If you were on Twitchy on Saturday — and you should have been — you’d have seen liberal TV pundits and Never Trumpers like Jennifer Rubin and Bill Kristol melting down over Bernie Sanders’ runaway win in the Nevada caucuses. Never Trumpers are starting to realize they’re going to have to vote for a socialist in November to own the cons, and the liberal media … well, they want President Trump out of office, and they’re certain Trump’s going to use the scary “socialist” label against his opponent in the general.
Sanders himself does what he can by always correcting people who call him a socialist — he’s a democratic socialist, thank you very much — but will the very word “socialist” scare even some Never Trumpers to secretly pull the lever for the incumbent?
Vox’s Ezra Klein is here to help. See, Sanders is campaigning on more of a socialist “ethic” than a platform.
Bernie Sanders isn’t running on socialist economics. He’s running on a socialist ethic.
What sets Sanders apart from many liberal Democrats isn’t his voting record. It is a deep, animating belief that our political and economic system is unjust. https://t.co/wf9fN76emr
— Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) February 24, 2020
And he connects, because kids who took out student loans to go to college and now have to pay them back consider themselves the victims of an “unjust” system. Here’s Klein to explain the “socialist ethic” further:
In his book Why You Should Be a Socialist, Nathan Robinson makes a distinction between the socialist ethic, which he defines as “anger at capitalism over its systematic destructiveness and injustice,” and socialist economics, which “rearranges the way goods are produced and distributed.”
…
“There’s the great Eugene Debs quote,” he said, “which is, ‘While there is a lower class, I am in it. While there’s a criminal element, I am of it. And while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.’ And that’s not a description of worker ownership, right? That’s a description of looking at the world and feeling solidarity with people who are at the bottom with the underclass, with the imprisoned.”
Meanwhile, you have Trump through the First Step Act enacting more prison reform than the previous administration ever did.
So Sanders, much like his surrogate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez makes clear in every tweet, is that the capitalist system is unfair, with women and minorities hardest hit. Does that make anyone more comfortable voting for a socialist?
Put more simply, Bernie Sanders hates the America of our Founding Fathers. They were the ones who set up our political and economic system, one that (mostly) recognizes individual rights and private property. This is the necessary logical consequence of what you are saying https://t.co/qP59cDoz0U
— Ken Gardner (@KenGardner11) February 24, 2020
The problem is that the system he is proposing is also unjust, only in different ways.
— Dr. Warren Carmichael (@BonerMalone) February 24, 2020
Please do not EVER claim Trump is an authoritarian dictator if you are going to endorse Sanders, who is an advocate for actual authoritarianism.
— Samuel Culper 722 (@politiwars) February 24, 2020
Vox is millenial for stupid
— kc2fargo (@kc2fargo) February 24, 2020
Dude, he’s pushing for free college, free healthcare, free daycare, forced employee ownership of corporations., etc. You can like those ideas or not. But you can’t say that’s not a socialist economy.
— Mary E. (@MaryWehby) February 24, 2020
— Charles Mulligan (@CharlesMullig15) February 24, 2020
So just Utilities and Healthcare.
— Charles Mulligan (@CharlesMullig15) February 24, 2020
The Green New Deal is 100% socialist economics.
It requires the reorganization of private and governmental entities. It creates new governmental structures complete with the power to enforce. It is intentionally vague language with intentional power structures.Be truthful.
— justmyhumble (@usebigears) February 24, 2020
Bernie thinks all the billionaires and millionaires, except himself, are the cause of all evil and he is going to play Robin Hood and take their money and give it away. In the interview he admits he doesn’t know how much it will all cost.
— Nancy Russell (@russelln10) February 24, 2020
Vox getting in early to be Bernie's preferred source of state propaganda.
— Guy Faux (@Faux_Guy_) February 24, 2020
.@BernieSanders is so ethical he wants everyone to wait in line all day for their substandard government rationed bread. pic.twitter.com/jiJuWIxFZA
— Grandville (@GrandvilleShow) February 24, 2020
Bread lines are good, ’cause at least everyone gets bread … until they run out.
Ah yes, the "well actually, the Cuban Revolution was good" ethical system.
That should be real effective.
— Nunca Trump (@NeverTrumpTexan) February 24, 2020
The day after Nevada vote marked the moment left wing pundits and twitter personalities realized it was time to kick defense of Bernie's socialism into high gear. From that point on, a significant portion of their energy and content will be dedicated to normalizing a commie.
— Invisible Constituent (@JustGreggo) February 24, 2020
Here come the cover-ups for the wanna be socialist dictator! Right on cue
— Doctor Why ?☠️ (@NoEyeContact) February 24, 2020
Yep … we were even hearing it from Chris Matthews and Joy Reid. Democrats had better sober up and figure out what they’re gonna do about Bernie!
Every Democrat in the field has a deep, animating belief that our political and economic system is unjust. Warren does. Klobuchar does. Pete does. Don't make Bernie a thing, Ezra. He's not a thing. He should never be a thing.
— Murder Paws (@barefootboomer) February 24, 2020
That's even worse.
Socialist ethics brought us the gulags, the Cultural Devolution, the Great Leap Backwards and the killing fields. All in all 100+ million dead.
Socialism is absolutely unethical.
Signed,
Someone who grew up not even 60 miles from the Iron Curtain.— A Bear (@Bearocalypse) February 24, 2020
Still see no reason why HE should lead any kind of revolution. The other candidates all run on the Dem issues as well…and in a few, in particular, have detailed ideas on how to accomplish their goals. Bernie has an ethic as you say. Wonder how you jot that down in legislation?
— Michael Martin (@pinemikey) February 24, 2020
The "deep, animating belief that our political and economic system is unjust" is wrong. Is it perfect? No. It's just immensely less imperfect than all the others. Not throwing it out the window in an adolescent tantrum because it isn't all things to all people.
— Today in Danistan (@RealDanLee) February 24, 2020
Either it is not animating and does not result in policy, or it is animating and does result in socialist economic policy.
— Caesar Pounce ? (@caeser_pounce) February 24, 2020
The spin. It has begun
— MrTate (@MrTate) February 24, 2020
We especially get a kick out of the Bernie Bros trying to convince voters that not even President Sanders will be able to get his Medicare for All plan through the Senate, so your private health plans are safe. None of this stuff he promises is going to actually happen is a great campaign strategy.
Is this the beginning of a card trick? State an obvious misdirection and then convince people that you're sharing a rare truth.
— Mark E (@markiejoee) February 24, 2020
Socialist ethics, the ideology behind the system, is what leads to socialist economics. The economics of places like the Soviet Union, Cuba, and Venezuela were a direct result of the ethics applied to those societies.
— Aldous Huxley's Ghost™ (@AF632) February 24, 2020
So he is deeply committed to being wrong
— Dan (@LawoftheGator) February 24, 2020
Electing ideologues who have no clue how to implement their version of Utopia never ends poorly.
— Stop Making Sense (@Talkinghead2017) February 24, 2020
— MaryanneGenX (@MaryanneGenX) February 24, 2020
His Socialist ethic can’t be detached from the economics of it. His Socialist ideas are unsustainable.
— Pete Campbell (@pcampbell001) February 24, 2020
What’s to say he wouldn’t go full-blown socialist if the American people were dumb enough to give him the power?
Yes: we know he thinks the whole American project has been evil. Some of us have a different view, BTW.
— Mark Noonan (@Mark_E_Noonan) February 24, 2020
He and Jane could go on a lovely second honeymoon in the Soviet Union if it hadn’t collapsed.
Related:
‘Democrats are going to have to sober up’: Hosts of well-known right-wing network MSNBC melt down over Bernie Sanders’ Nevada win https://t.co/3rGpucnJ4W
— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) February 23, 2020
Join the conversation as a VIP Member