Word: roosevelt
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...woman noted with pride. "My husband is working for the government." The despair that had hung over the land was lifted, replaced by a bustling sense of movement and activity, a renewed confidence in the future, a revived faith in democracy. "There is a mysterious cycle in human events," Roosevelt said when he accepted his party's nomination for a second term. "To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation has a rendezvous with destiny...
When Germany invaded Russia in 1941, Roosevelt once again defied prevailing opinion. To the isolationists, the invasion of Russia confirmed the wisdom of keeping America out of the war. America should rejoice, they argued, in watching two hated dictatorships bleed each other to death. Within the government, Roosevelt's military advisers argued that Russia had almost no chance of holding out. Still, Roosevelt insisted on including Russia in the lend-lease agreement. In the first year alone, America sent thousands of trucks, tanks, guns and bombers to Russia, along with enough food to keep Russian soldiers from starving, and enough...
...Roosevelt's critics were certain he would straitjacket the free-enterprise system once America began mobilizing for war. Through his first two terms, business had been driven by an almost primitive hostility to Roosevelt, viewing his support for the welfare state and organized labor as an act of betrayal of his class. Indeed, so angry were many Republican businessmen at Roosevelt that they refused even to say the President's name, referring to him simply as "that man in the White House." Yet, under Roosevelt's wartime leadership, the government entered into the most productive partnership with private enterprise...
Above all, Roosevelt possessed a magnificent sense of timing. He understood when to invoke the prestige of the presidency and when to hold it in reserve. He picked a first-class military team--General George Marshall, Admiral Ernest King, General Henry Arnold and Admiral William Leahy--and gave its members wide latitude to run the war. Yet at critical junctures he forced action, and almost all those actions had a salutary effect on the war. He personally made the hotly debated decision to invade North Africa; he decided to spend $2 billion on an experimental atom bomb; and he demanded...
Still, there were many days in the early years of the war when the situation looked bleak, when it seemed impossible that the Allies could overcome the lead the Axis powers enjoyed. Through those dark days, Roosevelt retained an imperturbable calm. To the endless wonder of his aides, he was able to relax and replenish his energies each night to face the struggles of the following day. Every evening he held a cocktail hour where the rule was that nothing could be said of politics or war; instead the conversation was deliberately turned to gossip, funny stories or reminiscences. Only...