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Chapter 1: Where's the Beef?
Chapter 1: Where's the Beef?
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HT: Listen Clinton, I've heard enough of this OPA talk for a lifetime. Controls will come back in August and that'll be that. They'll be phased out soon enough. There's no need to panic over it. We've fought this fight before and we've lost. The last thing we need before the election is another fight over the OPA, I'm so damn tired of this right now.
CA: But look at this! Farmers are just dumping meat into the market right now, what will be left on the 20th?
HT: There's always meat Clinton. No farmer worth his salt would sell all their meat at once. It was true in Missouri. Its true across the country.
CA: With price controls back no one will sell, the prices are too damn low, so they'll sell all they can when the prices are up. Then it'll all disappear.
HT: A meat eating fairy? Magically stopping the meat? That's my justification for wading into the mud over price controls?
CA: Harry, please. I'm not asking you to meddle in the OPA's prices, I'm asking you to let me sit down with some folks and try to stabilize the market.
HT: Clinton you're Secretary of Agriculture, this isn't only your territory. I've already got a Commerce Secretary who wants to run the State Department. I can't…
CA: This isn't a coup Harry. Its just some soft gloves trying to keep a drop off from happening.
HT: A drop off I don't even know exists.
CA: Tell you what. I'll throw together a report then we'll talk.
HT: Fine. You do that Clinton then we'll see how real this drop off is.
CA: Thanks.
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"I uh, remember that conversation. Clinton came to me and told me about how farmers were dumping meat before the deadline and how there'd be a shortage once the OPA took charge again. He told me all about that so I told him to get together something we could do about it. And of course Clinton did, good man that he was, and I sent him to do his thing.
"Yeah, it did get some heat in the papers. We'd just promised to free up the markets and here we were meddling and cajoling farmers into selling their goods for a lower price then they could be. But I'll be damned if getting red meat has ever made a working man angry."
- Interview with Former President Harry Truman about Clinton Anderson following the laters death in a car accident in 1957
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"As Truman slouched towards the midterms his advisors advised him to stay off the campaign trail. Contrary to some assumptions Truman was not universally unpopular, most people agreed with the broad ideals of liberalism and very few believed that the country was heading for disaster. However the president was tainted by defeat after defeat. His efforts to protect price controls were fruitless, though the OPA was renewed everyone saw it would not last much longer. His plans for universal healthcare, universal military training and universal employment had all been shot down easily by Congress. His handling of wage issues and labor was seen as uneven and pleased nobody. Truman's foreign policy had been decently received, but it was not stellar enough to improve his image. The 1946 elections looked poor already for the liberal democrats that Truman had tirelessly courted since his inauguration, and he still faced opposition from the most prominent liberal of them all, Henry Wallace."
- "Harry Truman: At Home", Alonzo Hamby
_____
HT: Listen Clinton, I've heard enough of this OPA talk for a lifetime. Controls will come back in August and that'll be that. They'll be phased out soon enough. There's no need to panic over it. We've fought this fight before and we've lost. The last thing we need before the election is another fight over the OPA, I'm so damn tired of this right now.
CA: But look at this! Farmers are just dumping meat into the market right now, what will be left on the 20th?
HT: There's always meat Clinton. No farmer worth his salt would sell all their meat at once. It was true in Missouri. Its true across the country.
CA: With price controls back no one will sell, the prices are too damn low, so they'll sell all they can when the prices are up. Then it'll all disappear.
HT: A meat eating fairy? Magically stopping the meat? That's my justification for wading into the mud over price controls?
CA: Harry, please. I'm not asking you to meddle in the OPA's prices, I'm asking you to let me sit down with some folks and try to stabilize the market.
HT: Clinton you're Secretary of Agriculture, this isn't only your territory. I've already got a Commerce Secretary who wants to run the State Department. I can't…
CA: This isn't a coup Harry. Its just some soft gloves trying to keep a drop off from happening.
HT: A drop off I don't even know exists.
CA: Tell you what. I'll throw together a report then we'll talk.
HT: Fine. You do that Clinton then we'll see how real this drop off is.
CA: Thanks.
_____
"I uh, remember that conversation. Clinton came to me and told me about how farmers were dumping meat before the deadline and how there'd be a shortage once the OPA took charge again. He told me all about that so I told him to get together something we could do about it. And of course Clinton did, good man that he was, and I sent him to do his thing.
"Yeah, it did get some heat in the papers. We'd just promised to free up the markets and here we were meddling and cajoling farmers into selling their goods for a lower price then they could be. But I'll be damned if getting red meat has ever made a working man angry."
- Interview with Former President Harry Truman about Clinton Anderson following the laters death in a car accident in 1957
_____
"As Truman slouched towards the midterms his advisors advised him to stay off the campaign trail. Contrary to some assumptions Truman was not universally unpopular, most people agreed with the broad ideals of liberalism and very few believed that the country was heading for disaster. However the president was tainted by defeat after defeat. His efforts to protect price controls were fruitless, though the OPA was renewed everyone saw it would not last much longer. His plans for universal healthcare, universal military training and universal employment had all been shot down easily by Congress. His handling of wage issues and labor was seen as uneven and pleased nobody. Truman's foreign policy had been decently received, but it was not stellar enough to improve his image. The 1946 elections looked poor already for the liberal democrats that Truman had tirelessly courted since his inauguration, and he still faced opposition from the most prominent liberal of them all, Henry Wallace."
- "Harry Truman: At Home", Alonzo Hamby
- King of the Uzbeks
- Word Count: 590