Many are puzzled at the popular appeal of socialist sympathizer Bernie Sanders. Don’t those youngsters know that you can’t just have everything handed to you? He’s promising welfare and, horrors, socialism! Well, yes, yes they do, but Bernie’s supporters see the enormous hypocrisy in the opponents of his brand of welfare-statism. What needs to be understood, crucially, is that the United States has engaged in socialism for decades, albeit socialism exclusively for the Warfare State. Everyone who is suddenly decrying “socialism”, the sound of pearls audibly clutched, chooses to ignore the debt-funded war socialism they’ve allowed to continue. Bernie supporters see this, and think, “why not spend the trillions here at home rather than wasting it on military misadventures?”
No socialism at all, for anyone or any industry, should be the goal. But denouncing socialism in the abstract while also remaining complacent about the outrageous wealth transfers occurring in the name of national security destroys the argument that so many are making in the face of Sanders’ campaign. Socialism for the rich and well-connected does exist, as do regulations that shield the established rich from the dynamic, virtuous forces of a competitive market that would distribute wealth to where it truly belongs.
Bernie supporters are misguided, yet do have their heart in the right place. They see massive inequalities of wealth. They see the trillion-dollar wars and wonder why that money isn’t being spent here at home, on programs that would help people here. The right answer to the trillion dollar wars is that government should never have gotten their dirty paws on the money in the first place. It should’ve remained in the pockets of the people who earned it, or it shouldn’t have been printed, or it shouldn’t have been stolen from future generations. The federal government’s power to print and borrow is the real culprit, and should be stripped utterly. That power should be the focus of the outrage.
The recognition that something is dreadfully wrong, combined with a sincere desire to fix it, is the correct starting point that will lead to social change. The problem, though, is that these Bernie bros are sitting ducks for the wave of socialist pseudo-intellectuals who are exploiting their naive idealism and channeling it into supporting totalitarian pipe dreams that will achieve the exact opposite of their goal. But it’s just a simple step for Bernie supporters to realize that the true path to radical humanitarian change is through a policy of unrestricted liberty. They only need to look at marijuana legalization. Did they support it? But it was a revolution for the marketplace, for dreaded “capitalism”. And yet it created a miracle. If only they could apply that same radical principle, of removing every government-created barrier to voluntary exchange, they would realize that their goal of lifting the poorest, most at-risk among us lies in, not socialism, but liberty.
