"In 1934, when William H. Woodin resigned because of poor health, Roosevelt appointed Henry Morgenthau Secretary of the Treasury (an act that enraged conservatives)............To protect the New Deal, in 1934, President Franklin D. Roosevelt asked Morgenthau to examine the taxes of William Randolph Hearst because FDR was "advised that Hearst was planning to use his newspapers to launch a major attack on the New Deal and its economic policies."[4] Treasury Secretary Morgenthau explained that he examined the taxes of William Randolph Hearst and actress Marion Davies and "advised FDR to mount a preemptive attack on both her and Hearst."[4][5] The Great Depression and its rampant unemployment were of primary focus for Morgenthau. And after almost two terms served by Roosevelt, Morgenthau assessed the federal effort to relieve economic conditions by proclaiming, "We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work....After eight years of this administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started...and an enormous debt to boot!"[6] Indeed, the unemployment rate for 1939 was higher than the unemployment rate for 1931, but lower than 1932.[7]" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Morgenthau,_Jr.
Obama is repeating a lot of mistakes made in history. He seems to have neither studied history nor asked advice from those who have. Bernanke, on the other hand, is supposed to be a student of the Great Depression era. It seems Obama has boxed him into thinking he has to take the path we've seen or let the economy crash again.
And then, surprise, surprise, WWII started. If not for that, America as we know it would have never come out of that depression. Expect history to repeat.