Below is my column in The Hill on the familiar bust-and-boom cycle of socialism, where failure is used to call for even more radical changes. While House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries this week reaffirmed that Democratic Socialists are part of the Democratic Party, radical figures are demonstrating how extreme this agenda is for some. For example, Socialist State Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher has declared that stealing should be legal for those in need. If socialism takes hold in New York, many will indeed need five-finger discounts in the Big Apple.
From New York to California, the American left is proving that nothing succeeds like failure. In areas ranging from immigration to taxes to health care, politicians are playing to their past fiascos to push an even more radical agenda.
Take immigration. Many, including the Democratic Socialists, have called for open borders or disbanding ICE. After the Biden administration chose to allow millions of undocumented people to enter the country, most Democrats are now calling for “pathways” to make them citizens. After all, they argue, there are too many to deport.
We now know the open border was a choice. The Trump administration immediately stopped crossings using the same laws Biden had refused to enforce. As expected, Democrats are expressing horror at the thought that the government would try to deport the millions that they allowed and even encouraged to enter the country.
The same is true on public health policy. Remember when ObamaCare was going to reduce health care costs and improve health care options? While insisting that they did not want government-run single-payer healthcare, Democrats promised that ObamaCare would lower costs while allowing you to keep your own doctor and health care plan. During the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised his plan would “lower your premiums by up to $2,500 per family per year.”
By that measure, ObamCare, or the Affordable Care Act, is a colossal failure. Premiums have nearly tripled since the law took effect, and deductibles have more than doubled. “The cost of coverage for a family of four has increased by more than $10,000,” according to studies.
In 2026 alone, median premiums increased by 20 percent, and that has already risen by another 15 percent in 2027. Meanwhile, enrollments continue to plummet across the country.
Democratic leaders and advocates are now responding to that failure by calling for more regulations and “Medicare for all.” As with immigration, the failure is the basis for doubling down on bad policy with even worse policy.
The same is also true of public education, which has failed families in major cities for generations. The solution has been to increase budgets while lowering proficiency standards. The one thing teachers unions and school districts oppose is a market-based system that lets families choose between programs through voucher systems. The solution is, again, more staff, more funding and more control over families’ options. The system gets worse and more expensive, and the teachers unions get more powerful, including greater ability to block reforms.
No one has perfected the politics of failure more than Zohran Mamdani. In New York, chaos only undermines the status quo. For example, his demand for free buses has predictably led to thousands of commuters — including affluent citizens — skipping fares, costing the Metropolitan Transportation Authority tens of millions of dollars. After all, only a chump would pay a fare that is about to be eliminated.
As the transit budget implodes, the calls for greater state subsidies will only increase — as will calls just to accept the reality and make public transportation free to the user (and expensive to the taxpayer).
Then there is rent reform. With Mamdani promising rent controls, landlords are predictably raising rents. Rent costs have reached their highest level ever under Mamdani, with the average apartment now costing $4,965 per month — and $6,655 per month in Manhattan.
So Mamdani can now push for even more significant regulations and rent controls by pointing to the rise in housing costs in an endless loop. As rent control inevitably constrains supply and prices for market-rate apartments skyrocket, he can call for even greater controls.
Failure can also solve problems through attrition. Mamdani was recently booed off stage at a law enforcement event in New York. The officers and their families are clearly upset with his embrace of figures calling for the defunding of police and his long hostility toward law enforcement. The result, however, is precisely the downsizing that many on the left have wanted. The NYPD has been losing as many as 300 officers a month.
What is true for police officers is also true for wealthy taxpayers. Mamdani has taunted affluent citizens with his new taxes and attacked them as not “paying their fair share.” As a result, the wealthy are fleeing New York and taking tax revenues and jobs with them.
Success through failure is especially evident in the housing policies. Mamdani has brought in socialists who called for “seizing the means of production” (as he has) and wiping out private ownership of housing.
Most recently, Mamdani has embraced figures such as Tracy Rosenthal, the privileged daughter of a well-known music industry figure who has refused to pay rent. Despite her family’s wealth, she has been effectively squatting on property. The co-founder of the Los Angeles Tenants Union and co-author of “Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis,” Rosenthal is a darling of the far left. In New York, she declared that rent is “a ransom,” and “We pay rent at the peril of our need.”
Rosenthal portrays landlords as bloodsuckers and rallied the left to refuse to pay rent even though “if we don’t make this payment, our landlords can call on agents of state violence who can use physical force to throw us outdoors.”
Rosenthal has perfected not only the squatter culture but also the use of regulations to take effective control of properties. In allegedly squatting in California, Rosenthal reportedly pushed to get her building placed under the Housing Preservation Department’s Alternative Enforcement Program. Under that, a landlord must fix problems or risk losing the property.
Mamdani is pursuing a similar model. He has ramped up tenant coordination to bring complaints to his advocacy offices. As landlords are hit with snowballing complaints and costs, they can be forced to surrender their properties or have them seized by the city. The Mamdani administration wants those failures to result in tenant or non-profit ownership of businesses. What it will do is ensure that fewer rental units come on the market, making the problem worse and creating new excuses to take further harmful action.
This pattern of success through failure has manifested itself on an even larger scale in history. Socialists often destroy economic conditions, resulting in greater unemployment and greater demand for government subsidies. That expansion of government power continues until conditions grow so severe that emergency actions are needed.
In “Rage and the Republic” I discuss how this pattern played out in Great Britain and France in the last century, when socialist policies devastated those countries’ respective economies. Great Britain ultimately had to be rescued by the International Monetary Fund, as if it were a third-world nation.
This bust-and-boom cycle is now repeating itself. As these policies fuel decline in these areas, demand grows for expanding the policies and government controls. If McDonald’s were to offer ever-shrinking food items at ever-increasing prices, it would go out of business. Government is the only industry that grows with failure.
For radicals, social and economic upheaval is not a tragedy but an opportunity. Lenin told the Bolsheviks to “utilize” crisis to “hasten the collapse of the rule of capital.”
The future seems bright for the American socialists. After all, with just a little more failure, who knows what Mamdani and others can achieve in America.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Democratic Socialists or Dezis.
Excellent piece. I sincerely hope enough of us are paying attention heading into November, that is all I can say. The book could not have been more timely.
Let it be noted though, that even though non-dems (at this point it includes everyone else – Conservatives. Independents, Libertarians) that aren’t’ still hoodwinked and voting blue see precisely what is happening – the left cheats, and seemingly without consequence, even now. That these failures have to fail even more spectacularly than they already have to wake people up – sheesh. I don’t even know what to say.
That blue bubble is quite a bubble, scientists should study it, and the brainwashing is something to behold. The modern, global left is a regime, and its useful idiot adherents are quite classically, a cult. Somewhere on the other side, the likes of Charles Manson or Mao are smiling. Let’s give them something to frown about.
“That these failures have to fail even more spectacularly than they already have to wake people up – sheesh.”
Trump’s already spectacular failures are the very reason why the Republicans will lose Congress. And then hopefully the impeachments will start: Trump, Hegseth, Burgum, Mullin, Kennedy, Patel, Todd to start with. Popcorn stockpiles may be needed.
You are dreaming. November will mark the end of the democrat party and it’s long losing streak. Losing since 1846.
If Republicans do NOT lose congress – THAT would be a massive rebuff to Democrats.
The party in power nearly ALWAYS loses midterms.
It would take D’s getting 60% of house and senate seats to be anything more than normal.
Current predictions are the GOP will hold the senate and barely lose the house – That is a very bad outcome for Dems.
But the likelyhood is that the GOP will do better than that,
There are 4-5 senate seats with a margin under 1% and several more between 1-3% and I do not think any D+10.
Republicans usually gain 2-5pts between August and November.
And this year those gains could be greater.
Frankly alot is up in the air.
The big deal is NOT what the majority want – Republicans are crushing Democrats on 8 of 10 top policy issues.
The big deal is who shows up to vote.
DSA voters are fired up – or atleast they were.
BUT Large numbers of Democrats ? came out to vote AGAINST DSA candidates recently – and Mostly won.
So Will the DSA stay home in states there are no DSA candidates on the ballot ?
Will normy independents stay home, vote D or Vote R ?
No one is sure about any of this – Dems are clearly getting more voters out in primaries – But they are also in a civil war against each other.
There is no telling if Normy D’s will vote for DSA candidates – or even republicans.
Nor any telling if DSA D’s will show up if their candidates were knocked out.
BTW most of the predictions that Harris would win in 2024 were based on the mistaken belief that D’s were more energized to vote than R’s.
Only a few polls were correct about the makeup of the electorate.
His book was certainly fabulous and should go down as a classic that–should America survive as a free nation–be as widely quoted in the future as de Tocqueville has been. The 2025 film “Nuremberg” emphasized the brilliant professor’s short discussion about insanity v. mobocracy as the cause of the Holocaust. “All Germans could not have been insane.” True. Great book.
“Remember when ObamaCare was going to reduce health care costs and improve health care options?” – JT
Why are we subsidizing the Medical Industry (Doctors/Clinics) anyway? For those whom use their Social Security benefits Medicare-B is a mandatory expense deducted from your full S.S. benefit, even if you don’t go to the Doctor in a given year.
“Medicare” is the subsidizing of the Medical Industry. If there was a choice as to what the S.S. benefits would subsidize, AutoCare (Automobile Care Insurance), DomocileCare (House & Apartment Care Insurance would be a choice on that list … etc.
Medical Care is important for those whom need it but it comes at a cost (expensive cost of medical billing), whereas Some may rather spend the premiums on things they use Day to Day (The Car, The House… practical Insurances).
For those that stay healthy, mandatory docking of their S.S. benefits for the subsidy of the Medical Industry is an injustice to how they live their lives.
Choice Matters.
“was going to reduce health care costs and improve health care options?”…. well, it did. As for choice matters, I’d like to see you drop your government benefits for the good of the country. Not gonna happen huh?
” I’d like to see you drop your government benefits for the good of the country.” – Anon at 10:26 AM
Haven’t used the government benefits allotted me. But I have paid for a lot out of pocket in AutoCare and Household Care over the years. Doctors (Healthcare) are overly privileged from the day they enter Medical School, and they use that privilege to charge exorbitant prices at the cost to the People and Systems. LegalCare Insurance might be another choice on the list of alternate choices of how the mandatory expense/subsidies by S.S. are made.
AutoCare-B
DomocileCare-B
*LegalCare-B
etc…
* The latter Congress would have no quarrel in passing, you can be sure of that.
Sorry, I paid for those. the left really doesn’t understand ‘ownership’ does it? How stupid they are.
People do not choose to walk away from free – even when they know it is not free and they will pay later.
Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Obongocare, etc. are irrefutably antithetical, un-American, and unconstitutional. Read Article 1, Section 8.
There’s a more important issue to consider than revolutionaries. Presidential candidate Donald J. Trump revealed it: Fake News. When less than half the nation knows the facts, revolutionaries can sell anything that looks and sounds good. I’ll share an anecdote. In 2022 I asked an Upper West Side businesswomen who hates President Trump this question: Is there even just one thing that President Trump achieved that you like? She replied that Trump never achieved anything. Then I asked her why she didn’t consider the Abraham Accords an achievement. She replied: I don’t know what you’re talking about, I never heard of the Abraham Accords. When America has a Fourth Estate that reports facts rather than Fake News, revolutionaries will have to find a new home.
Commies never understand, Many have fought and died for this Constitution and it’s protections. “Come at me commie!” is our motto. Freedom itself creates the courage to defend it.
So commies lived and died for the constitution, you say? Learn to punctuate.
Ok grammar Nazi, I guess I touched a commie nerve. Good cause commies suck.
You brainless child., I guess I touched your Karen nerve. Good cause stupid MAGAots suck. BTW, learn to punctuate.
The democrat party has been failing since April 9, 1865.
Um…. that include the years of the progressive era… 1900 to 2026? Where would you be without Social Security?
Without SS?
Much better off.
If I could of taken all the monies I got taxed to put into SS and put those into simple ETFs, I would of gotten a better return rate.
I could likely retire in my early to mid 50s along with my other investments.
You’re a pathological liar man. Mid 50’s. Liar! You’re 78 y/o and destitute, living in a trailer. So why then are you taking SS when you’re so filthy rich?
You? Beat the market with simple ETFs? No one can, and certainly not an uneducated simpleton like you.
That you call them simple ETFs shows how naive you are about ETFs.
ATS – you could likely beat SS by putting the money into a bank savings account. SS is an abysmally bad investment.
As usual the idiot John Say simply makes crap up.
By law SS taxes are invested in Treasuries. The annual return over the last 40 years has been 4.8%.
Over the last 40 years savings accounts have returned 2.5%.
Fake Farmer
First of all, ETF’s did not even exist until 1993.
You make the common mistake of retrospectively calculating the return of your SS taxes as if you had invested the lump sum that you have paid up until now, in some investment years in the past. You can’t do that. The taxes you paid into SS were small amounts over a long period of time. You can’t simply calculate a hypothetical return as if you invested the current lump sum years ago.
And if you had actually needed your retirement money in 2008, and it it was in an S&P 500 fund, you would have taken a 38% loss.
And if you had actually needed your retirement money in 2022, you would have taken a 20% loss.
The beauty of SS is that is protects you against the fickle nature of the market.
In the long term the markets always go up. If you don’t need the money, then there is no problem in the very long term.
But if you actually need the money at some point, and the market crashes at that time, then you are screwed.
There is no time period of 30 years that any of the US markets has not significantly beaten inflation.
You are making EXACTLY the same error you are accusing others of. Pretending that you would need 100% of your retirement in December 2008.
From 2004-2008 the S&P 500 gained 50% and then overnight lost 50%. From 2008-2012 the S&P 400 was 80% higher than in 2008 today it is nearly 10 times higher than in 2008;
No one withdraws their complete life savings in the single worst month in 3 decades.
If you put your SS money into the S&P 500 as you earned it instead of paying taxes, you would be WAY ahead.
You likely could match your SS just on interest and leave a huge nest egg for your kids.
The idiot John say continues his nonsensical babbling.
From Sep 2007 to Feb 2009, the S&P was cut in half.
It did not recover to the Sep 2007 level until April 2013.
There was a six year period where if you actually needed your retirement money, then you would have lost money.
Not only that, from Sept 2002 to the crash of 2008 there was no net change in the S&P 500.
In Aug 2000 the S&P was around 1,500. In Sept 2002, the S&P was at around 800. In Feb 2009 it was around 735. It did not recover back to 1,500 until Apr 2013.
So for that 13 year period you would have lost money.
The idea that the S&P 500 would beat SS is a MAGA myth. It only works if you never actually need the money. If you never withdraw then in the very long term you will be better off. But if you actually have to withdraw at a period when the market is volatile, then you lose. Anyone who retired in 2000 and started withdrawing from the S&P would have been worse off compared to SS.
yes, all fails and no progression. That’s the legacy of the left. Thank god they are over and done with, now the comunists can be easily handled.
Legacy of the left huh? Says the fool drawing social security. Learn to spell Dustoff.
Hey ano.
Learn to speak to the right person.. Moron.
SS is a losing proposition for nearly everyone.
Go calculate what you would have in the bank if you did not pay for SS – and worse remember that you are actually paying twice what you think you are for SS and Medicare.
Further if you had that money in a retirement account, if you did not burn through it before you died – it would go to your children.
SS was always a stupid idea.
@Upstate
May I ask a good faith question? Who does she think should pay for it? Is she in a position where she is out of touch with the fact that for lower earners that might be a very real problem? Does she think we should simply redistribute wealth or that that redistribution would stop at a certain income level? As I have mentioned my brother is the same, but in his case it’s just a concept that makes him feel good because he is quite comfortable in his bubble – the practical reality of it is something he doesn’t even like to, and won’t, discuss, as though the government just invents money out of thin air or that tax burdens aren’t a big deal because his only frame of reference is himself. It is a very small and myopic view in his case, and one that is very much under-informed by actual economics or a first-hand knowledge of what the day to day lives of people outside of his milieu might look like.
@Upstate
Sorry, that was supposed to be a reply to your earlier comment, not a new post.
James,
Dang it!
WP is having a issue. I have responded you your question twice now and both failed to post.
3rd try. Short version.
She thinks those in the higher tax brackets should pay more in taxes for those in the lower tax brackets social safety nets. That would include herself.
But she also knows the government is the least efficient at tax and spending money.
She gives to various charities.
She also knows there are tax loop holes people and corporations use to avoid some taxes.
And she knows there is a lot of fraud, waste and abuse in the government as we have seen in MN and CA.
Closing those loop holes and stopping the fraud, waste and abuse may be a better way of taxing and spending than just taxing.
@Upstate
‘She also knows there are tax loop holes people and corporations use to avoid some taxes.’
That is often my brother’s response, as well. He seems to be immune to the knowledge of the fact that he is also taxed. He also seems to think that anyone who has been successful in their life must be an evil conniver, even though he himself is quite comfortable. This is where economics comes in and the concept of liquid wealth. These people live in a fantasy land where they have been lucky enough to not see many consequences of anything that has transpired over the past 20 years due to a variety of cushioning. They are for all people – if they know them personally. Very often the legitimately downtrodden are not in that group, this is all just conjecture to them. Thank you for your honest reply.
Just a simple example: recently my brother told me of a gathering in which someone invited a friend the group didn’t know. This was a black dude. My brother’s assessment? ‘Nobody told us he was black. We had a wonderful conversation about race.’.
Why would they? So the guy couldn’t just hang out as friends? Nope. They had to make him feel objectified, make him the center of attention, because they do not have *real* diversity in their own lives, and made his presence about race. How would we feel if that was the general reaction to our presence on the regular? I do not think you and I are the problem, and even the merely left-leaning these days, given what that has become (spoken as someone that has always been very socially liberal) are a pox that drags all of us backward, often by decades, more and more by centuries.
“Who does she think should pay for it?”
The “haves”, of course. Until there are no more “haves.” Then we all starve, “equitably.”
Socialists operate on the cannibalistic premise that they have a “right” to treat others as a means to their ends.
Interesting position by the Filthy Socialists (aka Communists) when it comes to ‘stealing’ as long as one is ‘stealing’ from the Capitalist Pig System, right? The current low IQ communists seem to have missed the Woke History Lesson on Soviet Style Justice for those convicted of stealing from the Communist Paradise State – those people were committing the MOST HEINOUS crime of stealing from ‘the people’ and met a VERY HARSH SENTENCE. However, the current Communist Morons are flexible ethics types just like their HERO STALIN!!! What a surprise and how. Hey Half-Wit Gen Z and Woke Karen’s, just wait until HISTORY RYHMES from your brilliant votes.
Under socialism, stealing is having a little bit more bread crumbs than the next guy. EVERYONE must share without complaint or it’s gulag time.
“Interesting position by the Filthy Socialists (aka Communists) when it comes to ‘stealing’ as long as one is ‘stealing’ from the Capitalist Pig System, right?”
Oh dear, not been paying attention to little JD, have we? You know, the Vice-President who actually got it right for once and stated that just throwing slogans and abuse at anyone remotely to the left of you was not winning any arguments, and that it is perfectly understandable for young people to be drawn towards socialist (not communist) principles. THANK YOU FOR YOUR LACK OF ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER!!!
So you agree socialism is stealing. Good you’re learning. Now go tell all your filthy murderous friends.
Where did I say I agreed that socialism is stealing? I was quoting one of your fellow morons. Do you not learn reading comprehension in US schools, or are you still repeating Fifth Grade?
The Framers cared enough about us to put their whole plan of government into one instrument. The Constitution. The Left has two bodies of ideas in float. Get rid of the Senate, pack the Supreme Court, and run all of it with a unicameral legislature. The other is get rid of Adam Smith and The Wealth of Nations. What they have not done is put forth a blueprint that replaces the Constitution. There is an analogy from living creatures from the ancient oceans. Mollusks called Nudibranches- sea slugs- eat anemones anchored to the sea floor by crawling up and into the anemone’s top. And eat it from the inside out. More complex life forms like fish, shrimp and crabs eat nudibranches. In our world, we are being asked to be the anemone without a formal document that lets us see the actual nudibranch to replace the Constitution. Who of us would rather be the fish that eats the nudibranch?
MG the constitution and Capitalism are not biblical.
What they are is the systems that actually work well. They do so because they properly account for actual human behavior.
The enormous mistake the left primarily makes is pushing ideas that sound good (maybe) but do not work with human behavior.
People misunderstand that Economics as an example is just a branch of sociology.
Economics is about how humans behave with respect to different incentives.
If the goal is higher standard of living then you must have incentives that result in people producing.
Turley dances around this above -but one of the many reasons that socialism fails is that id disincentivizes people from being productive.
Thank You Prof JT for laying out just how the left is going to go down in flames this November. No one wants their nonsense.
Under collectivism, only the collective matters and later, only those at the top matter, the more equal ones. Individuals are dispensable as long as they have many.
Just like corporations in the good ole USA?
If you are refering to so-called ‘crony capitalism’ that phenomena is actually a feature of fascism and collectivism, not capitalism.
True capitalism means an equal trade of goods and everyones happy or it doesn’t happen, freedom to NOT trade.
Now ‘crony capitalism’, supported by every fascist in the world, is actually an unequal and forced trade.
Commies coined ‘crony capitalism’ to try to tag capitalism as bad, but under communism, it’s all cronies and you ain’t one of them.
Under capitalism, the customer is king, as the system would fail without consumer buying with confidence.
You should just join us in the fight against goverment cronyism as it’s a form of redistribution of public funds at the expense of your buying power.
but of course you must LIKE centralized redistributing by edict and no individual consumer choice. How Un-American.
Crony capitalism is a feature of ALL big govenrment systems.
It is the direct result of “rent seeking”.
The more of the economy that is within the govenrment the more rent seeking you will get.
Rent seeking is NOT free markets at work – it is pigs wallowing in the trough of government handouts.
The only way to reduce rent seeking is to reduce government.
You even get rent seeking inside socialist and communist systems.
It is just another reframing of Lord Acton’s adage “Power Corrupts, Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely”
The “Communist Control Act of 1954” is still “on the books.” Why isn’t it being enforced against the former “democrat” party? This movement could destroy our nation–thus, the need to use federal laws that are still enforceable! Our constitutional republic could easily be destroyed by these traitors-within-our-borders!
Nah, they can’t get past our Constitution that enshrines INDIVIDUAL rights.
So only in the USA you think? Best check out the EU’s position on that. Try France, Germany, the Scandinavias etc., you think they don’t have laws incorporating an individual’s rights? I guess the best thing the USA has done for mankind is to make abortion legal and gay marriage a way of life. Now that’s what I call “INDIVIDUAL rights”.
Where do you think the “EU” got the idea of individual rights from? and why do they now attack those rights so vociferously? You left out the UK, how come? We know why, because they are the best example of disrespect for individual rights. All of the EU is anti-freedom. America is the birthplace of freedom. big diff.
It won’t destroy our country. Those that aspire to communism advocating for thievery, violence and oppression of dissenters will get a first hand taste of the misery they wish to unleash.
“The “Communist Control Act of 1954” is still “on the books.” Why isn’t it being enforced against the former “democrat” party?”
Two reasons. 1) That utter proto-MAGA moron McCarthy made damned sure that “anti-communism” assaults on people’s rights and the Constitution will never, ever be tolerated again in the USA; and 2) the Democrats, not even the Democratic Socialists, are communists. You mouth-breathers here keep claiming that left-wing = socialism = communism. No, they do not. There is a huge difference between democratic socialism and communism, the key clue being the word “democratic”. Social democrats respect elections, respect laws, respect constitutions. That is why they have enjoyed such political success, on and off, in Europe since WW2, without a single one leading to authoritarian rule. Take a look at Trump, can you say the same thing about his instincts? What about the MAGA commentators calling for the suspension of the mid-terms just because they are panicked that the Democrats will win?
As for Turley, he should be ashamed of himself for constantly using Soviet imagery to illustrate his ridiculous rants. He ought to lose his professorial chair; then he would have something about which to bleat.
Kinda, but McCarthy also made sure that commies won’t be assaulting anyone’s rights around here anytime soon. We’re ‘wise’ to them now.
“Social democrats respect elections, respect laws, respect constitutions.” for now, they are not in power. and not individual rights. Show me when do they ever protect an individual’s rights? never. The DSA doesn’t ‘respect’ OUR constitution. they want it replaced and take out all those individual rights and put it vague rights for ‘groups’. give me a break with this crap.
Try reading what is written. Political history in Europe over the last eighty years is proof positive that social democrats respect elections, laws, constitutions. Personally, I do not agree with their policies, but there has never been a problem in getting a social democrat government to respect an election result when defeated. Hmmm, unlike you MAGA fools or the Orange Shitgibbon….
It’s not a question of forgetting history but, instead, of not knowing history, which is just as bad. Many of today’s DSA aficionados come from countries with dysfunctional systems of government led by corrupt and evil leaders. Used to tyrannical government, they cannot accept that American freedom is a people’s government, by the people, of the people, and for the people. There must be a catch. Thus are the seeds for anarchy planted in fertile ground.
A century ago, many Americans were impressed with the 1917 Bolshevik seizure of power in Russia and the Civil War that followed. It was advertised as a worker’s revolution but in the end it was more like the French Revolution than the American Revolution. Today’s DSA adherents are more like the French Jacobins or Russian Bolsheviks who simply want to take control of the government by displacing the one in power with their radical mutation.
The people? Oh, they are just useful idiots whose support can be bought for the promise of cheap bread or, to update the cause, cheap gasoline. Fortunately, the American devotees of the French and Russian Revolutions, and later the Spanish Civil War, lived to see their dreams of a workers’ paradise shattered by the hard, cold facts of tyranny. An apologia was created to soothe the troubled souls. The ideas, they said, were good, but the people in charge were not! As a force to be reckoned with, they folded quickly and became little more than a fringe group. We will see history repeat itself this fall when the DSA fades from the spotlight to resume its hermetic existence.
Apparently, anything not up to their utopian standards must be destroyed and rebuilt their way, even if they built the failed mess to begin with.
Building up from reality is hard work but generates results. Building down from utopia is doomed before it even starts.
How about we start with flushing out waste and corruption? What happened to DOGE? Did everyone run crying to Trump that unemployment would skyrocket if there was no waste or corruption? How to disguise the dole for middle America?
OldFish
Federal Government employment was reduced by 55K in June – that is about the average for the Trump administration.
This is occuring quietly – but it is HUGE.
This is half a million people a year going from unproductive federal jobs to productive private ones.
This is a win win. It results in significant federal savings – both NOW and permanently.
And REAL increases in GDP as well as changes int eh mindset of former federal employees.
question….did Obamacare lower or raise cost of healthcare?
Huh? You don’t know the answer to that?
Obama destroyed healthcare. We would have cured cancer had he not redistributed it’s capital.
No, greed killed healthcare. Corporate greed and it’s killing America. Growth and development, disposable widgets, designed to fail then priced to buy another instead of repair. All manufactured in China.
No Obama destroyed healthcare.
Healthcare took a poison pill after WW2 and opened the doors for government involvement killing the marketplace.
This is all nonsense.
A toaster in 1964 cost 19.95.
A better toaster in 2026 can be bought on Amazon for 12.99.
Yes you can not easily repair the 2026 toaster. But even if you could, you wouldnt.
A skilled appliance repair person today makes about 30-40/hr. He would have to repair 1 $12.99 toaster in less than 20 min or it would be stupid to repair.
It does not matter whether things are made in china or not. The US is in the midst of re-industrializing. More and more is made in the US.
But less and less labor is being used to make it.
The cheapest means to produce value will always win – until someone does better.
All things equal cheap labor in china will replace labor int he US. Today the Chinese are having trouble competing with poorer countries with even cheaper labor AND the US that is using more and more automation to produce things.
Regardless standard of living ONLY rises when humans produce more value with less human effort.
Incomes have more than quadrupled since 1960. A large number of goods like toasters are Cheaper in nominal dollars.
Nearly all goods are cheaper in real dollars.
Put simply you can buy abotu 4 times as much total value today as you could in 1965.
And it is “corporate greed” that has made that possible.
I would further note that despite perceptions to the countrary – with FEW exceptions – mostly connected to govenrment, the quality of products today is far BETTER.
That 12.99 toaster today does not have any screws to come lose. All the parts are welded or riveted. The products are lighter, more reliable and in most cases last longer.
There are exceptions – all tied to govenrment. We are having a MASSIVE problem with the engines in SUV’s and Trucks because the Biden admin enforced impossible to meet standards,
and automakers took designs that had been good for 1 million miles and tightened tolerances shifted to lighter oils and mad all kinds of other changes to sqwueeze another 0.1MPG from them, and now engines that lasted 1,000,000 miles are failing in 40-50,000 Dishwashers take hours to run and do not get our dishes clean. Toilets won’t flush.
These and myriads of other instances where quality has ACTUALLY declined are universally the result of govenrment.
I would note that nearly everything manufactured in the world today is under ISO 9001 – that is a manufacturers standard – NOT a govenrment standard.
That requires a 6 sigma defect rate. That is about 3 defects off the assembly line in 1,000.000 products. No one came close to that in 1965.
That is the norm today. Whether you are a chinese factory, a german one or an american one – if you can not document 6 sigma -0 no one will buy.
let Democrats enjoy their “socialism” BUT 1st end all federal aid to where they do it!
Currently the worse they make Camden NJ, the MORE money they get! Same Philly, NYC, Chicago, etc
Instead…FORCE THEM TO FUND their OWN Failures!
Each government intervention creates distortions that lead to demands for further government interventions to correct the distortions. As a result, the government eventually takes over more and more of the economy. This is a dynamic that Ludwig Von Mises identified long ago.
Daniel,
Great point.
Unfortunately, in both public education and higher education, better known as higher indoctrination, that kind of education is not taught.
So sez the fool who didn’t graduate from grammar school.
Now. If that kind of education was taught, that would somehow be the effect?
At least I know how to spell the word, “says.”
Your public education and higher-indoctrination is showing with your, “sez.” You have spelled it twice that way, showing it was not a mistake.
In order to enlist in the Marines, I had to of graduated from high school.
“In order to enlist in the Marines, I had to of graduated from high school.”
Oh dear, I think you meant to say, “I had to HAVE graduated from high school.” Clearly your school failed to impress upon you basics of grammar and tenses.
HAHAHA
Nice one Upstate
The authoritarian Grammar Nazi at it again. there is no grammar school you fool.
we don’t want to follow your grammar rules and you can’t make us!
We have the freedom here to write words any damn way we want and no, we don’t expect you to understand freedom.
“Now.” is not a sentence.
In other words: “Never let a [self-created] crisis go to waste.”
Spot on.
The principle is that controls breed controls. Until the point that there is total government control — a dictatorship.
Democrats count on two things to win power: people listen to promises and vote based on hope, and people have very short memories. They promise anything and everything, and, when the reality doesn’t match the promises, they simply move on to the next promise, blaming the failures on everybody but themselves. The media are complicit in this, failing to hold Democrats accountable for their many failures. Here come the fast and free buses. lmfao
“liberal… blaming the failures on everybody but themselves…” So conservatives never in the history of the USA had failures in their policies?
Iran sounds like a policy failure.
ATS – How so ?
Define your goals regarding Iran ?
Do you want a regime that is willing to sacrifice hundreds of its leaders to continue Jihad to have a nuclear weapon ?
Putin, Xi, Kim Un are not suicidal Iran’s leaders are – if they were not we would have a deal already.
Regardless do you want a nations with suicidal leaders to have nukes ?
If no – what price in blood and treasure are you willing to pay to preclude that ?
If you are prepared to allow Iran to have nukes – then absolutely – all policy related to Iran for the past 50 years has been a failure.
This same metric applies to all policy goals regarding Iran.
Whatr do you want and what are you willing to expend in blood and treasure to get it.
Hey stupid, the goals were defined by Trump not an anon commenter. Geezz… talk about stupid.
Trump has the IR right where he want’s them. Under his HUGE thumb.
Try Nam loser. The dem-o-rat party put us there.
Which liberal failures are you refering to? There’s so many you need a score card. And no, conservatives have NEVER had a failure in their policies or you would have named ONE.
NEVER? Obamacare?
As for those liberal failures, funny thing you can’t name just 1.
Obamacare? Liberal fail. bad idea. huge profit giveaway for health insurance companies.
Open border? It’s Domestic terrorism. liberals.
No pumping oil? 9% inflation. liberal fail.
DEI. fail.
Trannys in sports. fail.
please stop me
Democrats have funded Public Unions…their political army of failure.
Time to OUTLAW that Political army!
You make it sound like all democrat voters are rubes…oh.
I love it that Schumer and Jeffries have declared over and over again that “we are a big tent party.” That they welcome the DSA is like some small California town inviting in the Hell’s Angels. What they’ll get is all manner of chaos. The current Dems are the “lock-step” party, where everyone votes by command. No exceptions. No deviations. What they’re getting is a wild motorcycle gang of disrupters and malcontents, who will vote as they please, while revving their bikes right there in the tent. Just maybe a few of the regular type Dems may begin to think, “If they can do what they want, maybe I can too.” In the meantime, Schumer and Jeffries may be looking for the sheriff.
DSA = Hell’s Angels? Seriously?
Yes! It’s that serious
Oh oh, another crazy, seeing the end of mankind because a bunch of Americans are disatisfied with their lots.
You left out they want to replace our entire capitalist system that works just fine and has lifted the entire world from poverty, just because it cannot COMPLETELY extinguish all human entitlement, laziness, greed, and envy and they want free stuff.
Well they want to destroy, take over and control the villages, so yeah! Worse actually, the hell’s angels had armed opposition: LEO.
Liberals want everything to be “free”, which means other people will pay it, not them.
That’s an obviously very stupid remark. I’m a liberal and I pay for myself and family. We expect nothing to be free, because nothing is free.
Then you are not a liberal.
So you mean that anyone who wants something for free is a liberal? So, when someone offers a Conservative a $100 bill, they always reject it?
What about all those corporations that suck up billions of dollars of government freebies, they’re all liberals?
The claim that businesses are getting billions in government freebies is a myth.
That is not to say that corporations like everytone else does not engage in rent seeking.
The only way to end rent seeking is to remove as much as possible from the domain of government.
Myth huh? And you have definitive proof? I wonder what the education industry has to say about that? Or the oil companies? Whatabout Wall Street? Healthcare industry? No freebees?
Say, learn to shut-up.
wow an actual sincere lefty who simply doesn’t understand! there’s hope for us after all!
I would start with: Find out what is meant by ‘crony capitalism’ (lefty speak for one of their forms of centralized wealth redistribution) and then compare it to ‘capitalism’. these are the ‘freebies’ both you and I are against.
And the “Healthcare Industry Freebies” are ALL on you guys. NO repubs voted for Obamacare, remember?
Speaking for the oil industry which I worked in for 40 years, during my career,I kept hearing in the news media about subsidies the industry was receiving. I never once saw a dime of subsidy from any government entity during my career and I was in a position to know. We paid a lot of taxes, dealt with a lot of regulations but never received a dime of support from government. During my career, government and public opinion was generally hostile to the O&G industry. We are now producing record levels of oil and natural gas. We have become a net exporter of oil and LNG. When I entered the industry in the late 70’s the US rig count was about 5000 rigs actively drilling in the US. Today’s rig count is 593, about 12% of what it was 45 years ago. However with only that small number of rigs operating we are producing more oil and gas than ever before. The surface footprint for those wells is a fraction of what it was back then as well. We are more energy secure than ever. I recall waiting in line to fill my car during the Arab oil embargo of the early 70’s. This paradigm shift in productivity came about through the technological advances made by the industry in horizontal drilling and stimulation technology where a single well could produce as much as several conventional wells. Also multiple wells can be drilled from a single location. There was also the discovery of recoverable reserves from shale which was considered incapable of producing before. This came about as a result of many years of investment, trial and error, and research by drilling contractors, service companies and producers. The private sector made this happen not government.
Was at a local mom and pop restaurant for breakfast. Found a $5 bill on the floor. Asked the table I found it next to if anyone had dropped it. They said they did not.
I did not keep it.
I took it up to the register and put it in the tip jar for the employees.
So if your district in the general election is a DSA Democrat versus a MAGA Republican who are you voting for?
MAGA!!!
Not the MAF Make America Fail Democrats!
Democrat!
So democrats can’t be conservative?
IF a democrat believed they would be better off spending their money than if the goverment spent it (i.e. ‘conserving’ it for private/personal use), and voted that way, then yes. but we would call you a conservative cause democrats don’t believe that. They believe the government can solve all our problems with our money, but! private capital spending has ALREADY solved those same problems! Now the government has to CREATE problems so they can solve them for us to be able to justify all that taxing and spending. So conserve goverment to liberate private capital.
Dems stopped solving problems decades ago. You’re referring to the old Democrat party which doesn’t anymore. Of the Dems that I know I can only think of one who would balk at socialism.
phantomboldly,
With respect, I am going to have to disagree with you on that point.
My sister is a liberal. While she is a believer in social safety nets, she knows someone else has to pay for it.
Now, these so-called democrat socialists, they on the other hand want everything free and tax anyone in the middle class and up, to pay for it.
We know this by their words and actions. Started out as “tax the rich!” Billionaires! Then it became, “anyone making over $500M!” Now we are seeing calls for, “anyone making over a million!” Given enough time, and when their economic policies fail, “anyone making over $100k!” Then it will be “you dont need that much to retire on! Tax their 401k, their IRAs!” “Everyone has to do their fair share!”
Between you spouting every MAGA mantra and railing against anything that smells of progress, you sound especially naive. MAGA has bored itself in your small brain.
UpstateFarmer, while I agree in principle with a social safety net I think people need to define what that exactly entails. It was calculated that (in Massachusetts anyway) a person with a child (1 or more) that receives monthly aid cash payment, food stamps (SNAP), Medicaid, clothing allowance, Rent subsidy, educational assistance, childcare assistance (if in school), receives the equivalent of $65,000 + per year tax free. That would be fine if it led to that person becoming a productive member of society, ie., working toward a full time job. However, more often than not people are afraid of losing those benefits and do more to stay on the public dole rather than get off. Won’t work more hours because they would lose benefits. I won’t get even get into the families that are on public assistance generation after generation.
Pres. Clinton’s 1996 Welfare Reform Act was criticized by liberals as too restrictive. Pres. Trump’s requirement that able bodied people receiving SNAP or Medicaid work or volunteer 80 hours per month is criticized by liberals. People should have “skin in the game”.
People will point to Social Security as a social safety net and it is. But, it was never meant to be that people would not try to save for retirement. It was enacted so elders would not fall into dire poverty, although the retirement age of 65 for full retirement was set because people on average did not live that long. Maybe the joke is on the ghost of FDR that people are living well past 65.
The Liberalism of today is not the Classical Liberalism of John Locke and/or Adam Smith. The Liberalism of today thinks that an expansion of government is required to “fix societal problems”. In my opinion that only leads to a restrictive government. There has to be a balance between protective and restrictive. People fix problems, government doesn’t.