Bernie Sanders says he wants to "redistribute wealth". What is that, really?

[Little-Acorn]

This is the latest installation of liberals and other socialists saying they want to "redistribute" the wealth in this country. But that implies that the wealth was "distributed" by someone to us all in the first place, and maybe that someone did a bad job and the liberal socialists think they can do it better.

But wealth was never "distributed" to any of us, except maybe by welfare clerks to various indigent persons. But the $100 that's in my wallet now, wasn't distributed to me by anyone. A guy with a car and I made an agreement: I'd tune up his car and fix a few things on it, and he'd pay me $100 to do it. I tuned it up, changed the oil, and replaced two squeaking belts that were badly worn. He's happy, now it starts easier, gets better gas mileage, and doesn't make weird sounds as he drives. He'd much rather have a car that drives like this, than have the $100; and I'd much rather have the $100 and don't mind getting my hands dirty to do something I do well.

Nobody "distributed" anything to either one of us. He and I made a deal, both of us gave the other something of value, both of us are happy with the outcome.

But if our modern liberal socialists had come along just then, they might have taken the guy's $100, and the guy couldn't have gotten me to fix his car. He'd still have a sh*tty-running car that sometimes wouldn't start, I'd be $100 poorer... which means my son would be walking 3 miles to school instead of riding the bike I was about to fix up for him. The liberal socialists want me to think that a better use was made of that $100, than we would have made of it... but when we asked them exactly what the money was used for, they can't answer the question.

People who talk about "redistributing" wealth, are lying. What they are doing, is taking something that was yours, that you earned, and telling you that (a) they know better how to use it than you do, and (b) this somehow makes it OK for them to take it from you, whether you like it or not.

These people aren't "redistributing" anything, because your money wasn't "distributed" to you in the first place. You EARNED it, and you got it because you DESERVED it, not because some uninvolved bureaucrat thought your having it would somehow be a good idea and so gave his blessing on you to receive it.

"Redistributing" is the liberal socialists' way of implying you did NOT earn your money, and so it's not really yours. And pretending that his deciding what to use your money for, is the natural order of things. Not the idea that since you earned it, YOU should decide what to use it for. They're trying to get you away from that idea.

A man who jerks you into an alley, sticks a gun in your face, and demands you give him your money or he'll blast you, is doing the same thing those liberal socialists are. The only difference is, the guy with the gun is being more honest and straightforward about it. He's not pretending you owe him anything, and not trying to get you to believe that what he's doing is "moral", and not trying to fool you into thinking that your keeping your money is eeevil.

Next time one of our liberal socialists tells you he wants to "redistribute" the wealth, remember what he's really saying. And remember that in many ways you'd be better off with somebody sticking a gun in your face.

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http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2015/10/20/bernie_sanders_a_little_more_complicated_than_just _taking_wealth_from_the_rich_and_redistributing_it .html

Bernie Sanders: A "Little More Complicated" Than Just Taking Wealth From The Rich And Redistributing It

Oct. 20, 2015

In an interview with Felix Salmon of Fusion, Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders explains how he would redistribute wealth back to the middle class. However, Sanders said it's "a little more complicated" than just taking wealth from the rich and redistributing it to the middle class. Sanders also proposed a wealth tax to help pay for his economic agenda.

"I think what’s happened is that there has been mass redistribution of wealth in this country for the last 30 years," Sanders said. "The problem is it’s gone from the middle class to the top one-tenth of 1%. And I think we have to redistribute it back to working families and the middle class so that they can have a decent standard of living."

[NightTrain]

I'm betting that if & when Sanders is on a debate stage with the GOP nominee, that his support will plummet when he's asked some tough questions for the first time.

Anyone that actually works for a living isn't going to like him one bit when the cold, hard numbers are exposed. That leaves the welfare class, and there's no way in hell they can carry him to the WH.

[Kathianne]

I'm betting that if & when Sanders is on a debate stage with the GOP nominee, that his support will plummet when he's asked some tough questions for the first time.

Anyone that actually works for a living isn't going to like him one bit when the cold, hard numbers are exposed. That leaves the welfare class, and there's no way in hell they can carry him to the WH.

Funny, I just finished reading the article following. It addresses what seems both Trump and Sanders are managing to do well, destroy both parties:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/02/16/let-us-now-praise-famous-madmen.html


BURN IT ALL DOWN!02.15.16 10:01 PM ETLet Us Now Praise Famous MadmenBernie Sanders and Donald Trump are destroying their respective parties—and for that, at least, we should be grateful.

The only important thing—and certainly the most interesting thing—about the 2016 presidential election is that neither Donald Trump nor Bernie Sanders are real members of the parties for whose nominations they are running. Yet each is burning down his political home of convenience to the ground. Party identification is already at all-time low,according to Gallup (http://www.gallup.com/poll/188096/democratic-republican-identification-near-historical-lows.aspx), which finds just 29 percent of us are willing to admit to being Democrats and just 26 percent cop to being Republican.

With a few more strong showings in upcoming primaries, Trump and Sanders might even push those numbers down to single digits. Unless you’re one of those suckers still carrying water for political parties that reach back before the Civil War, you have no reason to fear their destruction. In fact, the best thing that can happen to politics is that the two major parties are forced to reboot themselves like a played-out superhero movie franchise (http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Spider-Man-5-Big-Things-Expect-From-Marvel-Reboot-70094.html).

...

Trump may indeed be “philosophically unmoored”—unlike Ted Cruz, he doesn’t know or care enough to sprinkle his applause lines with bon mots from Ludwig von Mises or Ronald Reagan—but nobody would confuse him with, say, a liberal Democrat, would they? (I'd disagree, he's liberal.)



No, that would be Bernie Sanders, who is causing equal levels of discomfort among the Democratic Party establishment by admitting that he’s not really a socialist. He just wants to give away a ton of free stuff, most notably education, health care, and retirement but also paid family leave and a laundry list of whatever else he can think of. When he got into the race, he refused to apologize for being a tried-and-true socialist, which he redefined later as being a “democratic socialist” and now characterizes as simply wanting to import the very best Denmark has to offer before it becomes even more like (http://money.cnn.com/2015/10/23/news/economy/denmark-inequality/) the United States.

...

If it’s true that Trump and Sanders are the only candidates throwing off sparks, it’s worth underscoring that they are not genuinely popular among Americans writ large. Rather, they are generating intense responses among the shrinking ranks of partisans and dead-enders who respond to what they think are purer and purer distillations of what the parties really should stand for. As fewer and fewer of us choose to identify as Republicans and Democrats, those that still do will get harder- and harder-core until the number of true believers approaches zero.



And when that happens, the major parties will be forced to change what they stand for, not because they want to but because they won’t be able to win elections otherwise (http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/02/10/team-crazy-wins-the-sane-state.html). Because of our first-past-the-post system, American will always have two major parties and there’s every reason to believe, at least for the foreseeable future, they will be called Democrats and Republicans.



But what those parties stand for—and what sorts of people can fit comfortably in one or the other—can and will have to change if they once again want to represent more than tiny slices of the electorate.

[darin]

"I think what’s happened is that there has been mass redistribution of wealth in this country for the last 30 years," Sanders said. "The problem is it’s gone from the middle class to the top one-tenth of 1%. And I think we have to redistribute it back to working families and the middle class so that they can have a decent standard of living."



Hey dipshit - when people WILLINGLY give their money to businesses (other people) for products they value MORE than their money that's a good thing. There's no blame. That's what happens in a free society.

[Abbey Marie]

Bernie can feel free to give away all of his money. Have at it, Bernie. But keep your mitts out of my pockets.