Two Depression-battered nations confronted destiny in 1932, going to the polls in their own way to anoint new leaders, to rescue their people from starvation and hopelessness. America would elect a Congress and a presidentāebullient aristocrat Franklin Roosevelt or tarnished āWonder Boyā Herbert Hoover. Decadent, divided Weimar Germany faced two rounds of bloody Reichstag elections and two presidential contestsādoddering reactionary Paul von Hindenburg against rising radical hate-monger Adolf Hitler.
The outcome seemed foreordainedāunstoppable forces advancing upon crumbled, disoriented societies. A merciless Great Depression brought greaterāperhaps hopeful, perhaps deadlyātransformation: FDRās New Deal and Hitlerās Third Reich.
But neither outcome was inevitable.
Readers enter the fray through David Pietruszaās page-turning account: Rooseveltās fellow Democrats may yet halt him at a deadlocked convention. 1928ās Democratic nominee, Al Smith, harbors a grudge against his one-time protege. Press baron William Randolph Hearst lays his own plans to block Rooseveltās ascent to the White House. FDRās politically-inspired juggling of a New York City scandal threatens his juggernaut. In Germany, the Nazis surge at the polls but twice fall short of Reichstag majorities. Hitler, tasting power after a lifetime of failure and obscurity, falls to Hindenburg for the presidencyāalso twice within the year. Cabals and counter-cabals plot. Secrets of love and suicide haunt Hitler.
Yet guile and ambition may yet still prevail.
1932ās breathtaking narrative covers two epic stories that possess haunting parallels to todayās crisis-filled vortex. It is an all-too-human tale of scapegoats and panaceas, class warfare and racial politics, of a seemingly bottomless depression, of massive unemployment and hardship, of unprecedented public works/infrastructure programs, of business stimulus programs and damaging allegations of political cronyism, of waves of bank failures and of mortgages foreclosed, of Washington bonus marches and Berlin street fights, of once-solid financial empires collapsing seemingly overnight, of rapidly shifting social mores, and of mountains of irresponsible international debt threatening to crash not just mere nations but the entire global economy.
It is the tale of spell-binding leaders versus bland businessmen and out-of-touch upper-class elites and of two nations inching to safety but lurching toward disaster. It is 1932ās nightmareāwith lessons for today.
This book title, 1932 (The Rise of Hitler and FDR-Two Tales of Politics, Betrayal, and Unlikely Destiny), ISBN: 9781493009442, by David Pietrusza, published by Lyons Press (September 1, 2016) is available in paperback. Our minimum order quantity is 25 copies. All standard bulk book orders ship FREE in the continental USA and delivered in 4-10 business days.
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