New Deal Debate - Can someone straighten this out?

[Mesogen]

There is a debate of sorts going on between Paul Krugman and Amity Shales in their columns in the WSJ and the NYT.

Here are some links.

This is where I saw this debate first:
http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/amity-shlaes-right-wing-hack

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002760.html
FDR Was a Great Leader, But His Economic Plan Isn't One to Follow

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/08/new-deal-economics/
New Deal economics

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/19/amity-shlaes-strikes-again/
Amity Shlaes strikes again

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/29/changes-in-money-wages-and-amity-shlaes/
Changes in money-wages and Amity Shlaes


The thing is, even after reading these columns, I still can't figure out who's right.

I see a lot of dishonest debate tactics being used in all of the columns and that usually tells me that either the speaker doesn't know what they are talking about or they are lying.

Can anyone help straighten out these arguments?

Thanks.

[theoakman]

don't lose yourself in the details and manipulation.

Close the blogs, and sit back and look at it from an objective point a view.

The New Deal started in 1933. The depression lasted into the early 40s. By the time we came out of the depression, most New Deal programs were scrapped. The New Deal did nothing to get us out of the depression.

The only thing that made the great depression so great was the fact that people were starving? Why were they starving? They destroyed all the crops and slaughtered all the livestock with the New Deal program known as the AAA. Of course people couldn't eat. We burned the food.

There were plenty of economic collapses in this country in it's first 100 years of existence. Each time, the government stayed out of the way and the recovery came sooner rather than later. That's why you don't read about "great depressions" in the 1800s. There were none, and for good reason. Enter the fed, 20 years later, you have a great depression and two presidents who tried to "stop the pain". The only crash they ever tried to fix ended in the longest depression.

There is plenty of historical evidence to suggest that when the government gets out of the way, a fast recovery follows. There is no historical evidence to prove that the government ever put us on the road to recovery.

[sdczen]

There has been many works proving that the 'new deal' did not bring us out of the depression. It certainly did make things much worse by turning a recession into a depression and extending until after WWII.

Krugman is a hack at best, his nobel prize is worth about as much as Al Gore's......Not much.