Back in the 1990s, we lived in a magical world where the majority (or a near-majority) of Democrats agreed that government regulation usually harms business, that the government is wasteful and inefficient, that welfare is too generous, and that illegal immigration is a burden.
Long gone are those days.
New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will probably pick up a Congressional seat as a Democratic-Socialist, and she’d be the second after Bernie Sanders. She’s not even the only Democratic-Socialist candidate for these midterms, Abdul El-Sayed is running in Michigan with a similar platform.
While they have “Democratic” in front of “Socialist,” it’s just a modern re-branding of the kind of socialism we’ve seen ravage countless countries. Democratic Socialist of America member and writer Meagan Day outlined as much in a recent essay about the ideology. “In the long run, democratic socialists want to end capitalism,” she admits. She also explains that “Medicare for all” isn’t even socialist enough for the group. “Medicare-for-all is not socialism. It would only nationalize insurance, not the whole health care system. Doctors would remain, private employees, for example, though under some plans they would be required to restructure their businesses into nonprofit entities.”
So even government-run health care doesn’t have enough government for these people.
And you know what’s scary? They’re growing. According to the Daily Caller, “Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) says it currently has 57 registered chapters on college campuses, according to Democratic Socialists of America Program Associate Lawrence Dreyfuss, up from just 15 in 2016. YDSA has experienced a 280 percent increase in the number of clubs from 2016 to 2018.”
Now, a 280% increase from an incredibly small number isn’t all that impressive, but this is really just a reflection of an increasing trend in the Democratic Party; a drift towards socialism. Even Hillary Clinton complained that being a capitalist hurt her in the 2016 election, noting that 41 percent of Democrats are socialists.
While socialism has become increasingly popular in the Democratic Party, it’s kept its unpopularity in the rest of America. In fact, socialism is least popular in working-class communities that have historically voted Democrat.
- In 1992, 15 of the 20 congressional districts with the highest share of manufacturing jobs were represented in Congress by Democrats. Today, all 20 are held by Republicans.
- In 1992, Democrat Bill Clinton won 49% of counties in which manufacturing accounted for 25% or more of all jobs. By 2016, Democrat Hillary Clinton won just 5% of manufacturing counties. Republican Donald Trump won 95% of them.
In just two decades, Democrats have gone from branding themselves as the Party of the working man to the Party of the latte liberal.
That hasn’t worked out too well for them.
