Life with Bernie

LARRY ANDERSON
Larry Anderson

Even with Hillary Clinton industriously hammering nails into Bernie Sanders’ political coffin, I thought it might be wise to imagine America with Bernie as president.

There’s still a chance, you know, though dim.

First, understand Bernie is a true believer. Everything that comes out of his mouth has long been accepted as incontrovertible truth. The part he is lying about is when he describes himself as a “democratic” socialist.

“Democratic” socialist is a convenient and temporary alias. Bernie could not care less about democracy as a governing system; he longs for the day when democracy will be vanquished and replaced by a socialist system so superior in its design that it is unthinkable that the masses would want something else.

Know the protections of democracy and the fantasy of true socialism are incompatible. Eventually democracy must give way. What would remain, Bernie would have us believe, is an immaculate society in which all are perfectly equal and the past failures of human weakness have been erased.

It is important to understand Bernie when he trots out his free-stuff fancy or when he drones on and on about the evils of those engaged in capitalism and/or conservatism.

Let’s turn to late notable scholar Harry Jaffa’s “How to Think About the American Revolution” to get a handle on Bernie‘s brand of socialism.

First, a definition of the New Left to which Bernie, Obama, and HRC belong:

“Liberalism and Radicalism both reject the wisdom of the past, as enshrined in the institutions of the past, or in the morality of the past. They deny the legitimacy to laws, governments, or ways of life which accept the ancient evils of mankind ….”

This goes a long way in explaining the Left’s contempt for American history and traditions. It also explains efforts to ignore, bend, and go around law as modeled by Obama’s willingness to bypass Congress.

Jaffa’s remark even explains why only the Leftist perspective is accepted and taught institutionally.

Jaffa continues: “Liberalism and Radicalism look forward to a state of things in which the means of life … are available to all. They must be available in such a way that the full development of each individual …is not merely compatible with, but necessary to, the full development of all.”

Therein is the socialist component that Bernie worships.

The Left does not consider the comprehensive guarantees of the Bill of Rights which allows unrestrained opportunity for individuals to succeed. Jaffa is defining the radical view that all things, income for instance, must be precise.

Hence, redistribution, punishing tax proposals for those most successful, and government-enforced guarantees on matters such as income. Class warfare is an intended consequence.

True believers like Bernie do not consider the negative impact of policies that extend from their beliefs. They measure only the ideal.

Continues Jaffa: “Competition between individuals, classes, races, and nations must come to an end. Competition itself is seen as the root of the evils mankind must escape. The good society must be characterized only by cooperation and harmony.”

Of course, this can only be found in works of fiction. This supposition deliberately misleads when a calculation of human nature is added.

Anyone with a lick of sense knows competition isn’t bad — indeed, competition breeds ideas and builds a better mouse trap — but that is not a consideration for Bernie.

Says Jaffa: “… the New Liberalism denies natural no less than conventional inequalities. In the Heaven of the New Liberalism … all will be rewarded equally….victory is not to be one of man, but of mankind over the scourges of mankind. No one in it will taste the bitterness of defeat.”

Doesn’t adversity make us stronger and wiser? Not in Bernie’s world.

Instead, we must be protected to the point of helplessness by an omnipotent government.

Jaffa adds: “…the goods of the future will be possessed by all.”

Redistribution began with the poverty programs of the 1960’s in which many were economically imprisoned for life. It explains the world economy theory and the open border beliefs of the Left.

In Bernie’s world, work for profit is morally wrong. Those who achieve wealth must be forced to share. It is the job of government to see to it that everyone has what they demand, as opposed to what they can produce, retain, and invest.

Sound good enough to vote for Bernie?

If so, prepare for the spread of poverty, an endless compilation of national debt, high taxes, and the destruction of drive and spirit.

That’s what socialism really is.

The Left calls it progress and themselves progressive.

Larry W. Anderson’s novel, I, Eugenius, is available at Maryville Daily Forum.