We owe Russian President Vladimir Putin a shout of thanks. His recent lessons reminded us of simple facts we’d rather forget. The tragedy of Russia and other communist totalitarian countries is that the citizens did it to themselves. Yes they were lied to by politicians, but the Russians wanted to believe the lies. The American voters could believe the sweet lies about state control if we didn’t have the real ugly examples thrown in our face.
Do American voters want to believe the same lies?
Government is for the workers!
We were once told that big government communism is for the benefit of the common man. That changed years ago. Today’s Russian rulers no longer seek power through the workers and have gone right to the state owners of businesses. Why woo workers when Communist politicians can buy votes directly. It worked for Vladimir Putin when he took state control of Russian gas and oil. Barack Obama settled for GM and Chrysler.
Big Government is wonderful.. if you’ve never lived under it
The old myth of worker equality still sells in the US.. at least if you’re a university professor, or if you live in Chicago or New York. “Worker equality” is a very tough life if you’re one of the un-favored workers in Russia, or Venezuela.. or Chicago for that matter. Russian workers fled Russia in search of a better life. Some found it in Crimea. Back in the United States, Chicago, too, extinguished the middle class and drove them from the city.
Tax those who have.. until they don’t have any more
Putin invaded Crimea because it accepted Russians workers, the same countrymen who fled Putin’s kleptocracy and his crony capitalism. In the United States, it is like the Chicago or New York mayors taxing the business owners who fled to Texas.
Wait a minute. I guess the Obama administration is not so far behind Vladimir Putin after all. President Obama proposed raising taxes 442 times since taking office.
Progressive Government IS for the workers.. the workers who buy it with campaign donations.
There is a small difference between Russia and the US. Russian tyrants don’t care about public opinion because they are not in a perpetual beauty contest for reelection. Unfortunately, Democrats who’ve bought votes with the state treasury don’t care about good government either. New York and Chicago mayors simply close charter schools that threaten their union supporters. The unions expect some payback for their massive campaign contributions.
Nationalism and racism sell very well, thank you
So what else are we to learn from our communist neighbors? Race and Nationalism sells. Putin claims his Russian countrymen are special, and they need to be ruled by fellow Russians who understand them and what they need. Russians, in turn, support Putin while he steals the country blind. That sounds nationalist and racist when I say it about Russia, but similar stories are repeated in communist countries around the world.
Now let’s look at the US where Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis says Chicago public schools need to teach race and wealth based social justice. I’m sorry, Barack, is that too close to home for comfort? It is a fact that America’s failing inner cities, governed by Democrats, voted overwhelmingly for President Obama. Obama then crushed the economy and eliminated the jobs so desperately needed to revive our cities and lift the poor out of poverty. The voters chose rhetoric over reality, and racism is a pretty effective way to win votes.
Understanding the obvious is beyond most professors
The American Left has a long-running love affair with state control and state power. They think communism is too harsh a word, so they call it workers democracy or progressivism. Their academic theory of state control has little to do with the real world. In practice, some workers are important, the workers who sold their votes to the progressives. Progressivism is good for them. Tough luck for the rest of us. Time and again we see Communism devolve into rule by oligarchs, a brutal police state, and labor camps.
It seems our progressive politicians have already learned quite a lot from the Communists. The question we face.. is will American voters learn as well, and will we learn in time.
Image: Courtesy of:http://groundreport.com/how-the-united-states-meets-the-russian-invasion-of-crimea-matters-said-senator-mcconnell/
