Balancing Reality With Hope

Feb. 24, 2009— -- From the man who ran a successful presidential campaign on a message of hope has come a more sobering tone less than two months after taking office.

Amid daily market turmoil and concerns about unemployment and the banking industry, President Obama's team believes that tonight's prime-time address must balance grim reality with the can-do optimism he's known for.

But has Obama become too negative?

"We learned from the Great Depression that an inspiring leader is important, someone whose voice can shine through the darkness," said Amity Shlaes, author of "The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression."

The comparisons between Obama and President Franklin D. Roosevelt have come fast and furious lately, even though FDR undoubtedly presided over a country in much greater need of comfort.

"If you were to compare the two now, this very minute to then, the Great Depression was Katrina. This is a rainstorm," Shlaes said."

At the start of 1933, 25 percent of Americans were out of work compared with 8 percent today. In the 1930s, people were pulling funds out of banks. Huge numbers of Americans were going hungry and more of the country's elderly were living in poverty.

Americans awoke this morning to news that the world markets had tumbled after the U.S. stock market's latest dive, which pushed Wall Street to 12-year lows. While markets were expected to moderate today, Monday's news was a sign that investors weren't overly confident about Obama's $787 billion stimulus plan.

Obama has promised large banks that he won't let them fail. And he's said that he wants to halve the national debt by the end of his first term.

It's proving a tough task.