Are we all socialists?

Ignorance is on display today with Twitter’s #SocialismChecklist. Bernie Sanders matched Hillary in Iowa caucus so that has encouraged his supporters to expose their embarrassing support for a socialist. So much ignorance of history and economics on display. Most of them are very funny. There appears to be two flavors of socialists out today: angry and clueless.

The angry socialists are hammering on evil corporations.  Walmart dared to make a profit, which means they stole money from every consumer that should have been given to government as taxes. Their evil lawyers and lobbyists helped them get away with because Wall Street is controlling every decision we make. And Koch brothers.  

The clueless socialists are creating checklists of all the good things that socialists have done. Essentially it is a list of things that people agree are good about America and crediting socialism with their existence. We wouldn’t have schools, bridges, fire departments or libraries without socialism, they say. Therefore the government should be in charge of healthcare and minimum wage should be $15 an hour, they say.  

One thing that socialist don’t lack is a sense of futility. They don’t know when to quit. I will give them that. All experience has shown that socialism is a failure but that doesn’t bother them. They just want to try again and experiment with a more pure form of socialism because the last was tainted in some fashion.  Their arguments are destroyed but their zealous belief is not to be swayed.

Benjamin Franklin is famous for many things. Among them is the establishment of a public library and the first fire department. Does that make him a socialist? Only by today’s definition that all good things are socialist. However, the books and the building were privately owned. Access was open to the club and later to the public. The collection remains as private property with access to the public. The fire fighters charged for services.

This is not socialism. Not even so-called democratic socialism. You can’t vote that the library belong to the public. The problem with socialism is that violates property rights, which are essential to liberty. What about the fire department? It is socialist unless no one makes that evil money providing a service to the community? 

Are roads socialist? No, although if the socialists would limit themselves to bridges and roads then I would have less gripes with them. The problem is that they want the government to run everything. We will all just share everything. That’s the economic failure.  Socialism is forced sharing. But people don’t like to be forced to share. It is against human nature. Roads are a good use of government. The establishment of roads is called for in the Constitution. The Romans built roads. It makes sense for everyone to share and benefit. It is an asset that makes other functions of government and society possible. Do you want your healthcare run like roads? We will have committees gather to review reports that take years to write. Open meetings must be called for public input. Tax rates must be established by legislature. We will bid out the work to get the best price and see what pieces of the project should be delayed because there are almost never enough funds. Open books help to combat fraud and abuse. Just try that with cancer surgery. Most medical decisions are personal and quick. No one wants public comment and a vote before your knee surgery. Or a photo review of your kidney stone removal. And they only take out half before they run out of money. Stitches provided by the lowest bidder. The fact is that government should be involved in some things, but as few as possible.

I would like to hear the result of the argument between the angry and the clueless socialists. We need free bridges and health care. Everyone must have fire departments and libraries.  Who is going to provide it? Are the evil car manufacturing corporations supposed to provide free fire trucks? Must the evil corporatist book publishers be forced to fill libraries at gunpoint? What entity is going to build and maintain the roads if not the evil corporations?  Imagine how the hospitals get built, the supplies are made and shipped to each nurse’s cabinet by socialist good feelings alone. Can’t be done. It’s been tried.  The beauty of free enterprise is that people can make money providing what others want or need.

Let’s recap. Socialism is bad. It is a stupid idea that fails every time it is tried. People go hungry when government involvement restricts resources and incentives.  This is the history part. When people try it they end up running out of simple things like bread and toilet paper. This has been the case from the Mayflower to Venezuela. Bastiat tore apart the socialist argument in 1830. Socialism should have died then but someone always has a new flavor. Bernie and his wise and experienced youth vote think they can make it happen. If only we didn’t have socialized education.