economy/foreign policy?
Politics Matters 
When FDR was inaugurated, he knew that he would be facing the country at one of it’s darkest hours and was prepared to give a strong speech to help his people feel more secure about their choice to elect him as president and give them hope that he would fight to end the depression. FDR kept his promises and helped fix the economy, right now I feel that politicians are making empty promises to fix the economy when they really only care about getting reelected. I also think the economy and foreign policy issues need work and should take precedence in policy making, but instead social works are being taken care of because that is what the uninformed people want to hear about. The politicians worry about social issues to get reelected when foreign policy and the economy are what needs work. FDR fixed what needed fixing and that is what America needs now.
FDR was president during one of the toughest periods in American history. What the country needed at that time was someone with FDRs enthusiasm. Today we have issues regarding race and immigration. Police brutality has been in the news a lot lately and their has been a lot of talk about putting cameras on police. A bill has passed that allows immigrants who have been in America for 5 years are able to become citizens.
The time when FDR was president he knew he had to do something to get the country excited. Our nation is in a different state then it was when FDR was in office. We are dealing with issues of immigration and race. The most important thing in the news is about the illegal immigrants who are able to become citizens and about police and the way things are done with them.
Right now, I am not happy to be apart of this country. You can say I am un American but my ancestors didn’t come from here, I would rather be in Italy or Poland. Our country’s stance on social issues like Anti- LGBT and anti abortion is awful. People don’t have freedom to chose, people are trying to pass obscene bills like, in Michigan giving EMT’s the right to tell LGBT that they wont help them and giving parental rights to rapists so that their victim cant have an abortion. I don’t like the way things are run, I think a lot of people are full of hate sometimes.
When FDR was president many things were different from now. We are still fighting over things like race, and immigration. many people have different stances on many things and can’t come to agree on things for example police brutality and how we have to change things. FDR was excited when he became president and wanted change.
We are still fighting the same issues, just in different ways. Our racial issues aren’t as settled as one would hope by now. There is still oppression and hostility in our midst from our country’s past racial issues. Immigration is all over the place. We are in trillions of dollars in debt and we have yet to try fix that. A lot of the people of this nation are too worried about everyone’s personal issues like someone’s sexual orientation for example. Or their religion. Like why cant we just accept and respect each other and move on? No, we have to sit and question everyone’s beliefs when we should be questioning how we’re going to fix our debt crisis and figure out a sensible immigration process. We’re too busy fighting over very important laws being passed simply because we don’t like the opposing party. We are also too busy worrying about helping other countries before ourselves. I understand helping our allies and bonds with others, but how about to try fixing ourselves first? We are so unstable as a country in so many tedious and stupid areas and its like everyone just tries to ignore it like our problems will work themselves out.
When FDR was president there was much fixing to be done to this country. He knew the tough job he had to do to try and restore it. Like many other people said, today our issues mostly include race and immigration. A lot of news has also been on about police brutality. I think politicians today are making a lot of empty promises to the people.
When FDR was elected, our country was in a devastated state and people had lost hope. The country needed a lot of fixing to be done and it needed someone who would most definitely take action and leadership, who had charisma and great enthusiasm, and most importantly who would unite the people, and FDR was able to do all of that. I do think that times are tough economically but not as bad as they were during the Great Depression. Although, I do think that we are in a modern age where the most predominant issues are the social ones. I honestly feel that our nation’s policies regarding these issues are not enough and divide the people more on those issues. I also think like others have mentioned, that politicians only make empty promises now and do not have the enthusiasm to fix our country. In order to fix these social, foreign, and economic problems, we need to have more people who share and hold the conviction and enthusiasm FDR wielded and maybe our policies would be more effective, and unite the country a little bit more.
The United States is in BIG BIG TROUBLE. People of my age will be paying for our Presidents mistakes for a long long time. He has put this country in a backwards position. He promised so much and failed across the board.
This country is going down and has been for a long time. We are paying for mistakes. We are not learning And fixing our mistakes we are just covering them up for a little make it someone else’s problems.
I think our nation needs to focus on our issues rather than giving money to other nations. There is a lot of work that needs to be done to make this country the superpower it once was and will be again. Once the economy bounces back, I am hopeful for the country as a whole to do exactly the same.
I think our nation needs to worry about ourselves for a little bit. It seems that everyone is not working together anymore. I really can’t remember the last time our nation was strong and everyone stood together. I hope that one day everyone will put their differences aside about politics and trust in the government to do their job.
Our nation needs to be more focus on people in America, many homeless people in America as well as in other countries.I do believe that we should take care of them by creating new jobs, to help them not to live off the streets. We need to learn to work together to make this world a better place without violence, being able to love one another like you love yourself. They always said the more minds the better.
My assessment of the U.S. right now would not be good. Our citizens cannot agree on domestic policies that include: gay marriage, immigration, and social rights equalities. Our nations economy has never fully recovered from the recession, yet the rich are still getting richer while the middle and lower classes remain stagnant. Our foreign policy does not seem to be successful from the publics perspective either.
FDR’s famous quote, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself” is exactly what the citizen’s of the US needed to hear in the 1930s. It was a time of depression and people needed some optimism. Today the US is facing many problems whether they be economically, socially, or having to do with foreign policy making. These issues include be are not limited to government overspending, pensions being threatened, gender, race, and marriage inequality, and war. For these issues to be solved citizens do need to remain optimistic and band together to diminish overspending and create a more peaceful and equal country.
My current assessment at the state of the U.S. is that things are starting to get slightly better. Things were quite rough for a lot of people for many years and the recent upswing in jobs has really helped to turn that around. While the jobs may not be as good, they are better than nothing. The government needs to stop bickering over some of the nonsense and start working together to make some more positive changes. In my opinion, much needs to be done in regards to education. It is probably the most important thing the nation needs to worry about, but it seems like the kids keeping losing more and more money and teachers are expected to do more with less, and that is a losing system.. Our foreign policy should be dropped, we need to worry about ourselves before we worry about everyone else. We also need to stop selling off our country to the Chinese. We are making progress, but we could be doing better still.
The U.S seems to get better but I don’t really know where we stand at the current moment. The past years have been really rough for the economy but hopefully we can build up from the past and move on. I hope the economy will get better someday so everyone can enjoy the greater things in life.
My assessment of the U.S. right now would be a slightly positive one. I think that things are looking up a little bit right now; I can remember some pretty tough times quite recently with the poor economy and other factors. I think that the nation’s recent foreign policy change was a poor one. That is just my opinion. Also, the nation’s policies with social issues could be better. I tend to be more right-winged in my ideologies, but I believe that certain issues like gay marriage should have been left alone. So, in the end, my assessment may have been a bit too positive. I think that the nation is doing better than in recent years, but we still have some improvements to make.
FDR was probably the only president to be elected during hardship and actually get the US out of devastation and make the country better.He did this by focusing on America, and creating new opportunities for people getting passed the Great Depression. Although we did not have another Great Depression, we still had a recession, that we still haven’t fully recovered from. Although the economy is getting better, there is still more to do. America overall needs to worry about fixing our country instead trying to help others, when they can barely help themselves.
FDR came into power during a time period when there was around 33% unemployed and the employed fought for an 8 hour work day. The New Deal does not compare to the welfare system he have now, also the population has increased therefore tax revenues increased but it is hard to fun a welfare program when there is a large body of part time workers and more retires and the youth out of work. FDR put people to work, be it a short period of public works, or a investment such FWP, all the work and infrastructure constructed during the New Deal laid the foundation for the economic during/after WWII. Nowadays ObamaCare is implemented adding more burden to the weak working force that is currently paying taxes. Foreign policy is a joke, Putin and China don’t even take us seriously, the EPA is concerned about the caribou, and unlike FDR, Truman was faced with a decision that i believe modern day politicians would refuse to make.
FDR cared about his people. He wanted the best for all of America. He made it through the hardship. I believe that as the years go by, each president cares less of us as a whole. Also, I think that they should be supporting our country and people with financial help instead on giving money away to other countries.
When FDR was president there was a lot of fixing to be done to this country. He knew the tough job he had to do to try and restore it. Like many other people said, today our issues mostly include race and immigration. A lot of news has also been on about police brutality. I think politicians today are making a lot of empty promises to the people.