The New Deal ended the Great Depression. The 80's and 90's saw the availability of capital for the masses through credit which created an artificial boom and wasteful demand.
The new deal was enacted from 33 to 35? something like that. The unemployment rates and stock market didn't return to pre-crash levels until the 50's. Glass-Steagall reigned in our reckless banking practices that brought about the depression. This was a good move to ensure it didn't happen again but he thought Keynes was right and kept us in a depression his entire 3 terms. Ending WWII and our military complex brought the economy back. The country as a whole was more geared toward production and exports instead of service and consumption as we are now.
FDR is the favorite of the leftist revisionists. He expanded executive powers like no one before or after until Bush/Obama. It was so bad congress had to enact a "we can't have another FDR" amendment.
If we didn't ignore history we would point to the leverage trading causing the 1907 panic (50% of dow, now that's a crash). Bucket shop laws were enacted to stop this practice. The depression of 20' was handled by cutting taxes and spending and was over in a year. The crash of 29' was caused by savings and loans conspiring with investment banks and manipulating an artificial bubble. Glass-Steagal was enacted to stop this sort of gambling and manipulation.
Fast forward to Clinton's term and the prevalent greed of the times. GS was repealed and credit default swaps (read about bucket shops from the 1900's) became all the rage. People got rich as our banks once again manipulated the market and here we are today.
Only Clintons and Newts think allowing S and Ls who are backed by FDIC to leverage our savings 40 to 1 could be a good thing. FDR would have fixed this (albeit with huge government expansion), Obama comes out with Dodd-Frank that does nothing to stop this. So you can praise FDR for at least recognizing a problem.
You've accused me of having an irrational hate for the left because I think 20 years of depression is not a good track record. You say it was the best time in our country for upward mobility, you say FDR ended the depression. I'm the irrational one....
FDR resided over the slowest recovery period in our history, Obama has resided over the second slowest. You would have to be irrational to not admit this. Ever, all time in the history of the US economy. Nobody's track record on the economy is worse than these two. Both were Keynesians. Both are regarded by the left as two of the all time greats.
Go ahead and ignore and skew history, it's all you got.
Edit: and what Dr. Kynes said