Dear Millennials, THIS is what Socialism looks like!

One of the greatest unintended consequences of the government's reaction to Covid-19 is the first-hand, once-in-a-lifetime lesson in what socialism really looks like.  So to all of you folks out there who are somewhere between 18 and 35 please read this carefully.  It could save your life.

I know many of you have been super-excited for quite some time with the Presidential candidacy of Bernie Sanders.   Some of you have acknowledged that Bernie is now finished but has laid important groundwork for youger socialists like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who can pick up his mantle and carry it forward in your quest to finally have Democratic-Socialism arrive in the United States.

It is somewhat understandable - for two reasons - that you would want this.  First, if you are 35 years old it means you were in kindergarten when the Soviet Union fell apart.  It means you have never lived one day in a nation that was pitted against a nation that was threatening to export human misery on a mass scale to the rest of the world - or bomb us into oblivion as a second-best choice.

You did not get to live in a world where 40% of the population lived under communism or socialism.  You have never even lived in a world where Scandinavia, long held out as the dream of you young socialists, actually practiced socialism.  See https://www.heritage.org/index/

So, having no frame of reference other than modern-day Venezuela, for what socialism looks like, you are largely ignorant of what it would look like to live through it.  Of course my students from Venezuela do not need to read any more of this post because they have lived through socialism and are well versed in the deprivation it creates.   That is one reason why they are my favorite students.  They live for liberty and value it more than my American students do.

A second reason why young Americans want socialism is because this has been a lousy century for you.  When you were babies your government turned on its own people in the wake of September 11th on a scale that would make George Orwell shudder.   From the Patriot Act to domestic surveillance to a nation that makes us cow-tow at airports, you have lived in a nation that has largely traded in its liberty for security.

Then, when you were a little older, you got to see the second worst recession in our nation's history and the mass-hijacking of your futures when the Federal Reserve Bank and the federal government combined to bail out large banks and corporations that would make Robin Hood cheer.   It is no wonder you want Grandpa Bernie to give you free health care, free tuition and free child care.  You have grown up watching government give away your future earnings in the form of artificially pumped up money supplies and plunder in favor of the well connected.  Now you want your share.

Finally, we now see your government destroying liberty in the name of health care security by locking us down and telling us we cannot go places they do not approve of and that we have to be in our homes at 11PM.  In exchange for that, Congress is going to steal another $2 trillion from your future (did you think the stimulus was free money?) and destroy your jobs and income in the present.

Socialism is an economic system that violates the rights of the individual in order to serve the desires of the state.  Socialism means the nationalization or overt control over key industries.  Socialism means a huge expansion of the size of government on the backs of future taxpayers.  Socialism means lots of rules and regulations in order to make us all safe.

As you prepare to be locked in your homes by our new quasi police-state think about this...

Which seems better - the freedom and chance for prosperity you had a few weeks ago, or the security and reliance on the state that you are getting now?

Remember, be careful what you wish for....