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Politicians can't agree on how much, if any, of the economic stimulus package should go to the arts. But controversy is nothing new when it comes to funding culture. As part of our series "The Culture of Change: The First 100 Days," we find look at past and present plans ...

The Senate will vote today on the passage of the $838 billion economic stimulus bill. And with Senators expected to pass what has been called President Obama’s New Deal, an old debate about the original New Deal is bubbling up again. Did FDR’s heralded program really drag the U.S. out of the Great Depression or was it World War II that put us back on track? The Takeaway is looking at both sides of that coin with Amity Shlaes, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression, and Nick Taylor author of American Made, a history of FDR's Works Progress Administration.

The Great Depression-era Works and Progress administration led to some great triumphs and great failures. Find out what the WPA accomplished, and what we can learn from it now, during the current economic hard times. Nick Taylor’s new book is American-Made.