Posted on 07/15/2026 6:07:52 AM PDT by MtnClimber
Finding out that, by a 3-to-2 margin, Americans think the country is “evolving into a big government socialist state” is bad enough. Far more worrisome is finding out how many Republicans and self-styled conservatives are on board with one of socialism’s central tenets.
The latest IBD/TIPP Poll, which we are reporting on today, finds that nearly half of Americans agree that we’re sliding into socialism, and less than a third disagree. (See: “By 3-To-2 Margin, Americans Believe U.S. Is Turning Into A ‘Socialist State’: I&I/TIPP Poll.”)
It also finds that Republicans are more pessimistic about the future than Democrats, which strikes us as defeatism on the part of the GOP and willful ignorance by Democrats, whose party is now controlled by the Democratic Socialists of America.
The really disturbing findings in the poll were when we started asking about policy positions endorsed by the DSA.
We’re not too surprised that 51% of liberals say they’re “willing to pay higher taxes to support more social programs.” (Although the number should be 100%.)
But why do 30% of Republicans feel this way? And why in the world would more than one in five “conservatives” say they’d pay higher taxes for more services?
It gets worse.
The poll also asked whether respondents “believe the government should own key industries such as health care and energy.”
Incredibly, 43% of Republicans agree, as do 41% of conservatives. That’s barely higher than the share of liberals who want government ownership of key industries. (See the chart above.)
What in God’s name is going on here?
Does this reflect the rise of “nationalist” conservatives, who distrust the private sector and like big government almost as much as liberals? (Vice President JD Vance, who has described himself as “postliberal” conservative, was last seen bashing Milton Friedman in an interview that our friend Steve Moore described as “anti-free-market, big government gobbledygook.”)
Is it the result of President Donald Trump’s push to have the government buy up shares in companies? The New York Times reported this week that “over the past year, the Trump administration has made deals to acquire equity stakes in more than two dozen firms, an unusual practice that has extended the government’s influence over industries including semiconductors, nuclear energy, minerals, quantum computers and steel.”
Is it something in the water?
The only good news we can find in this poll is that your average Democrat isn’t at all on board with the socialists taking control of their party, which will become clear when we report on support for other DSA policy positions next week.
But what hope is there for the country if Republicans – and even more alarmingly, conservatives – have bought into a major plank in the socialist agenda?
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I call BS on the hi article. I don’t believe any poll done on the Internet by some political entity.
Where is General Augusto Pinochet when we need him?!
What drugs are these people on?!
Vance certainly has vocalized some socialist leanings recently.
“ Is it the result of President Donald Trump’s push to have the government buy up shares in companies? The New York Times reported this week that “over the past year, the Trump administration has made deals to acquire equity stakes in more than two dozen firms”
Oh. Ya. It’s Trump’s fault. And ya, people are aware of this, they read the NYT, they are concerned that corporate bla bla bla
No
It is because the government education system has taken civics and history out
And parents have taken zero responsibility in educating the past generation. And I mean since baby boomers
Also keep in mind that the big central government stuff came from the republican party. The 14th amendment comes to mind.
Sounds kind of bogus. 🙄
I figured that out when obama was running against romney.
We had a democrat running against a communist.
What a choice.
Free stuff has always been appealing. “Something for nothing” sounds like a great idea ! (until you try to take the “something” away from the productive).
Corporate Statism. Privatize the profits. Socialize the human costs of production. Even Trump sees the economy in terms of sovereign wealth and power on the world stage. Government stakes in business and all of that.
Then consider AI and how it might rewrite the implied contract between capitalism and jobs. Socialism may be inevitable. If so, would Republicans and Conservatives be better served to get ahead of them curve and start to shape future policy rather than have the DSA dictate terms?
It’s the average guy having a hard time just holding a job, while watching the number of billionaires (and even a trillionaire now) grow to unprecedented numbers, most of which seem to come from foreign countries, who seem intent on replacing us with H-1B’s. Trickle down has failed, and all the wealth is consolidated into just 3 or 4 companies who essentially own the entirety of the equity markets, stagnating small business development and leaving the average guy trapped in a world of a few big box stores and daily threat of being replaced by an Indian with a phony degree.
Socialism is certainly not the answer, however, as the same people running these equity markets and Fortune 50 companies now will be the same ones running the new socialist government programs. That’s probably where we’re headed though, as that configuration, where they only have one entity to control, is probably where we’re headed, as it would simply be more efficient and convenient, for those at the top.
It will same ultra elites, in control then. Socialism is just an advanced form of crony capitalism, which has been taking over the country in the form of the tech/pharna bros for the last 10 years. People like Bill Gates, Larry Ellison and Peter Thiel et al would be more powerful the]an ever, which is one of the main reasons why we’re on this new course.
The problem is that there are now people who literally NEED free things, that are being added to the names of people who simply want them. The healthcare crisis, lack of retirement programs, and influx of cheap H-1B labor are probably the main reasons why.
The harsh truth is that is totally believable. As the article rightly points out, some of the national/populist strain on the right, including VP Vance, Steve Bannon, and even President Trump, have endorsed more federal government ownership or and involvement with private industries. That's something that some have advocated on FR, and those of us who argue for more limited government have been told we are out of date/out of step with the times. That the idea of limited government that stayed out of the economy as much as possible is a relic of the past.
That's a distinction that depends largely on the eye of the beholder. Ultimately, a lot of so-called conservatives have surrender the argument in principle to the left.
Sure thing. Go away with this garbage. This is true psyops.
I see this especially with AI and the cry of “If we don’t do it, China will!”
I’m right there with you on my views of politicians, but the reality is they are mostly controlled by the billionaire donor class, who can be even more ruthless and conniving. It’s my estimation that THEY are the ones actually behind this new movement for socialism, and we’ll start seeing it soon with the direct government investment (secret merger) with the big tech companies. Take a look at the new AI governance program proposed by Bernie Sanders for one clue of how they might make it happen, but it’s likely inevitable and already underway with the government ownership stakes recently taken in Intel and Lockheed.
Yes. They are pushing that window of “normalcy” as hard and as far to the Left as they can.
My wife got a movie from the Library because she thought I would like it: “Hoppers” which came out last year from Pixar Studios.
I am pretty certain she got it for me because I used to be a huge fan of Pixar back in the day when they were actually making good, creative, quality, fun animated features with great storylines that were unpolluted by wokeness.
But the truth is, I stopped following them years ago when they took a turn to the left and began incorporating leftist themes into their features. I became quite disgusted with them.
For me, even though my disgust with them had peaked some years before, I was particularly incensed and revolted to see them market a feature called “Lightyear” in which two females have a full-on-lips homosexual kiss. Apologists say “it was just a quick kiss, and women do that kind of thing” and so on. We know better. And the homosexual community knew better, too. And this, marketing directly towards young children by the left in entertainment.
But to be polite, my wife took the time to pick the movie out for me, so when she said she wanted to watch it, I sat down with her to watch it.
It absolutely did not disappoint me and fulfilling all the worst ways that I thought it would disappoint me.
In my post, I mentioned entertainment as an element, pushing the Overton window (in addition to the media, education, politics, etc.) this was an object example of that pushing the Overton window to the left.
Worse, it markets it towards very young children. It was pushing the theme that humans are evil, nature is inherently good, progress is capitalistic evil, and children should rise up, disobey their parents and teachers, and do “what is right”, such as protesting a construction sites, breaking into facilities to free animals, that kind of thing.
And it wasn’t lost on me, that the only Mail whites portrayed were almost universally bad guys. I also noticed that the young female character in it who appeared to be a high school age kid, had no father in her life, only two women…her mother and grandmother.
These things may seem like nitpicking to some, but they are real and meaningful… And fully intentional. They could’ve told that story in a variety of ways, but they chose to frame it in that fashion and market it at young children.
It is just another example of one of the things I find despicable about the left. They just can’t keep their fingers out of the malleable young skulls, full of mush.
Crony capitalism really exploded with the pharma companies during the plandemic, and is only going to grow in scale with the ongoing AI tech/gov merger which will be required to keep the AI equity bubble from bursting due to lack of legitimate ROI. The crash of SpaceX and postponements of the IPO’s for the darling AI companies is all you need to see to know to see fed money will be needed to save them, and the plan is to do it before the crash, this time.
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