HILLARY CLINTON’S RED SCARE

HILLARY CLINTON’S RED SCARE

Is this the Clinton campaign or the John Birch Society?

Hillary Clinton’s campaign network is riot with talk about socialism, seeping in under the door or perhaps in the fluoridated water. You never know where the “conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids” will turn up.

Among those warning of socialist creep is prominent Clinton booster, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon, who got double coupons for warning of a threat to the very heartland of the nation. “Here in the heartland, we like our politicians in the mainstream, and he is not — he’s a socialist,” Nixon told the NYT.

The sinister socialist to whom Nixon is referring is 74-year-old Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has been in Congress since 1991 and for all of his adamancy about being an independent and a, yes, socialist has almost always been a perfectly pliant supporter of the Democratic party.

Democratic leaders getting Sanders’ vote has been something like bums turning up for a hot meal at the Salvation Army: You have to listen to a little sermon, but you’ll get what you came for.

Now remember, Democrats are socialists. Heck, most Republicans are socialists, in the traditional sense that socialism refers to the government taking resources from the private sector and redirecting them. In an academic understanding, it’s all about degree. Some people are socialist enough to want the government to build highways and provide basic regulations for commerce.

What Sanders means is that he would like the government to do much, much more of that. Like, much more.

But during the Cold War and beyond the word came to be associated with the dangerous boys in the Politburo. Being associated with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was not exactly good PR. And that after the National Socialists of Germany, well, you’re going to need a re-branding.

Welcome back progressivism!

But despite the relatively short ideological leap between Clinton’s policies and those of Sanders, the scare is on. Joining Nixon in the red scare is Clinton PAC man David Brock.

“He’s a socialist,” Brock told Bloomberg News. “… He’s got a 30 year history of affiliation with a lot of whack-doodle ideas and parties.” Not very kind to say about a guy who has been a loyal Democrat and shared 93 percent of votes in common with Clinton when she was in the Senate.

This ought to prove a couple of things to election observers: Team Clinton is very nervous and utterly willing to do anything to win.