There is some interesting recent polling out of Gallup:
As the 2016 presidential election field takes shape, more than nine in 10 Americans say they would vote for a qualified presidential candidate who is Catholic, a woman, black, Hispanic or Jewish. Less than half of Americans would vote for a candidate who is a socialist.
What fascinated me about this poll is that 47% of those polled said they would vote for a socialist. That number sounds awfully high to me. Are you comfortable with it? Because I’m not.
And there’s more:
At least two-thirds of adults younger than 30 say they are willing to vote for a candidate with any of the characteristics included in the survey.
How do you market limited-government principles to the 47% who would consider voting for a socialist?
Do those polled fully understand the implications of socialist leadership, including the ways in which such policies would impact their own paychecks and freedoms?
Could Bernie Sanders-style politics hit home with almost half the country? What about in five or ten years?
Just some food for thought as we ponder 2016 and beyond.
Jedediah Bila is a Fox News host and commentator, author, columnist, and former professor and academic dean. Follow Jedediah on Twitter @JedediahBila.
The answer to why so many willingly accept socialism is “education”. I put that in quotes because I would hardly call it an education. All the pc and liberal drivel coming from college campuses today is sickening. The number of communist and socialist professors and teachers in today’s colleges is enough to make any Conservative cry in his beer. Anyone actually considering working after their education should look toward the trades. Maybe IT. College courses like African History and Gender Studies are not preparing anyone for any job. They are teaching them to trade their freedom for a kind of slavery, slavery to the federal government. College educations today are not worth the paper on which they are printed. The only people who can be offended nowadays without some sort of reprisal are Conservative Christians. I won’t go down without a fight.
Socialism is definitely being taught in our colleges and universities. I always taught my children to think things through, which helped buffer what my son encountered at the university he attended. He would be thoroughly disgusted at some of the liberal untruth that was being spouted by professors and guest speakers…which many students fell for hook, line, and sinker. The problem was, if a student spoke up to oppose those ideas, it affected their grades. We have allowed socialism to take over education and the students are unprepared and unable to counteract it.
Buy MREs and water stock up so you don’t have to go to FEMA camps.
This man was put in the white house to brake the country , and take our freedoms away. I don’t know what I’m going to do the IRS is taking 60% of our
Retirement and .may take our S.S.
Jed, I am really worried about where we are headed. The only nation to infranchise liberty in 6000 years may never be seen again should we perish, but the polls’ results seem to be too close to call since many results are within the stated margin of error. Also, no specification was made as to likelyhood to vote. At large polling is nonsensical.
What most concerns me about our roster is that their dilution (spreading the votes too thinly to beat an “establishment selection” candidate) will shoo in that preselected Republican (traditionally, a Neo Con) and we loose again or get a weak lessor evil.
Hope you don’t mind the name abbreviation. Having watched you on Fox (esp. Lou Dobb’s show), I feel I know you, and so often being public breeds familiarity.
Thanks for keeping us informed.
President Obama is a socialist, No more please. I wish he would run away from home so we could hold the election now instead of Nov. 2016.
Jedediah, I have a feeling many people polled do not even know what socialism really is. The nation has been undergoing an OLDSPEAK to NEWSPEAK a la 1984 for some time now. My AMAC article of a few months ago goes into a bit more detail on my thoughts. It is titled OLDSPEAK to NEWSPEAK?
Diana, why is it that neither you or Jedediah’s articles ever make it onto Saturday’s newsletter commentary? … Also, Alan Keyes? … You three would add more thought provoking commentary than the usual repeated drivel we seem to get!
Good question, RIK.
This article should really be (en)titled: A Socialist/Marxist/Communist President?
Is this the 47% Romney said would not vote for him….
If the younger generation was so upset when the administration ordered all our cell phone calls to be collected ,I don’t know how on earth they would want to vote for a Socialist Government who would control their life from Cradle to Grave
Far too many people are willing to allow government to control their lives from cradle to grave just so they can “be safe”…i.e., take away all the guns so nobody can defend themselves.
How come when the government gives corporations hundreds of millions of dollars in lucrative government contracts, government grants to conduct research that improves profit margins, price supports, foreign transactions that are insured by the US government and tax breaks on foreign investment income it’s called capitalism, but if the government gives me $300 it’s called socialism?
Still unable to think for yourself PAULO? Stop drinking the Obama kool-ade.
What did you do to earn that $300? Did you pay into Social Security??? then you earned it…if it is welfare…I earned it and it is being given away to you!
More than 47% of voters already *did* vote for a socialist, twice! If we’re down to only 47% now, things may be (finally) heading the right direction….
My family is the same, many are liberal progressive democrates. It’s hard to understand why because most of our parents were hard working middle class republicans. Political discussions generally dissolve into shouting matches with the few republican left in the family being told we are dreaming up these issues or stats or whatever rebuttal facts we present. I am scared for our future but I am also tired of fighting.
My cousin and some other family members are liberal progressive Democrats, quite vitriolic in their opinions. They scare me and trying to talk to them about conservative issues fall on deaf ears. They just do not get what socialism means, all they see is free stuff, ie. healthcare, education, etc. without realizing its costs. Nothing is ever free!!!
Most of these people think they will be on the receiving end of socialism. How wrong they are. Our welfare system is as close to socialism as I care to get. One thing is for sure when they find they don’t like socialism it will be someone else fault.
Jedediah, I have a feeling many people polled do not even know what socialism really is. The nation has been undergoing an OLDSPEAK to NEWSPEAK a la 1984 for some time now. My AMAC article of a few months ago goes into a bit more detail on my thoughts. http://amac.us/oldspeak-newspeak/
The United States has slowly been moving away from the free market capitalism that made us the most prosperous nation in the world. The fact that 47 percent of the population would vote for a socialist is alarming but not surprising.
We have an education system that has been taken over by Leftist who despise America and the principles of our founders. They infiltrated the universities in the 1960’s and slowly changed the curriculum by gaining control of many departments. One area they made tremendous progress was in the schools of education. Many of the flawed ideas of the progressive John Dewey are trivial when you compare them to the things being promulgated in the schools of education today. He who pays the piper calls the tune and he who controls the curriculum determines what gets taught. The schools today teach left wing propaganda in almost every area of the curriculum. And it doesn’t begin in high school it starts in kindergarten. This is one reason so many young people do not understand the virtues of freedom and free markets. (Full disclosure: I was a public school teacher for many years so I have witnessed everything I have mentioned above.)
Another problem is the rhetoric of politicians who aim to blame the success of one group as the cause of the failures of a different group. They promote class envy and promise all kinds of government handouts to those who think society is giving them the shaft. Free stuff for everybody.Of course,it isn’t free. And we wonder why the national debt is approaching 19 trillion?
Another area of concern is the mainstream media feeds the frenzy with its biased reporting that supports big government and socialism.
There is good news. At one time there were only a few organizations, foundations, and think tanks promoting free enterprise. Today we have many organizations promoting and teaching about free market economics. Unfortunately, we are losing the battle to those who believe the government is omnipotent and capable of making a heaven on earth. Of course, every time someone tried to create a utopia it failed and failed badly. Usually as a totalitarian hell on earth. But who studies history anymore?
In another five or ten years I think the number of people who support socialism will grow unless we get good leadership. A President who can articulate the virtues of a free market would help. An executive and legislative branch that would work together to reduce regulations, eliminate departments, and downsize the size and scope of government is the only thing that can save us from a future calamity.
Marketing freedom and free enterprise isn’t easy when you have so many established groups working against you. I don’t have a good answer. Keep teaching the truth and try to reach as many people as possible using any means available.
Bernie Sanders type of rhetoric is common in Europe and it receives a lot of support. So if we don’t get out the correct message it will eventually take hold in the United States.
Sorry to be so pessimistic but we have serious economic problems that very few people are wiling to talk about.