Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a self-proclaimed socialist, defeated Representative Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, in a June 26 primary. Crowley’s loss marked the most significant upset for a Democratic incumbent in more than a decade, a giddy news media reported.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was asked if the Democratic Party is increasingly younger, more female, more diverse, more progressive, should the Democratic House leadership look that way?”
PELOSI: “Well I’m female, I’m progressive, I’m — and the rest. So what’s your problem? (Laughter) Two out of three ain’t bad.”
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is a Senator Bernie Sanders unapologetic socialist supporter who has a ten-point platform, all of which calls for massive government spending with no sustainable plan to pay for it. Nine of ten points are traditional socialist concepts with a price tag that exceeds three hundred trillion for ten years. The one that will not increase short term spending is the elimination of our borders and the folks who guard them. Open borders will have a huge long-term cost.
As Senator Sanders platform stated, we will tax the rich and help the poor, great, but what happens when the money runs out? You and I can run up our credit cards and borrow all we can, but a day will come when the wonderful life we had will run out of funds. I will not get into the mine field that is deficit spending, referring you to my friend Ranger Rick’s excellent past columns on the subject.
The Democrats are at the same place the Republicans were when President Obama was elected; the right side of the party was vocal, the Tea Party being the most vocal. The remnants of the Occupy Wall Street movement are once again stepping forward on the left.
The socialist Democrats who supported Senator Sanders are angry that the party rigged the election, interfered with the electoral process to aid Senator Clinton, and actively defeat Senator Sanders. I join them in that anger, as this column stated at the time, a choice between Free Market Democracy and National Socialism would end the debate over our system of government that has raged off and on since the Russian Revolution in the early years of the last century.
In crossing rhetorical swords with a liberal friend in a debate over interference with our electoral process, he stated that he always hated the Russians, a very strange thing for a 1960s/’70s radical socialist to say. Thinking about it, his choice his words was carefully crafted; the left loved, to the point of worshiping, the Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR), but not necessarily the Russians who were part of the USSR. The grand socialist experiment that was the USSR failed for a variety of reasons, one being nationalism among the Polish, Georgian, East German and other Soviet Union States. The predictable economic disaster was the main reason for the disillusionment that ended the largest ever test of an experiment hailed by the world’s progressives as the best hope for the one world, one people, one government folks.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez was elected, her district is solidly Democrat, she will go to the swamp and soon find out the lofty concepts she advocates, though wonderful on paper, are not realistic outside the academic world nor in a real world.
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the President elect of Mexico, has campaigned on the pledge the government of Mexico would “protect the right of Mexican citizens to live and work in America.” That may be campaign rhetoric, let’s hope so. The Mexican government using the power of its military and federal police to aid illegal immigration and the drug trade may be necessary to fund Mr. Lopez’s promises of universal government support for all.
Drug income and funds sent back to Mexico from undocumented aliens are the two leading sources of income in Mexico. Mr. Lopez, who is cut from the same cloth as Ms. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, is big on promised spending but short on how to pay for it. The only way to fund his promises, of government support for all in the long run is to increase drug trafficking and illegal immigration. President Lopez will fail, but he will blame the United States when he does.
I guess good ol’ Scott Pruett just got hit with reality.
Mr. Basura,
Thanks for the comment. Some context please.
Thank you.
Hit with reality soon, eh? I dunno, it seems there’s an awful lot of old folks who’ve been able to craft strawmen and false dichotomies their entire lives so as to never face reality.
But seriously, I only skimmed through this commentary for the inevitable “run out of other people’s money” Thatcher quote, and surprise! I found it. The thing I don’t get about that trope is: to where does the money go when it “runs out”? It can’t just disappear, right? Or are we to suppose that there are people who will accumulate all that wealth and hoard it away from the economy?
Now I know it can be said that folks such as myself are economically illiterate in regard to the concepts of debt and inflation, but progressive policies are crafted with growth in mind. If you’d like to criticize socialist programs that aren’t constructive, Army Bob, take a closer look at the military. The entire premise for that over-bloated arm of our government is destruction. But since we know that that closer inspection will never happen here between either you or Ranger Rick, let’s step back and identify this column for what it really is: Fear-the-browns and fear-the-reds hyperbolic fear-mongering.
Mr. Gless,
Thank you for the comment.
Interesting, I can not find the Thatcher quote you cite in this column? I feel the military exists to protect us from destruction. Sir, if progressive/socialism are such great forms of government, please cite a government that has lasted as long and been as successful as ours.
Mr. Gless, have you seen the attacks on folks who support President Trump? Many on the left are guilty of hyperbolic fear-mongering on a daily basis.
Next time please read the column before you comment.
Thanks again.
Army Bob, here you go: http://bfy.tw/IzZ8
Since you regularly show preference for crude dichotomy over refined nuance, here’s another for you:
Education, healthcare = constructive
Tanks, bombs = destructive
Also, have you ever heard of the concept of begging the question? I see how well nationalism sells to the basest of the base, but for the rest of us let’s be a bit more objective than beginning with the premise that America has the most successful government.
And finally, whataboutism. As Pee Wee Herman so eloquently stated, “I know you are, but what am I?”