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In the 1930s, the Communists weren't the only ones saying we [communist appears]

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ought to snatch the wealth from the haves and give it to the have-nots. Bombastic

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Louisiana Democratic senator Huey P. Long shot to national prominence with the [Huey P. Long pictured]

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slogan, "Share our wealth." His vision was simple: he said we should limit the

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fortunes of the wealthy to a few million dollars. Then, we'd take the so-called [money taken from wealthy and given to masses]

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excess and redistribute it to the masses... kind of like Robin Hood, if Robin Hood

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was a bombastic Louisiana senator. Well, many people accused Huey of being a [Long dressed as Robin Hood]

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demagogue, which is a politician who appeals to the masses by tapping into [demagogue definition]

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their base desires and prejudices rather than by proposing policies that actually

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make sense. Well, demagogue or not, Huey definitely had popular appeal. Tons of

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poverty-stricken Americans ate up his Robin Hood-y message and went crazy for [Americans "eat up" Long's rhetoric]

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his folksy charm. Some of Huey's memorable shtick included comparing the

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Depression-era economy to a Louisiana barbecue. He asked, "How many men ever went [Long uses BBQ analogy]

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a barbecue and would let one man take off the table what's intended for

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nine-tenths of the people to eat? The only way you'll ever be able to feed the

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balance of the people is to make that man come back and bring back some of

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that grub that he ain't got no business with." Great... now we're hungry. Bring the

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potato salad. All right, Huey continually went off on mega-rich guys like Morgan,

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Rockefeller, and Mellon, saying they'd taken away more than their share. Well, [rich men are upset]

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what were these fat cats going to do with all that money? asked Huey. Basically, he

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painted the rich like Smaug sitting on his golden hoard, and Huey claimed to know

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how to slay the dragon... and he wasn't talking about tickling them to death. Well, these [Long paints a dragon]

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days most would agree that Huey's plan was wildly unrealistic. That, of course,

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didn't stop him from becoming wildly popular. America has always liked to play

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pretend. By 1935, Long claimed that more than 7.5 million Americans subscribed to the [Long pushes popular but unrealistic ideas]

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mailing list of the 27,000 Share Our Wealth clubs scattered throughout the

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country. Long, who criticized the New Deal as too conservative, pondered an independent

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run for the White House in 1936, and Democratic polls indicated he might win [Long considers running for president]

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as many as three or four million votes, potentially costing President Roosevelt [election poll results]

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his re-election. Well, the thought of losing because a guy who used barbecue

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metaphors made FDR pretty steamed. Roosevelt even called Huey one of the [steam from FDR's ear]

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two most dangerous men in the country. Some even feared that Huey Long's wild

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popularity made him a likely candidate to become an American fascist dictator. [Long called a potential dictator]

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Yeah, we kid you not. As it turned out, the most dangerous man in America was in

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danger himself. His left populist challenge to Roosevelt ended on [Long pictured]

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September 8, 1935 when he was assassinated inside the Louisiana State

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Capitol by the son-in-law of a local political enemy. Stick a fork in him [Long assassinated]

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there, he's done. What? No more barbecue metaphors? [picture of fork]

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