By Douglas V. Gibbs
The Cuban electrical grid collapsed again. Such is the folly of communism. Socialism and its cousins (collectivism, communism, utopianism, communitarianism) fail every time in history because, as Thomas Sowell has explained, “it ignores the fundamental economic problem of knowledge distribution.” No central authority can possibly possess the dispersed knowledge required to run an economy effectively. When prices are eliminated as signals of scarcity and value, as happens under communism, resources become allocated disastrously. Rather than the equality it promises, socialism always gives to the new elite class of party officials while the masses suffer shortages, poverty, a breakdown of institutions and infrastructure, and loss of freedom.
Ayn Rand experienced the Bolshevik Revolution firsthand, and explained in “Atlas Shrugged” that communism fails because it violates human nature. For Rand, communism is fundamentally immoral because it sacrifices the individual to the collective and denies the virtue of self-interest. Rational self-interest is not only moral, but practical. Human beings thrive when they are free to pursue their own values and keep the fruits of their labor. Socialism’s demand for a rejection of individualism and individual natural rights inevitably leads to economic stagnation and spiritual decay. When you remove the incentive of achievement, you remove achievement itself.
Therefore, communism requires force because it must compel people to act against their own interests. Socialism always becomes authoritarian because it must crush dissent to maintain control. Liberty does not need to be enforced because people don’t need to be forced to do what is in their best interest. The forceful authoritarianism of socialism is always accompanied by fear and guilt – to quell any refusal to allow government to take complete control over the economy.
In the end, the choice is always either poverty or imprisonment. Choice, innovation, and individualism become crimes against the state.
Current progressive policies mirror the policies of socialism/communism that destroyed Venezuela’s economy, and has brought Cuba to its knees with failing power grids and a need to shed its communist imprisonment. The same flawed premises that doomed the Soviet Union, Venezuela, and Cuba now animates today’s American Democratic Party. The belief that government can allocate resources better than a free market and free individuals, the demonization of success and innovation, and the promise of equity of outcome rather than equality of opportunity all point to the same failed ideas of fallen communist systems of history. The progressives and democratic socialists have simply repackaged the failed Marxist ideas that destroyed those other countries, painting them as fair wealth taxes that are nothing more than a Marxist redistribution of wealth, saving the planet with the Green New Deal which is nothing more than saying the way to save the planet is to place all energy decisions in the hands of a centralized government, and that we must fight against racism with critical race theory which is nothing more than communism’s strategy of class warfare.
Unfortunately, the younger generation has no memory of communism’s bloody history, and we are no longer teaching it because the communists in the education system have cut that part of history out of their lessons.
Cuba is suffering from a failing electrical grid because communism fails across the board. It violates human nature, economic reality, and the moral requirement that individuals be free to pursue their own happiness. The historical record shows that wherever communism has been fully implemented, it has produced not prosperity, but poverty. Not equality, but a new ruling class. Not freedom, but oppression.
Meanwhile, in America a growing number of Americans are falling for the deception of socialism. A recent poll found that 31 percent of people have a favorable view of socialism. Among those 18 to 29 years old, socialism had a positive approval rating. Among college graduates, 49% approval.
President Donald Trump is not only trying to make sure America doesn’t fall into the trap of communism, he’s also attempting to pull Cuba out of it – which makes sense considering they are only 90 miles off the coast of Florida.
“We want to help Cuba,” President Trump said. “We want to open Cuba up to our people.” At the United Nations he called Cuba a “failed state,” at which the communist Cuban delegation walked out.
Trump said that Cuba has “spent decades coordinating with the left-wing radicals and communist networks here in the United States.” He cited the U.S. State Department, which has stated that Cuba has “cultivated ties to subversive and radical groups” that include the Communist Party USA, Antifa, and the Democratic Socialists of America.
“Communism will never be coming to America, but freedom will be coming to Cuba,” Trump said.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez said later on Sept. 26 that Cuba remains open to dialogue and commercial ties with the United States.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
