Amity Shlaes, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, penned an August 18 Washington Post column examining five of the government's Depression-era mistakes that made financial matters worse. Shlaes, author of "The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression" cautioned today's lawmakers against following in those footsteps.

According to Shlaes, "perverse monetary policy was the greatest cause of the Great Depression." But there were five other mistakes in the 1930s that some politicians today seem ready to repeat. 

• 1. Giving in to protectionism
• 2. Blaming the messenger
• 3. Increasing taxes in a downturn
• 4. Assuming bigger government will bring back growth
• 5. Ignoring the cost of inconsistency