Socialism, Bernie Sanders, Venezuela, and The Failure of Third-Way ‘Democratic Socialism’

This page will continually be updated. Note links to other pages below.

Why ‘Real’ Socialism Leads to Tyranny
“Real socialism hasn’t been tried!” Anyone who’s gone to college in the past few decades has probably heard some form of this phrase to excuse the failures of socialism and distinguish between “nice” socialism and the “mean” socialism of, say, Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Oh, and maybe communist Cuba isn’t all bad, they say. Well, yes it was and still is. Regardless of the excuses for actual authoritarian regimes, socialists typically try to soften what their ideas would look like in reality and dodge the endless historical and present examples of the ideology’s failure. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I.-Vt., continually tries to thread this needle—essentially relying on the old Cold War leftist analogy of not wanting to be like Washington or Moscow.

Bolshevik Bernie hates US billionaires but loves the ‘billionaire paradise’ of Sweden?
At the same time that Socialist Sanders wants to eliminate billionaires in the US, he simultaneously wants America to adopt the supposed socialist model of economically successful Nordic countries like Sweden and Norway. But there’s a BIG problem with Bernie using countries like Sweden as examples of the socialist utopias that America should emulate — Sweden ain’t socialist as I highlighted recently on CD. And as the chart above shows, both “socialist” Sweden and Norway have many MORE billionaires per capita than the US — Norway has 56% more (2.8 vs. 1.8 per million) and Sweden has 81% more (3.25 vs. 1.8 per million).

Video: Bernie (Not That Bernie) on Socialism
Bernie Marcus, cofounder of The Home Depot, talks about the virtues of capitalism.

What Is ‘Democratic Socialism’?
By Paul Austin Murphy
The basic thing is that no matter how the word “democratic” — in “democratic socialism” — is defined or used, it’s still deemed to be an aspect of socialism.

The Unexpected Contest of 2016: Free Market Capitalism v. Democratic Socialism
By John Biver
With the election of Donald Trump, free market capitalism and individual liberty has at least for now, won the day.

* * * * *

Follow the links…the pages are repeatedly updated:

What is Socialism?

‘Feel the Bern’? A Collection of Articles about Bernie Sanders

Socialist Venezuela in the News

Scandinavian Unexceptionalism: The Failure of Third-Way ‘Democratic Socialism’