Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Does this define a Communist?

Almost.

He doesn't call for the nationalization of all US businesses. That would make him a true communist.

In his first public speech as a presidential candidate in Burlington, Vermont, Sanders in May 2015 broadly laid out the major planks of his campaign's agenda:

He declared that financial inequality "is immoral, it is bad economics, it is unsustainable."

Vowing to send "a message to the billionaire class," he said: "[Y]ou can't have huge tax breaks [for the rich] while children in this country go hungry ... while there are massive unmet needs on every corner.... Your greed has got to end.... You cannot take advantage of all the benefits of America if you refuse to accept your responsibilities."

He pledged to enact "a tax system that is fair and progressive, which tells the wealthiest individuals and the largest corporations that they are going to begin to pay their fair share."

Claiming that "the current federal [hourly] minimum wage of $7.25 is a starvation wage and must be raised ... to $15.00 an hour."

He described the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) as a "modest" step in the direction of rightfully forcing the U.S. to "join the rest of the industrialized world and guarantee health care to all as a right." "And we must do it through a Medicare-for-all, single payer health plan," he explained.

He called for "pay equity for women workers," and "paid sick leave and guaranteed vacation time for every worker in this country."
Describing the rising costs of a college education as "insane," he vowed to "fight to make tuition in public colleges and universities free, as well as substantially lower interest rates on student loans."

He pledged to "expand Social Security benefits" and mandate "a universal pre-K system for all the children of this country."

Asserting that "there is nothing more important" than fighting global warming, he said: "The debate is over. The scientific community has spoken in a virtually unanimous voice. Climate change is real, it is caused by human activity, and it is already causing devastating problems in our country and throughout the world." He elaborated that in the absence of government intervention, America would inevitably see "more drought, more famine, more rising sea level, more floods, more ocean acidification, [and] more extreme weather disturbances," he elaborated, in the absence of government intervention.

He called for the government to use taxpayer dollars to rebuild America's "crumbling infrastructure" by repairing "our roads, our bridges, our water systems, our rail and airports." Sanders added he would begin this process by working to advance, in the Senate, a five-year, $1 trillion bill that he himself had proposed, claiming that it "would create and maintain 13 million good paying jobs."

Yes.

I respect Bernie. He ain't hidin nuthin. Unlike Hil-liar-y.

it's a bit difficult to know the exact borderline between a true socialist, and a true communist.

russia and china have had their own versions of so-called communism for a spell. at least based upon the textbooks that i have read.

and cuba, with their dictator Fidel falls into that category as well.

and then there's venezuela, and the list goes on.

in my limited understanding communistic rule means the gov't representing the people owns everything, and assigns everything. in other words, it's a kind of cult. the gov't manages everything. and owns everything.

socialism is a bit different in terms of degree. the gov't assigns direction to the owners of the mfg. capacity. in other words without a good gov't contract, the owners belly up, and the workers are laid off. everything is driven by statist direction.

and of course i could be wrong. i never wanted the us to fight the pagans in vietnam but i got overruled.

I don't know that he's a full blown communist today, but he sure the hell has flirted with it. He's clearly a Scandinavian style socialist for the "welfare state". He has ZERO chance of being elected president. As a socialist and a self professed athiest, he WILL NEVER carry the South, and you can't win unless you can carry the South.

Furthermore, I don't think the Democratic party is going to allow someone they can't control to have the nomination.

Bernie is shaking up his party, and he knows ever populist slogan for the left, but he's not going to get the nomination.

I can't decide what would be more interesting, Trump vs. Bernie, or Trump vs. Slow Joe?

If college was free why would one need lower interest rates on student loans?

Well the definitions are very clear. A communist state owns everything and provides everything for you. A socialist state owns resources and some or all of the production, and you provide for yourself.

In the US we use the terms Socialist and Communist completely wrong. We use Communist and Socialist as a pejorative, not as any sort of accurate descriptive.

Correctly, Bernie seems to advocate for the Welfare State

A "Welfare State" (we in the US use that term completely wrong) is closer to what we call "Socialists" here in the US these days. A "Welfare State" like what exists in Scandinavia is a highly regulated capitalist system with a collectivist focus. Business and individuals are heavily taxed and that money is spent on massive social programs and entitlements. In the US we call that Socialism when technically that's incorrect since the State doesn't own resources or production. (technically every state owns at least SOME of the resources)

After watching Bernie's campaign, it's clear to me he wants the US to be Scandinavia.

vel, ya can call him the slow joe all ya want. but to me, he's uncle joe, the shotgun man.

can you imagine every household in this country with a shotgun at a minimum?

ol bernie is working hard to shift the country left, as is the trump man to shift the country right.

the tipping point has yet to be decided.

There are some colleges in Oregon that are doing something interesting. You get your degree for free. Then they get 20% of your pay for the next 10 years. If you got a really good degree, they make a lot of money. If you got a crappy degree and end up flipping burgers, they don't get very much money. In the end, they get paid on the merits of their teaching, and you get paid on the merits of your education. It will be very interesting to see how or if this works. It's an interesting idea and I'm glad someone's at least trying SOMETHING, because college education is just one more thing being priced out of the middle class.

All read disaster.

Parrtteeeeeeeee!!

If you attend a community college in Colorado a Pell grant will more then cover tuition and books.

Even that's arguable. Through taxation and regulation, the State does own the businesses. You may not think so, but when you have a govt inspector come through, you'll realize they really do own your business.

Sanders says he is a commie, and he has always been backed by the Communist Party of America.

Scandinavian style socialism could never work in the U.S. Scandinavian countries are almost homogeneous, though that's soon to change with the influx of muslim immigrants. The vast majority of their population actually works and contributes to society. The U.S. has minority underclasses where most have never worked and never will, they contribute nothing to society and only suck up resources all their lives. A socialist system can work if most people contribute, but we have far too many parasites for it to work here, the percentage of permanent unemployed is far too great in the U.S.

Socialism won't hold up so well after the homo geniuses re-make Europe.

I agree with Gungeek's summary. What he says is correct about the definitions of "socialist" etc. The term for these European style welfare states is "Social Democracy". And that's basically what Obama wants too. It's a system far from American traditions but it's not true socialism where the government owns and operates some of the major means of production like energy, banking etc. However with single payor healthcare we would be starting to get close.

You mean what works in a country of 5 million won't work in a nation of 320 million? Bernie and the libs are smart enough to figure it out.


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