By Eddie Howell
Michael Walsh of
Yahoo News
reported on Bernie Sanders' remarks during a discussion at the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C., on
June 22.
Is Senator Bernie Sanders correct that President Donald
Trump's “authoritarianism” is a threat to American democracy? Hardly. American democracy, in terms of
people saying and doing what they like, voting as they like with
honest results, and worshiping as they like, indeed the whole Bill of
Rights appears to be in quite good shape. Of course the Tenth
Amendment hasn't been respected by government in the last century,
and more, with few exceptions. But Trump has had little influence on
that.
Sanders obviously prefers the policies
of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to those of Donald Trump.
Sanders says no president has told as
many “outrageous and blatant lies” as Trump. Really? It would
take quite a few misstatements of fact to equal Obama's blatant lie,
“If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like
your plan, you can keep your plan. Period.” He used that one to
sell a destructive health care power grab that a majority of
Americans never wanted. Plenty of other lies came from Obama, enough
to make Trump look like a faithful Boy Scout.
A few more of Obama's many lies, as
listed by
Western Journalism in an article by
Derrick Hollenbeck, dated September 4, 2012, are the following:
Obama said there has never been a
better friend of Israel in the White House, and also “In May 2011,
Obama asked G8 member nations to fund
the Arab Spring counties who are clearly on their way to
planning an all-out attack on Israel.”
“Obama lied and said that there would not
be public funding of abortions under Obamacare.” Further,
Remember Obama telling us there would
be no earmarks in his 2009 stimulus package? He lied. The bill had
over 9,000
earmarks in it; and of course, it failed to deliver even a
small improvement for our economy.
And those are just in his first term.
Authoritarianism? When a president uses
his legitimate authority, which is considerable, that is not
authoritarianism. If you want examples of authoritarianism, consider
Democrat presidents. Woodrow Wilson made it illegal to
criticize the government or the World War I effort. Barack Obama
legislated immigration policies contrary to statute, after previously
stating, correctly, that he lacked the authority to do so. His pen
and phone were used to usurp congressional authority, but Congress
made no real attempt to stop him. They simply criticized him, and
filed a few lawsuits.
Trump's efforts with executive orders
are mostly aimed at undoing Obama's abuses and keeping his own
campaign promises, within existing law, in the fields of immigration,
regulations and others.
Largely by his own authoritarian
policies, Obama had America set up to suffer his “third term” in
the presidency of Hillary Clinton, had she been elected as expected.
Fortunately, the election of Trump has, in my opinion, saved America
from globalism and a calamitous collapse, at least temporarily.
Also, contrary to Mr. Sanders'
statement, President Trump's statement that the “mainstream media”
is “fake news,” not to be believed, is quite true in the realm of
political news, especially in “reporting” on Donald Trump. It is
blatantly obvious that much political “journalism” from the MSM
these days is actually anti-Trump propaganda. Also,
[Sanders] said Trump’s outbursts at
judges are not simply “temper tantrums” but a blatant disregard
for the separation of powers enshrined in the Constitution —
attempts to delegitimize a coequal branch of government so it cannot
constrain his power.
But the courts brought criticism upon
themselves by playing politics and ignoring the president's
constitutional power to limit immigration. If the president wanted
to, he could legally stop any and all immigration, which has been
done for long periods in previous years. If the president believes
limiting immigration is necessary, he can do it, no matter what he
might have said during his election campaign.
Sanders thinks Trump's criticism of
judges is a danger to constitutional separation of powers, but
Democrats have a poor record in that regard. Sanders thinks Trump is
trying to “delegitimize a coequal branch of government.” But he's
simply expressing reasonable opinions. And the courts
have constrained his power, though not, in my opinion,
legitimately. Meanwhile, Democrats and leftists are trying to
delegitimize the Trump presidency, i.e., that of the Chief Executive
of the coequal Executive Branch of government, which to Sanders is
apparently OK.
Further, it must be noted that, while
socialist Sanders complains of authoritarianism, socialism is the
very acme of authoritarianism, which it has to be, in order to make
its anti-freedom, paternalistic system work (for a while). Socialism
leads to things like we see in Venezuela, as a relatively mild
example. Lenin said, “The goal of socialism is communism.” Ludwig
von Mises, libertarian economist said, “The goal of socialism is
socialism.” It is not individual freedom or economic prosperity,
and even if it were, socialists know no way of producing either.
