In a speech Friday, presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders pointed out that a large portion of the United States worked on a pure socialist scheme for several decades.
“This doesn’t get a lot of attention,” he said, “and it’s easy to see why. It’s a touchy subject. But let’s get real here. The North had to mischaracterize Southern economics and attack it precisely because it was so economically powerful.”
The slogan of socialism has long been the famous aphorism: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
“Stay with me. Let’s break it down,” Sanders courageously went on, ignoring some boos from the crowd around him. “From each according to his ability – that means you work just as hard as you can. You give everything you’ve got. To each according to his need – that means you are rewarded with the bare necessities of life. Every slave household in the U.S. - come on, we have to speak truth to power, folks – every slave household in the U.S. was run on socialist lines. And it worked! That’s what they don’t want you to know.”
Sanders also referenced another socialist slogan: “Property is theft.”
“Did the slaves have the hope of getting rich someday? Did they have the hope of owning any property of their own? No! And did it make them famously unmotivated and unhappy? No, of course not. It is true that slaves were very sad about their families being broken up and their white masters having privileges they didn’t have. But when it came time to work, you couldn’t beat those boys! I mean you could, but you almost never needed to. They would sing in the fields all day long, just full of the joy of their primitive life of working like magnificent, highly cinematic beasts for mere sustenance. No worries about keeping up with the Joneses. Just pure, natural economics.
Those slaves are an inspiration to us all. They showed us the natural condition of mankind – what we all need to get back to.”
In order to clarify these statements, this reporter sat down with Mr. Sanders for a brief interview after his speech.
“Some people took from this that you think we should go back to the days of slavery. Is that what you’re saying?” I asked, shaking my head slightly to let him know that would be a bad thing to agree to.
“Of course not, that would be racist,” Sanders explained. “But if these conditions applied equally to everyone, and not just blacks, it wouldn’t be slavery. It would just be socialism.”
“Who would replace the slavedrivers?”
“No one at all,” Sanders explained reassuringly. “By the time we’re done destroying everything that people want to compete for – wealth, privilege, luxury, ancestral piety, all that disgusting mess – people's minds will have cleared. They won’t need to be forced to work. They’ll just do it for the pure joy of flexing their muscles and knowing they are an important cog, er, member of society.”
“But what if someone really, really doesn’t want to work?”
“Hah, hah, well that’s where AOC and I disagree. She feels no one should be forced to work. Maybe, I don’t know, maybe she wants to keep a few rich people around to keep taxing so we’ll be able to pay those guys. Not white rich people, naturally. I think she believes that once you transfer the population of South America up here, it will be easy to redistribute wealth from selfish white people to unselfish brown people... something along those lines... and then restrict the mechanisms of capitalism just to them – like sacrificial cash cows. I don’t know. It’s hard to say how her system would work in real life.
My system is a little different. In my system, no one is wealthy at all, capitalism is completely gone, wealth is held in the loving hands of the people’s government. So if someone doesn’t want to work, it’s not a case for whips and chains, it’s just a case for a loving case worker, or a compassionate guidance counselor, or at most vocational rehabilitation by a trained psychologist.”
“Psychologist? So there will be professional, middle class people after the socialist revolution?”
“Psychology training will be open to anyone who wants to do it purely for the joy of listening to other people’s problems, and who is willing to get paid the same amount as any ditch digger or actress or plumber out there.”
“According to their need.”
“Yes, exactly. Whatever their guidance counselor decides they need, that’s what they get. It frees you from that competitive spirit so you can spend time with your family, just watching the sunset or playing pea knuckle.”
“Pea knuckle?”
“I’m told it was a favorite game among the slaves. I don’t really know how it works; I’m not into that sort of thing; but I believe most American families will find it a fascinating replacement for their decadent televisions sets and swimming pools. Especially those types of people who spend their time watching Duck Dynasty and so forth.”
"God, yes. People like that won't know the difference. What do you want to be after the revolution?"
"Definitely want to be one of the guidance counselors. I mean, I wouldn't want to give America any less than my best, and I think that's where my abilities really lie."
"And your needs?"
"That's between me and my guidance counselor."
"This is very fake news!"
- Donald J. Trump