Socialists are never satisfied. No matter what, they always demand more government “solutions,” programs, intervention, spending, and wealth redistribution.
Case in point: Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) response to President Biden’s decision to “cancel” $10,000 of outstanding college loan debt per borrower. Whereas one would assume that Bernie would be pleased with Biden’s socialist scheme, in reality, Bernie is peeved Biden did not go full socialist and wipe away all student loan debt while making college “free” and vastly expanding our already bloated social welfare state.
Never mind that the president does not have the authority to do any of these things unilaterally according to that pesky document known as the U.S. Constitution. Socialists despise the Constitution because it limits government power. In other words, the Constitution is like kryptonite to socialists like Bernie.
While appearing on ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos,” Bernie downplayed Biden’s unconstitutional end-run while calling for Biden to do much more. According to Bernie, the answer is simple: “we need to make public colleges and universities tuition-free.” Yes, that will solve everything! While we’re at it, why not make groceries, gasoline, food, clothing, and shelter “free” as well?
When pressed about the fairness (or lack thereof) of canceling student loan debt for a sliver of the population, Bernie responded with the typical socialist rhetoric that we ought to expand the social safety net across the board.
As Bernie put it, “maybe we should demand that the wealthiest people in this country start paying their fair share of taxes so we can expand Social Security, improve the benefits and protect those workers. Maybe we should raise the minimum wage to a living wage for lower-income workers. Maybe we should do what every other major country on earth does, George and guarantee health care to all people as a human right rather than spending twice as much per capita on health care as other countries and leaving 70 million Americans uninsured and underinsured. Maybe we should have the courage to take on the drug companies and not pay ten times more for a particular drug than they do in other countries.”
Maybe we should embrace basic morals, like when you choose to take a loan, you should pay it back. Maybe we should make the already incredibly progressive income tax system more fair, via a flat tax or consumption tax. Maybe we should make people on welfare work. Maybe we should let people choose what type of health care they desire. Maybe we should stop spending money we don’t have. Maybe we should stop printing trillions of dollars, thereby increasing inflation. Maybe we should say it is time for a balanced budget amendment, term limits, and several other commonsense reforms that would decrease the power of our increasingly tyrannical federal government.
Maybe, just maybe, we should tell the millions of micro-managing bureaucrats and out-of-touch politicians in Washington, DC to stop helping us. Maybe we would be better off if we were left to our own devices, so we can pursue the American dream, or what’s left of it.
Chris Talgo ([email protected]) is the editorial director and a research fellow at The Heartland Institute, as well as a researcher and contributing editor at StoppingSocialism.com.
