Bernie Sanders appears to think all we need to be happy is more money. Alexis de Tocqueville dismantled that idea two centuries ago.
Since a self-described democratic socialist, Sen. Bernie Sanders, is a major contender for the Democratic Party’s nomination for president, and polls suggest one-third of American millennials and over 40 percent of self-described Democrats view socialism favorably, perhaps it’s time to be attentive to great nineteenth-century French thinker Alexis de Tocqueville’s highly critical opinion of socialism.
Most Americans who express positive opinions of socialism, I expect, have some type of European social democracy in mind. Generally speaking, that seems to be what Sanders proposed in his November 19 speech at Georgetown University, in which he defined what he means by democratic socialism.
h/t Rob
Boy, that could get to stinking after a while, just like Bernie.
“democratic socialist” is a redundancy.
Socialist socialist is more appropriate.
Unless we’re referring to the classical definition of democratic, not the party affiliation of “democratic.”
A must-read excerpt (of de Toqueville himself) from the article:
“A third and final trait, one which, in my eyes, best describes socialists of all schools and shades, is a profound opposition to personal liberty and scorn for individual reason, a complete contempt for the individual. They unceasingly attempt to mutilate, to curtail, to obstruct personal freedom in any and all ways. They hold that the State must not only act as the director of society, but must further be master of each man, and not only master, but keeper and trainer. For fear of allowing him to err, the State must place itself forever by his side, above him, around him, better to guide him, to maintain him, in a word, to confine him. They call, in fact, for the forfeiture, to a greater or less degree, of human liberty, to the point where, were I to attempt to sum up what socialism is, I would say that it was simply a new system of serfdom.”
Watching a bernie sanders rally is more painful than clamping a hemostat on your upper lip. It is.
And the people in attendance? His background crowds are comprised of old stoner burnouts, welfare queens, certifiable teen-aged idiots and people who look like they couldn’t find a date for the evening. I’m not kidding–take a look for yourselves if you don’t believe. And his campaign slogan? “A future to believe in” Ughh.
But sanders does point up a serious problem in our country — too many college-age idiots (the ones who sign petitions to ban the 1st A.) believe this lunatic’s fantasies about economics, social engineering and money for nothin’. I’m sure some of the guys think they’ll get chicks for free, too. Ugh.
And I’m certain that if you said the name “Tocqueville” to most of them, they’d think you were talking euphemistically about medical marijuana. I was thoroughly depressed the other night when two of our best friends said they thought “Bernie” could win — this based on what their daughter reports to them from her uber-liberal college. I have a hard time trusting the judgement of anyone whose immediate reaction to bernie sanders isn’t eye-rolling or outright scoffing.
‘Zactly. And is also why Hayek’s seminal work discrediting communism and Europe’s scientific social engineering is called “Road to Serfdom”.
Every jerk turkey, like the Mad Hatter, who wants socialism also wants to be one of its dictators!
People are wasting their time debunking Bernie Sanders. He’s just a stalking horse for Hillary Clinton.
IMHO, anyway.
I have the misfortune of knowing someone that supports Bernie. She runs a small business that employs 3 people. She says… income inequality.
So I ask her if she would be willing to take all of her profits at year’s end and divy them up with her employees. She says that’s not income inequality. I ask don’t you make more then they do? She says yes but it’s her business and she means the inequality between us and people like the Koch Bros or the Waltons.
I say they are employing 100s of 1,000s of people in their businesses on top of paying literally billions in taxes. Shouldn’t greater risk involve a greater payoff? She says they don’t pay living wages. I say if you don’t have the skills to command a higher salary, why should government dictate anyone’s wages?
I ask her if she provides health insurance to her employees. She says she’s not required to provide health insurance. I ask her if she has health insurance. Yes she says. I ask her if her employees have health insurance. She doesn’t know(I suspect a lie here) I ask why she doesn’t provide it to them. Too expensive.
I say that in 1 minute I’ve provided a couple ways you could lessen the income disparity between herself and her employees and both times, she said no.
I asked her rather then having government redistribute income, which is inherently inefficient and immoral, why not let meritocracy rule-would she hire unqualified employees? She said we’ve elected people that believe we should redistribute wealth.
I asked her if I had the right to come into her business and seize the cash drawer. She said no. I said if I don’t have the right to do that, how can I delegate that right to some else. She said if you live in a community that says we should redistribute wealth, then you have to go along because that’s what the majority wants.
I ask her if everyone on her block decided to share her wealth, would then be OK. No. I said but it’s OK for the government to use the power of violence to take my wealth and redistribute it. Yes.
So what’s the difference I ask. Now her argument becomes tautological. She says we elected people that have that right. I ask again, how can they have been delegated a right that we don’t have in the first place?
Because…fair.
With any communist, and that’s what they are, when it comes down to them having to join the giving part, they balk. What they can never understand, even if you confiscated every penny of the Walton/Kopck billions, it wouldn’t begin to touch the problem. Hell the government is printing $65 billion a month in fairy dust money. A MONTH.
You cannot reason with them.
They don’t (or won’t) follow logic.
There are only two options:
Divorce (total and complete) or Annihilation (us or them).
Just as Christians and Jews cannot coexist with izlamic savages, Freedom cannot coexist with Slavery.
And make no mistake about it – Socialism is Slavery.
In most cases the more words someone needs to describe a subjects the less they understand it. This includes Alexis de Tocqueville. I would rather read descriptions of socialism by at least half the readers of this website.
All those suck of the gummit losers support sanders hoping some day they’ll benefit by having the gummit take from the rich and give to the poor. Fine. But why to so many filthy rich liberals support him?
Because they know that he needs them, and has no intention of taking their money. It’s the middle class that the Left always goes for, never the rich.
🙁
DING! DING! DING!
Give the man a prize!
Plus, “filthy” rich socialists always think they’ll be living in the King’s palace or become ambassadors to a tropic isle.
A person like that will lose all assets because of socialism, be crying in the gutter, broke, bitter, and it will STILL be big business’ fault. It will still be everyone’s fault but her own actions and voting practices.
And even if she goes home and thinks over what you said and finds you correct, her pride will not let her admit she was duped by socialism and she was wrong.
And did it ever occur to her that her employees must think she’s acting like a ‘Koch brother ‘or a ‘Walmart’, the same way she thinks about those companies?