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    Ken Burns and the Myth of Theodore Roosevelt

    By Michael Wolraich on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 10:42am | Arts & Entertainment

    The Roosevelts, a new PBS documentary by director Ken Burns, presents President Theodore Roosevelt as a political superhero. In photo after photo, Burns’s famous pan-and-zoom effect magnifies Roosevelt’s flashing teeth and upraised fist. The reverential narrator hails his fighting spirit and credits him with transforming the role of American government through sheer willpower. “I attack,” an actor blusters, imitating Roosevelt’s patrician cadence, “I attack iniquities.”

    Though exciting to watch, Burns’s cinematic homage muddles the history. Roosevelt was a great president and brilliant politician, but he was not the progressive visionary and fearless warrior that Burns lionizes. He governed as a pragmatic centrist and a mediator who preferred backroom deal-making to open warfare. At the time, many of his progressive contemporaries criticized him for excessive caution. The “I attack” quote, for example, came from a 1915 interview in which Roosevelt defended himself from accusations that he had been too conciliatory.

    Read the full article at New York Magazine's culture website, Vulture.com

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    Comments

    I was hoping to hear from you on this.  I've been watching the Ken Burns mini-series on the Roosevelts and, while I love Ken Burns' technique and the sweep of his narrative, I always get the impression he is merely doing a Greatest Hits collection of History.   He covers all the high and low points, but the filler in between is rarely of any depth and seldom reveals anything we didn't already know about the subject.   I still continue to watch with interest, however, because ... well, I love Greatest Hits as much as the next guy, and Ken Burns gets some wonderful old film clips and blends everything together to make a delicious historical stew... just don't look too closely at the meat of his story.  LOL


    by MrSmith1 on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 11:01am

    Well put, Smith. To be fare to Burns, this program is more about the personal development of the Roosevelts than their political record, but having written about it the era so recently, I found it disturbing to watch Burns gloss over the complexity of TR and the world he inhabited.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 3:12pm

    Great piece! But we're you yelling boo or boo-urns?


    by Michael Maiello on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 3:16pm

    TOS warning. Bad punnery.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 5:35pm

    But great Simpsons referencing!


    by Michael Maiello on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 7:06pm

    Upon appeal, I'll rescind the warning, but I'm citing you for contempt-of-blog for using an obscure cultural reference without a link.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 8:44pm

    I am picking up parts of the Burns recent PBS epic.

    Most of the time I have the attention span of a horny seventh grade boy.

    I read your link and probably five other links concerning this nonfiction historical TV show.

    How to define nonfiction is not an easy task.

    Most of our 'history' is fiction anyway. I mean if there are almost as many histories of Lincoln in this country as histories of THE CHRIST, how many of those histories are silly 'cherry tree' fables?

    The prehistory of the Presidential Family that ran the Executive Branch of this country for 19 years of the first 45 years of the Twentieth Century is more than just fascinating.

    I have written before, many times, about my belief in the progress of this nation over the last 250 years or so and I have oftimes underlined the sins of this nation.

    But I will say this.

    Without Lincoln and even Grant (whom I believe had a better effect upon our nation's future than most history books acknowledge), without Teddy and Wilson we would never have been introduced to FDR (my personal hero who was not without sin, otherwise how could all those repubs hate him so much?).

    Teddy was, like my youngest brother, an 'accident'.

    New York biz bastards wished to get rid of Teddy and that is how he became VP under a real big biz repub in the olden days.

    I would not apologize for the sins of Teddy than I would the sins of Lincoln.

    Life is complicated but:

    Anti-Trust statutes were initiated.

    A national park system was created.

    Some labor initiatives were instituted.

    He initiated the Federal Meat Inspection Act of 1906.

    He adopted his orphan niece, Eleanor Roosevelt. (To me anyway, the single greatest American woman in the history of this nation)

    These new approaches to governmental action only touch upon what Teddy accomplished.

    Teddy became Assistant Secretary of the Navy. FDR topped that by BEING Secretary of the Navy.

    Both Roosevelts became Governor of NY.

    Teddy of course became VP, FDR just ran on the Dem ticket and lost. Hahahah

    But FDR built upon the reforms of Wilson with less racist overtones of course.

    These Roosevelts accomplished more than all the presidents who preceded them except for my God, Lincoln.

    Again, without Teddy and without Wilson we would not have had FDR.

    And without FDR we would not have had Ike (the only modern repub I adore).

    And without FDR we would not have had LBJ who continued upon Franklin's progressive values.

    Go back to 1901 and tell me what you would do?

     

     


    by Richard Day on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 4:08pm

    TR was a great president, and he accomplished a great deal, but his legislative achievements don't compare to those of Wilson, FDR, and LBJ. That's not all his fault--those guys had much friendlier congresses. But I think he would have accomplished more if he had fought harder against opponents in his own party.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 5:33pm

    a


    by Richard Day on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 4:09pm

    I'm in Little Rock for the week long 57th Anniversary of the Little Rock Nine events. Oliver Stone presented the fifth episode of his "Untold History" Showtime series which included Central High as part of his analysis of Eisenhower. Stone judges Ike as doing much to create the Military-industrial Complex that Eisenhower later lamented.Ike and the Dulles Brothers were an imperial trio. In part of his comments after the showing in response, to a question, Stone  noted that Ken Burns offered a more positive view of historical events and did not go below the surface. The United States was viewed in an always positive light.


    by rmrd0000 on Sat, 09/20/2014 - 10:03pm

    It's much more fun to watch America glorified


    by Michael Wolraich on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 5:29pm

    Speaker Cannon  Boehner remarked, “Roosevelt Obama, business found, had a bark that was considerably worse than his bite, although often his bark was annoying enough

    There, fixed it for you...(sorry 'bout the O/T).  Wider point, Oscar Wilde had it right "hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue".

    Which is to say that the myth is not without its real value, even as it misstates the actual events.

     


    by jollyroger on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 1:51am

    I reject the substitution. Obama does not bark or bite.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 5:26pm

    Ouch!


    by jollyroger on Mon, 09/22/2014 - 8:36am

    When he was in office, Teddy was only moderately progressive, but that counts for something. His platform in 1912 was progressive as hell(I had read some stuff about it before watching the Burns series).


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 8:19am

    In my book, I argue that TR's incrementalism was less effective at creating change than the uncompromising tactics of Sen. Bob La Follette and other Republican rebels. TR not only failed to appreciate the value of radical politics but occasionally undermined progressive allies, some of whom he actively disliked.

    That does not mean that his presidency didn't count for anything. It had a very positive and important effect on the progressive movement, as did his radical turn in 1912. It was just not as effective as it might have been.

    That said, my position is controversial, and I would not taken Burns to task for failing to share it. Had he lauded TR for his pragmatism and praised the compromises, it would have been good history. The problem is that he presented TR as an ideological warrior in the White House, which he was not.


    by Michael Wolraich on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 5:21pm

    This series definitely glosses over the ugly stuff. They admit that the conquest of the Philippines was "brutal" but they provide no details about the atrocities. Teddy's military actions in Honduras and Cuba aren't mentioned(I don't mean San Juan Hill; I mean Teddy sending troops into Cuba when he was president).

      Unless I missed something(I could have), the internment of Japanese-Americans was barely mentioned. The greatest stain on FDR's career, the fire bombing of Tokyo on March 9-10, 1945, was left out.


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 09/21/2014 - 8:35am

    I CANNOT BLOG HERE.

    PLEASE TELL ME WHY?

    I WORK FOR TWO WEEKS ON THIS DAMN BLOG AND I GET A BUNCH OF WINDOWS TELLING ME I CANNOT BLOG.

    WHY?


    by Richard Day on Thu, 09/25/2014 - 4:05pm

    I have to take your observations on Theodore Roosevelt and your critique of Ken Burns with a grain of salt, after just having picked up a copy of "Unreasonable Men/Theodore Roosevelt and the Republican  Rebels Who Created Progressive Politics" and noted in the first 10 minutes of reading your book that you got Mr. Roosevelt's date of death wrong (p. 257).  He died January 6, 1919 ... not January 5, 1920.  Facts are important ... sometimes as important as interpretations.


    by David Klinger (not verified) on Wed, 10/08/2014 - 5:21pm

    Thank you, Mr. Klinger. I very much appreciate your correction of this embarrassing error. Both I and my editors made an effort to double-check all the dates, but obviously, we missed an important one.

    I do hope that you'll read the book, which provides much more detail about TR's pragmatic approach to politics. I believe the weight of evidence will persuade you of the position I took in this article.


    by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 10/10/2014 - 12:41am