Continuation of Part A & B above.
Millennials & members of Generation Z are projected to make up 37.5% of the 2020 electorate. See graphic below.
click on graphic to enlargeThe youthful voters are not focusing on Trump's above list of accomplishments & neither are the older generations to some degree. Generation Z is interested in mass shootings, racial equality, & immigration policy & treatment of immigrants. Millennials are interested in healthcare, global warming/climate change, & mass shootings. Generation X & older generations are interested in healthcare, terrorism/national security, & the national debt.
The 19 Democrat candidates running in opposition & resistance to Trump for the presidency offer plenty for every socialist voter to like – led by the ideas of the five freshman Congresswomen shown in the photo above, & especially the ideas of AOC & her mentor Bernie Sanders. AOC worked as an organizer in the primaries for Bernie's 2016 presidential campaign. She previously worked for Ted Kennedy & has been called "the future of the Democratic Party."
AOC graduated cum laude in 2011 with a degree from Boston University majoring in economics & international relations. Following graduation she was employed as an educational director, strategist, & organizer working for various firms & projects with college-bound high school students. After her father died she took an additional job working as a waitress & bartender in lower Manhattan to help her mother who was fighting foreclosure of their home. AOC is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (see graphic below that shows the growth in membership of DSA from 2016 to 2018) which has its roots in the Socialist Party Of America whose most prominent leaders are former many-times socialist presidential candidates Eugene Debs & Norman Thomas.
But AOC discredited her fine college education & work credentials when she told Margaret Hoover on Firing Line that unemployment was low because everyone has two jobs working 60, 70, 80 hours per week, listed the three branches of government – the House, Senate, & Presidency, compared the plight of the migrant caravan mobs to Jews fleeing the Holocaust, threatened Don Jr. with a subpoena she would issue, & called four star Marine general & Gold Star father John Kelly a coward – Kelly had enlisted in the Marine Corps during the Vietnam War & his son 1st Lt. Robert Kelly was killed in Afghanistan after stepping on a landmine in November 2010.
AOC's progressive platform which virtually all of the Democrat presidential candidates support to one degree or another, include Medicare for All, a federal jobs guarantee, a proposed Green New Deal that calls for the end of the use of fossil fuels within 12 years – by 2030, abolishing ICE, eliminating the electoral college, free public college & trade school, & a 70% marginal tax rate for incomes over $10 million. A Sienna College Research Institute poll of AOC's constituents conducted earlier this month found 75% support Medicare for All, 76% support free college, 73% support a federal jobs guarantee program that pays a living wage, & the Green New Deal is favored 41% to 20%.
AOC was born in 1989 & as I have written many times about Millennials they have never really experienced the power & benefits of free enterprise capitalism – growing up under GW Bush & BO. Click here to hear AOC define democratic socialism & explain how she came to hold these views – mostly formed because she "never experienced a time of prosperity in the United States".
Other Democrat ideas with near universal support of all the Democrat presidential candidates include reparations for slavery for some kind of compensation to descendants of slaves from the Atlantic slave trade hundreds of years ago, packing the Supreme Court with liberal judges, increasing the minimum wage to $15 per hour while waiting for the guaranteed federal jobs program to become law, & limiting political speech – Hillsdale College reports that 37% of American college students think it is acceptable to shout down speakers & 10% support violence to keep someone from speaking.
In addition to AOC's 70% tax on "tippy tops" income, Democrat presidential candidates fall in line supporting Warren's wealth tax, Wyden's plan to tax capital gains as ordinary income & institute an annual unrealized capital gains tax, Sanders 77% estate tax, Castro's 90% top income tax rate, & Connecticut Congressman John Larson's uncapped 2.4 percentage point increase in payroll taxes.
All of the above statistics, tables, & graphics whether from Hillsdale College, the Harris Poll, Gallup, or Pew Research show the movement of Democrats toward socialism. The following graphic provides further gender & age breakdown in this regard from WSJ/NBC News polls including percentages of Democrats that consider themselves moderates & conservatives.
click on graphic to enlargeTo a greater & greater extent from so many sources we see that the 2020 presidential election may very well not be about the normal peace & prosperity issues that have dominated previous election results that President Trump is counting on. The country has moved or even lurched to the socialist left. See graphic below from Pew Research Center that surveyed five generations of Republicans with each one moving further left than the one before – i.e., becoming more statist.
click on graphic to enlargeTo answer the question I am so often asked – yes, many people living up & down your street prefer the Democrat socialist policies described in this post whether they be presented by a 29 year old freshman Congresswoman whose lack of substance is stunning or Bernie Sanders who unapologetically admitted on FNC on April 15 that he was one of the millionaires or billionaires he rails against because of his capitalistic book writing endeavors.
We have seen time & again that as liberal Democrats leave the oppression of statist hellholes in states where they reside & move to traditional neighborhoods in conservative states, they still prefer the dependence of government programs – but not the responsibility to pay for those programs. Consequently they continue to vote Democrat & turn more red states blue thereby continuing the incremental transformation of America that BO started.
Both AOC & Bernie have very high energy work ethics & should not be easily or quickly dismissed - they really can convince people that they believe what they espouse. They both acknowledge that America is the richest nation ever in the world. But do they not recognize that it was capitalism that built & sustains this wealth – not socialism?
Do the American people not see this?
How depressing!
ReplyDeleteDoug
ReplyDeleteMuch needed analysis. Many thanks. Outstanding job in depicting what we are up against. Warding off increasing Socialism is very tough and that is an understatement. what can we do?
At grass roots, we must in a civil way, tout the advantages of free markets over Socialism. In person and via social media we can make quick points such as — telling those who own successful private businesses that Socialist Admin will render their businesses virtually unmanageable with excessive taxation and regulation. I tell others that Socialism results in tiny ruling class, like 1/100 of 1% with extreme privileges & all else way behind. Personal freedoms suffer. One may need special Gov approval for life saving surgery. One may only be allowed 3rd rate doctors, wait 6 months for knee MRIs.
Finally I like to cite strong historical and current evidence that the more free markets we have the greater economic growth and security of entitlements to the truly needy as Treasury revenues increase.
Last week JP Morgan CEO, a Democrat, very clearly and effectively contrasted Socialism and Capitalism.
Right now the Socialists r much more passionate than GOP. In a close football game many times it is the team that wants it more, wins. At times the winning team must play much better than the loosing team else loose if the referees are biased or incompetent. Just ask the New Orleans Saints. For the GOP the media except for Fox r the referees. Hence GOP has tremendous challenge ahead.
A dark horse may be Larry Kudlow. I watched his CNBC night show for many years and he started off each stating “free market capitalism is the best road to economic prosperity”. Time for him to step it up big time.
Time also for Jamie Dimon and other successful businessmen and private entrepreneurs to leave Democrat party. This includes Leftist Silicon Valley execs and entrepreneurs. If they take some quiet time to mediate on what Socialism would do to their control of their businesses their decision would be a no brainer — quit Democrat party. Imagine how much campaign funding would dry up as result. It is incomprehensible that Any successful business person should contribute campaign funds to Socialists that will destroy their businesses immediately January 2021.