On the recordJune 12, 2019
I confess that my fascination--or maybe ``obsession'' is another word to describe it--with what some people proclaim to be their newfound belief in socialism is really a mystery to me. It is something I have thought and read quite a bit about just so I could try to understand what they could possibly be thinking. A recent poll found that 4 in 10 Americans say they prefer living in a socialist country to a capitalist country--40 percent. For those of us who have witnessed the rise and fall of socialism over the course of our lives or who have even read about it in the history books, that is a major cause for concern. Yet today's socialists try to distinguish themselves from those countries that have actually implemented socialism--Venezuela, the Soviet Union, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, and other failed socialist nations. They are saying that they are democratic socialists. As a matter of fact, one of our Senate colleagues who is running for President--the junior Senator from Vermont, not the distinguished Senator on the floor--is speaking today at an event in defense of democratic socialism. I have to say, if you ask me, that is an oxymoron. You can't support democracy and socialism at the same time. Those two ideals are completely at odds with one another.…
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