Letters to the editor

Letter to the Editor: Understanding socialism

On a recent, July 17, Fox News airing of Life, Liberty and Levin, pollster, and former Bill Clinton advisor Mark Penn stated that many of today's American young people were supporting socialism, while decrying capitalism as an unfair system, without understanding what socialism embodies.

Mark Penn proceeded to question these young people if they should be allowed to own their own home, to which they would reply yes. To which Mark Penn would inform them, under socialism, individuals do not own homes, all homes are owned by the government.

Next, Mark Penn would ask the same young people if they would like to own their own business, to which, they would answer yes. Mark Penn would then explain that under socialism individuals do not own businesses, the government owns and controls all businesses.

Next, Mark Penn would ask said young people if they believed they should be paid based on the amount of work they accomplished, to which they replied in the affirmative. Mark Penn, then, explained under socialism, the government strictly regulates the amount each worker is paid and all workers are paid the same. Thus, your lazy co-worker would be paid the same as you, no matter how much harder you worked.

Socialism does away with any inclination for an individual to work harder and be more productive to "get ahead."

Finally, Mark Penn asked these young people to name one country where socialism was successful. The young people were deafeningly silent. Young people are voting in socialism, a system they do not understand, largely because of the curriculum being taught in today's schools and universities on the "evils" of capitalism, with no mention of the much greater "evils" of socialism.

Once socialism is voted in and takes hold, it will never be voted out because the government will totally control the ballots and the elections.

Conservatives need to do a better job of getting the message across on the failures of socialism, which is always the precursor to communism, to young people or we are going to lose our country to socialism. Under socialism there is no American dream for anyone, including young people.

Steve Wolverton

Parkersburg