“It has been part of the camouflage of leftist movements in this country,,,that liberal has come to mean the advocacy of almost every kind of government control…A conservative movement, by its very nature, is bound to be a defender to established privilege and to lean on the power of government for the protection of privilege. The essence of the (classical) liberal position is the denial of all privilege, if privilege is understood in its proper and original meaning of the state granting and protecting rights to some which are not available on equal terms to others.”
– The Road to Serfdom
In the 2020 democratic primary, Bernie Sanders, the Socialist with a “D”, was swept into prominence by a majority of Generation Z. The “D” for “Democratic”, we are told, is the part that makes it more palatable. It’s not Socialism, Socialism, it’s Democratic Socialism. I seem to recall when we were told the very same thing about Romania and its kinder gentler despot Nicolae Ceausescu. It’s not Communism, Communism, it’s “Democratic” Communism. You know, the kind that murdered thousands of its own people.
But socialism isn’t just a junior obsession anymore, it’s spreading like Creeping Charlie with some older folks as well. They’ve grown fond of their Social Security, so maybe they’d be willing to give up more freedom for more grift. They aren’t long for the grave, so what does a little more debt matter to them? They’ve earned it! Because why not, just like the perennial ivy, socialism thrives in shady places.
In a 1925 article, “Toward Capitalism, or Towards Socialism”, Leon Trotsky condensed Lenin’s slogan on the class struggle to a brief “Who, Whom?” Or which will dominate the other? Around the same time, American writer Robert Frost penned his poem “The Road Not Taken”, where two roads diverged in the woods. Since both can’t be taken, one needed to be selected. The question might be, do we proceed toward capitalism or do we proceed toward socialism?
One relies on rationality, the other on emotion. One leads to a spontaneous system while the other depends on a planned economy. One uses free enterprise and voluntary choice to address life’s problems, the other opts for bureaucratic hegemony. Capitalism guarantees equality of opportunity while the government controls the equality of outcomes. Free people give charity, while collectivism doles out welfare.
In Friedrich Hayek’s 1944 book “The Road to Serfdom” a political book written during WWII, Hayek raises an alarm over a new kind of socialism, one that micro-managed the economy and used excessive redistribution schemes through progressive taxation and large welfare programs. Hayek would go on to predict the cultural change that would ensue when people ceded their freedom for more and more security. While promising more power to the people, the new socialism was actually a reorganization of society on hierarchical lines, one that would end in a modified aristocracy of government. This new philosophy was an anathema to our Western way of life that relied on the institutions of capitalism, free trade, and non-aggression to create a level of wealth and prosperity not seen before in human history.
Communism, Fascism, Marxism, and Socialism are birds of the same feather. The only difference is the degree. Free enterprise gives way to a welfare state which falls further and further into collectivism, whatever you choose to call it. The more that is ceded to the government, the harder it is to regain. The exploding deficits and debts created by the US government over the past several decades do not make any of us safer. If anything, it has made the economy more unstable and our future more uncertain.
Winston Churchill said “The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.” And as the “Road Not Taken” concludes, “Well, I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” History has already shown us the road that leads to destruction and death. Onward to capitalism!
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