Topic: Politics & Elections
One difference between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton is that he believes what he’s saying whereas she, probably, does not. The self-described socialist senator from Vermont has a past rooted in kooky radical politics; the former First Lady and Secretary of State abandoned her youthful radicalism decades ago. That’s why the Democratic Party base is gaga for Bernie: progressives just don’t think that Hillary is telling the truth when she pledges to “topple the one percent.” Sanders, though, they recognize as a true believer.
Yes, but just what does Bernie Sanders believe? We know who and what he hates: Republicans, the Walton family (not the TV one), the Koch brothers, hedge fund managers, China and Mexico and trade, etc. and so forth. For sure, Sanders is a good hater. And we know, in general terms at least, what he wants for America: a Scandinavian-style welfare state. To that end, he preaches all-out class warfare. As Kevin D. Williamson put it in a recent National Review article, with Sanders it’s Us versus Them—everywhere, all the time. In short, Bernie Sanders is a good hater.
And that’s the funny thing about him because his political style, his “brothers and sisters” rhetoric, his rants against trade and the Koch brothers, blah, blah, blah, is divisive in a manner that makes his stated objective impossible of achievement. Williamson points out that the Scandinavian-style welfare state is made possible (1) by a broad political consensus and a level of social conformity that from the American point of view is positively stifling and (2) the ethnic/racial homogeneity of the Scandinavian (and most European) countries. To put it another way, the political and social environment necessary for the establishment of a Scandinavian-style welfare state does not and probably cannot exist in a large, diverse country like the United States of America.
Thus the over-the-top class warfare rhetoric of Bernie Sanders, his constant bashing of corporations and the rich, his moralizing quackery, is at cross-purposes with his stated goal. The Sanders campaign is one long exercise in naming and denouncing enemies, a nonstop hymn of hate. Now of course such blather appeals to the progressives of the Democratic Party base who can’t stomach Clintonism. But the belief that it constitutes a plausible political program is, in a word, delusional. Bernie Sanders embodies a bundle of attitudes and emotions, but he has no ideas. Between his boilerplate leftie rhetoric and the Scandinavian-style heaven on earth so earnestly desired by American progressives there is no bridge. Sorry comrades, but you just can’t get there from there.
