Posted on 02/09/2016 1:28:34 PM PST by Kaslin
When Bernie Sanders came within a few coin flips of beating Hillary Clinton in the Iowa caucuses, it signaled the Democratic Party's astounding march toward an outright embrace of socialism.
Young Democrats overwhelmingly supported the avowed socialist senator from Vermont, with 84 percent of those under 30 backing him. National polls show similar results.
Only voters older than 45 in Iowa went strongly for Hillary Clinton, who has managed to avoid the socialist label while advocating policies that often mirror those of Sen. Sanders.
People familiar with the shocking historical record of socialist countries may scratch their heads in amazement. How could so many young people expect others to pay entirely for their college education, all their medical needs and their job training, which Sen. Sanders has promised if he's elected?
We could write off the young, pro-socialist voting bloc as yet another group eagerly joining the Free Stuff Army that President Obama has been cultivating since taking office seven years ago. But there is much more to it. People falling for the siren song of socialism are not callously ignoring the many failures and atrocities committed in that doctrine's name; they're often blissfully unaware.
For the past several decades, government public schools and nearly all colleges have touted socialism's principles of redistribution, racialism and class envy while declining to connect the dots between socialism and tyranny, examples of which abound. It's no wonder that so many young people have a rosy view of socialism when it's depicted as the epitome of compassion and "fairness."
"The moral prestige of socialism is such that we are still being warned about the excesses of capitalism, even after the extermination of tens of millions of people under socialist regimes," wrote the late Joseph Sobran in his 1985 National Review essay, "Penses: Notes for the Reactionary of Tomorrow."
"It makes no difference that socialism's actual record is terribly bloody; socialism is forever judged by its promises and supposed possibilities, while capitalism is judged by its worst cases."
Socialism perverts the biblical notion of charity, turning it into an excuse to empower the state. Since it advances at the expense of existing institutions, violating natural human relations rooted in the family, socialism is a driving force behind the sexual revolution. Hence, modern progressives naturally embrace abortion and promote the redefinition of marriage and family while denigrating religious faith - with the notable exception of Islam. As families fail, the state grows larger to pick up the pieces.
Men do not naturally place the needs of strangers ahead of their own families. In fact, the Bible warns that it's a sin not to look out for one's family first. "If anyone does not provide for his own, and especially his own household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever" (1 Timothy 5:8).
Charity happens after one has done that primary duty, and it is best realized on a personal level, where the giver's sacrifice is voluntary and the giver is aware of the impact of his charity.
Every government transfer of income involves coercion and taxation. Socialist countries tax most or all of people's income, which productive people naturally resent. Outright slavery is 100 percent taxation of one's labors.
In recent years, soft totalitarianism (confiscatory taxation and effective seizure of the media and private companies) has characterized socialist-led regimes in South America such as Venezuela, Argentina and Brazil, where once-vibrant economies are floundering. In Europe, "democratic socialism" has weakened many nations, leaving them open to an invasion by millions of Muslim immigrants, some of whom openly advocate turning the former center of Christendom into a trophy of the Caliphate.
Where socialism is fully consolidated, people become prisoners in their own countries. This chilling pattern was seen in the rise of National Socialism (Nazi Germany), the Soviet Union, Communist China, Cuba, Cambodia, North Korea and other socialist nations that resorted quickly to torture and mass murder.
In 1999, several authors compiled The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression, which details the bloody cost of the worldwide experiment in the most extreme form of socialism. Their estimate: 100 million people killed.
Combined with millions of Jews and others killed by the Nazis, end-game socialism compiled a grim total of upwards of 110 million deaths in just the 20th century.
In a recent column about the Sanders phenomenon, Peggy Noonan observed that, "Socialism is an old idea to you if you're over 50 but a nice new idea if you're 25."
If American educators were doing their job, they would be inoculating the young against the siren song of socialism. Instead, they're teaching them to sing its tempting, misleading tune.
No wonder so many are happy to join what Sen. Sanders calls his "political revolution."
If Bernie does not win this time, someone just like him will win once his supporters’ younger brothers and sisters turn 18.
Sanders reminds the young adults of favorite college professor.
Gosh, I can’t imagine why a socialized education system would teach socialist preferences. It’s just beyond me.
Well said!
Kiss the American dream goodbye. Socialism stifles all creativity and ambition and encourages government cronyism. The government chooses who is successful and who is not.
Few of us will ever become millionaires but at least the opportunity is there (with a ton of hard work and a lot of luck, of course).
Electing a Marxist twice demonstrated the Democratic Party’s outright embrace of socialism.
In fact, middle America’s election twice of a Marxist demonstrated the apolitical middle 60% of mainstream America’s embrace of socialism.
We went over the tipping point eight years ago, and it wasn’t the Democrats who did it -— it was our neighbors next door who did it.
Until the AP is toppled, the vector is still towards the left.
They also preach a distorted view of American Exceptionalism.
The Greatest Country on Earth SHOULD pay my college tuition, give me free healthcare, guarantee me a job with lots of paid time off, etc. etc.
You can’t really blame these kids. They have been brought through 12 years of the public school system and many go 4 more to the progressive universities that teach them Socialism all the way.
All right, let’s not panic now. Remember, there’s some evidence Trump has unprecedented strength (for a Republican) with the young.
I take a contrarian view. Iowa is a caucus state. Dem turnout overall was low, and statistically, nothing about the youth vote can be reliably extrapolated from this small sample.
Our young have no jobs, surprise, surprise they have time to show up for Bernie events. They are hardwired now, cell-phones and Facebook. Easily manipulable. I’m not convinced the young will show up at the polls in the Presidential election, in any great numbers. Partying with Bernie is a social event. Voting isn’t.
Conservatives are simply more stoked. Liberals a bit disoriented. Youth apathetic, as usual.
The left will quickly tout “democratic socialism” to differentiate it from all that “bad” socialism.
This would be something akin to what’s in Europe today.
So let’s look as some quick numbers, per the U.S. and the Euro:
2014 US GDP=17.4T
2014 EU GDP=18.5T (in USD)
2014 US Population=319M
2014 EU Population=508M
So under a European style socialism, where US is getting closer to, you have about 59% more people but only about a 6% bigger economy.
Bottom line is socialism sucks, no matter how kindly you attempt to make it. The tyranny associated w/the absolute power of it comes later.
Not just the young. Plenty of people 40 and up who say socialism is fine while agreeing communism is not okay. Useful idiots all.
That’s factual
Excellent!
My latest bumper sticker— Vote socialism! Now go line up for toilet paper you dumb f***s!
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