The Socialist vs. the Tycoon or Socialism vs. Capitalism?

Ever since billionaire tycoon and former New York mayor
Mike Bloomberg entered the Democrats' presidential
nomination race as a latecomer the contest has come down
to just a few remaining hopefuls, with recent departees
including former South Bend, Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg
and California billionaire Tom Steyer, who unlike Bloomberg
is not as well known and never got any traction for moving
forward. And the final two contestants may be the marquee
matchup that many political observers inside and outside
of the Democrat Party are eager for: Socialist U.S. Senator
Bernie Sanders (who is an independent caucusing with the
senate Democrats) and Bloomberg, someone who has
benefited greatly from our capitalist system and is its
champion, to at least some degree. The political/economic
championship bout: Socialism vs. Capitalism. As this post
goes to press, both of these combatants are still in the running
for the Dems' laurels.

However, Bloomberg has spent $3 million of his fortune
over the past decade on campaign contributions to
Colorado legislature candidates and PACs, according to
state and federal campaign finance records; The New York
billionaire has been courting the support of community
leaders around the country for his presidential campaign,
as well as his campaigns for more and tighter gun control
laws in as many cities and states as possible. One such
entity to assist with the latter, Everytown for Gun Safety,
has spent nearly $2 million in Colorado since 2014.

For his part, Sen. Sanders won the Colorado caucuses
in 2016 with 59% of the vote. In August of that year,
Sanders launched Our Revolution, a non-profit political
group. Although this entity raised over $9.5 million
between 2016 and 2018, it spent a miniscule $500 (!)
on Colorado campaigns while amassing thousands of
"Berners" in that state.

Bloomberg made a crack putting down the Colorado state
senators who voted against his gun control agenda legis-
lation in a 2014 interview with Rolling Stone in which he
had begun to exhibit his view of non-wealthy, workaday,
politically conservative Americans, particularly those
who dared to openly disagree with him, saying that the
legislators were from "a part of Colorado where I don't
think there's roads." Very recently, Bloomberg made
belittling remarks about farmers and farming in a speech
before an assembly at Oxford University in Great Britain:
"I could teach anybody .. to be a farmer, ... It's a process.
You dig a hole, you put a seed in, you put dirt on top, add
water, up comes the corn." It has never come to Bloomie's
attention that farmers have to do research on the quality of
soil that they have to work with, study seasonal weather
forecasts, buy and maintain farming equipment to help
them with the planting, the harvest, and the nourishment
in between for their crops, among other things. There are
agricultural colleges and universities which prepare
people for being farmers, awarding degrees in agricultural
management. But when one lives and works up in the
Ivory Tower away from the real world and real people
such things are bound to escape one's notice.

Bernie has "Berned" more than a few of his supporters over
time with an attitude of "My way or the highway!",
according to a former Colorado Democrat Party Rick Palacio.
Sanders has made campaign staff "feel disregarded, verbally
assaulted," Palacio has averred. Apparently what some had
thought to be crotchety behavior normal for a septuagenarian
may well be just good old-fashioned megalomania.

The chief difference between Bloomberg and Sanders is the
respect that the former has for capitalism and the maintaining
of the free market, although with stiff regulations on corpor-
ations concerning their "environmental sustainability" in
their practices, i.e. using compostable packaging and recy-
clable materials along with diversity in their staffing ---
having the desired (by Big Brother Bloomie) staff gender
and racial makeup of their workforce. Add to these
some new taxes to pay for, among other things, health
care and environmental protection programs. Sanders has
no faith at all in the free market, and desires greatly
to replace private insurance in the equation regarding the
way we shall pay for our health care, touting what he calls
"Medicare for all". This name he gives his plan is simply a
euphemism for socialized medicine with the attendant total
government control. While Bloomberg values the free
market, he has little or no regard for most of those who
participate in it, endeavoring to make a fortune for themselves;
Hizzoner Bloomberg is like so many wealthy liberals in that
he thinks that capitalism is fine and dandy --- for himself;
just don't let the hoi polloi get their greasy fingers into it.

Sanders does not mask his contempt for the free market and
for those who have done well in it, including Bloomberg.
Bloomberg restricts his attempts at controlling any aspects
of our lives to concerning himself with how much salt we
consume and how much soda we drink --- remember his ban
on large-size sodas in New York? And forbidding salt shakers
at New York restaurant tables? You could ask for salt, though;
This part of the measure was a mere compromise to get
Nanny Bloomberg's legislation passed at City Hall.
But Bernie concerns himself with a larger, wider range of
things that go on in our everyday lives, looking to place as
many of them under government control as possible, such as
how we are cared for when we are ill or injured, how much
money we can keep (apparently very little!) from our
annual incomes, with the rest going to fund his expansive
and expensive programs for this, that, and the other.
The transplanted New Yorker-turned-U.S. Senator from
Vermont has even remarked that we have too many brands
of toothpaste (!), that we really need only "two or three" (!!),
and that we also have too many brands of athletic shoes to
choose from (!!!). I guess this illustrates ol' Bernie's antipathy
to the free market, it just affords too darn much freedom to
we peasants.

So The Peasant says this to the aforementioned political
observers: If the Democrats' presidential battle royal comes
down to Senator Bernie Sanders and former Mayor Mike
Bloomberg you'll get a battle between two bumptious
New Yorkers, one an avowed socialist and one an example
of pinnacle-reaching capitalist success --- but not between
socialism and capitalism. And whichever wins the Dems'
brawl at their party convention this July, that candidate will
go down in flames come November. The American people
will stick with the leader who not only is a testament to the
possibilities of accomplishment in the free market but also
reopened its doors wide so as to welcome back the workers
who were sent away, along with the entrepreneurs and those
hoping to be, by his immediate predecessor.


MEM


UPDATE (March 5): Minutes after I went to press with this post, your
faithful Peasant saw an online article announcing that Mike
Bloomberg ended his presidential campaign, and that he is
now supporting former Vice President Joe Biden after the
latter's super Super Tuesday, winning most of the fourteen
primaries/caucuses held. After much discussion with his
campaign manager and some influential Democrat officials,
Bloomberg saw no way of catching up to Biden or to runner-
up Senator Bernie Sanders and called it a day on his pursuit
of the presidency. It looks like the big matchup won't be
taking place after all. What might have been (?).