Former vice-President and Presidential Candidate for the Progressive Party, Henry A. Wallace laid out the situation in a radio address, part of the radio series Pro and Con on July 29, 1949.

Among the many things he crammed into fifteen minutes, he said:

Henry Wallace: “It is no answer to say that savings are high. The truth is that one-third of American families have no savings. And that most of the savings are in the hands of the top 10%. The wealthy 10% can’t buy all the products of our farms and factories. That is why there are 3 million fewer people working this summer than last summer. That is why farmers are making 1/10th less money. That is why business failures have doubled in less than a year. The President tells us the decline in industrial production has only been moderate. And as I look at those figures I see that the decline in the last seven months is as great as the decline in the first seven months of the 1929-1930 bust.

Wallace was acutely aware of what the problem was. As Secretary of Agriculture prior to his vice-Presidency, he oversaw many of the New Deal Recovery programs take shape to help put the country back on its feet. Clearly, in those 60+ years, not much has changed. Well, the stakes, the greed, the corruption and the incompetence have reached new highs. But the bottom line hasn't.

And that's where the insanity takes over.