Francis, Bernie Sanders and Socialism...

Mona Charen writes:


"According to CNN, Bernie Sanders 'has been consistent for 40 years.' Some find this reassuring. Sanders is not a finger-in-the-wind politician who tacks this way or that depending upon what’s popular. On the other hand, if someone has never changed his mind throughout 78 years of life, it suggests ideological rigidity and imperviousness to evidence, not high principle.

Why make a fuss about Sanders’ past praise of communist dictatorships? After all, the Cold War ended three decades ago, and a would-be President Sanders cannot exactly surrender to the Soviet Union.

It’s a moral issue. Sanders was not a liberal during the Cold War, i.e. someone who favored arms control, peace talks and opposed support for anti-communist movements. He was an outright communist sympathizer, meaning he was always willing to overlook or excuse the crimes of regimes like Cuba and Nicaragua; always ready to suggest that only American hostility forced them to, among other things, arrest their opposition, expel priests and dispense with elections.


Good ol’ consistent Sanders reprised one of the greatest hits of the pro-Castro left recently on '60 Minutes.' When Anderson Cooper pressed the senator by noting that Castro imprisoned a lot of dissidents, Sanders said he condemned such things. But even that grudging acknowledgment rankled the old socialist, who then rushed to add: 'When Fidel Castro came into office, you know what he did? He had a massive literacy program. Is that a bad thing?'

Actually, the first thing Castro did upon seizing power (note Sanders’ whitewashing term 'came into office') was to march 600 of Fulgencio Batista’s supporters into two of the island’s largest prisons. Over the next five months, after rigged trials, they were shot. Some 'trials' amounted to public spectacles. A crowd of 18,000 gathered in the Palace of Sports to give a thumbs-down gesture for Jesus Sosa Blanco. Before he was shot, Sosa Blanco noted that ancient Rome couldn’t have done it better..."

And Bernie Sanders isn't the only one to whitewash the evil machinations of the Castro Regime.  "Pope" Francis, himself a Socialist, has engaged in such historical relativism and has even welcomed Raul Castro, a sociopathic madman, to the Vatican.  See here.

The Democratic Party, which Francis the False Prophet favors, has been hijacked by Socialists. And make no mistake about it, these socialists are waiting for the most opportune moment to overthrow this government and to install a tyrannical regime. It was Pope John Paul II who reminded us that, "..the fundamental error of socialism is anthropological in nature. Socialism considers the individual person simply as an element, a molecule within the social organism, so that the good of the individual is completely subordinated to the functioning of the socioeconomic mechanism.

Socialism likewise maintains that the good of the individual can be realized without reference to his free choice, to the unique and exclusive responsibility which he exercises in the face of good or evil. Man is thus reduced to a series of social relationships, and the concept of the person as the autonomous subject of moral decision disappears, the very subject whose decisions build the social order. From this mistaken conception of the person there arise both a distortion of law, which defines the sphere of the exercise of freedom, and an opposition to private property. A person who is deprived of something he can call 'his own,' and of the possibility of earning a living through his own initiative, comes to depend on the social machine and on those who control it. This makes it much more difficult for him to recognize his dignity as a person, and hinders progress toward the building up of an authentic human community." (Centesimus Annus, No. 13).

Some random quotations:


"Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill.

"Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude." - Alexis de Tocqueville.

"Socialism in general has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it." - Thomas Sowell.

What have the Pope's said about Socialism?  See here

American Sniper and bloodlust

General Douglas MacArthur, in his farewell speech given to the Corps of Cadets at West Point on May 12, 1962, spoke of duty, honor and country and what these words entail for the professional soldier.

General MacArthur spoke of the bloody battles and the heroic sacrifices made by the soldier on countless battlefields. But he added, "This does not mean that you are warmongers. On the contrary, the soldier above all other people prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war."

This point is not understood by everyone.  It is least understood by those who have never served in the Armed Forces.  In a post on Facebook, Mr. Deal Hudson writes, ""American Sniper,' in my opinion is NOT TO BE MISSED. The 500 persons in the theater walked out in absolute silence. I've never witnessed that kind of a reaction to a film before, ever. Bradley Cooper is wonderful and Clint Eastwood's direction is masterful."

Various people chimed in fully agreeing.  One woman wrote, "I agree, it is a great movie!!! Thank God for Chris Kyle & others who serve our nation, their wives, children & families.

Another wrote, "Amen Mary. He saved the lives of a lot of Marines." And another, "Saw it Friday, took my very breath away!"

One woman added, "My husband (marine who served in Iraq and Afg) took our 17 year-old son last night. The entire audience reacted the exact same way - complete silence."

One individual wrote, "Heard this movie has lefty heads exploding, so naturally I must see this soon!"

Marcus Grodi, of EWTN's The Journey Home, wrote: "Couldn't agree more. Deeply moving. But a subtle point of the story: why the demands of some Callings require or should require celibacy. Celibacy allows a person the complete freedom to risk all for the good of his task—as it does or should for a priest. Marriage makes some Callings difficult—as it did for Chris when he was in the process of looking for threats to 'take out' to protect the troops while on his cellphone with his wife who was challenging his Calling. There are married men like Chris in harms way every day — like unappreciated policemen — protecting our lives: they need our prayers and support."

Only one individual, Stephen Hand, expressed concern over the film and it's glorification of a man some might consider sociopathic.  He wrote, "Er, the Church opposed that war. We opened up the gates of hell (ISIS). Read John Paul II and Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger who at the time warned us," and included this link with his comment:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/06/real-american-sniper-hate-filled-killer-why-patriots-calling-hero-chris-kyle

And then added: "The real American Sniper was a hate-filled killer. Why are simplistic patriots treating him as a...[hero]?

Deal Hudson responded, "Stephan [Stephen], I don't agree with but I'm not going to argue it out in public in a thread that honors the memory of a man and his comrades who fought for our nation."

Stephen Hand replied, "I don't want to do an injustice to anyone. But his officers had a duty to remove him from combat. Or remove themselves if they were the ones who exhibited psychopathic tendencies. That was always military code and honor."

Deal Hudson answered, "Like I said, Stephen, I understand the point you want to make but this is not the place."

But it is the place to honor a man [sniper Chris Kyle] who publically quipped, "The enemy are savages and despicably evil,” and that his “only regret is that I didn’t kill more.” Kyle made these statements in his best-selling book, “American Sniper,” on which the film is based.

This is not what General MacArthur had in mind when he spoke of Duty, Honor and Country.  And what a tragedy that a man who came to enjoy killing so much that he actually wanted to kill more and regretted not being able to do so should be glorified in the cinema.

In his excellent and prophetic book Trousered Apes, Professor Duncan Williams documented extensively the banishment of God from society in the West and said that as a result, "the Western world and its culture is saturated with violence and animalism....We are teaching savagery and are naively appalled at the success of our instruction."

Professor Williams continues, "What shocks an audience today will be acceptable tomorrow and thus the contemporary dramatist [or reality show producer, my note] is constantly impelled to seek further excesses to gratify a warped taste which he has himself implanted in the public mind....The whole modern cult of violence and animalism is in essence an admission of defeat.  Since we cannot be men to any idealistic extent, let us lapse into barbaric animalism but, still clinging to vestiges of a past which we hate but cannot escape, let us clothe our defeat in high-sounding terms: 'alienation,' 'cult of unpleasure,' 'realism,' and similar jargon.  Yet all this fashionable phraseology cannot conceal the fact that the Emperor has no clothes....The contemporary playwright or producer might well take as his motto, Apres moi, la secheresse (After me, the drought), and congratulate himself that he is writing before a morbid public appetite demands scenes of such repellent realism that actors and actresses will have to be killed on stage in order to satisfy it."

Welcome to the Theater of Lust, the Theater of Violence, the Theater of Antichrist.

God help us all!