OPINION:
The leading Democrat Party candidate for mayor of New York City is a socialist-slash-communist named Zohran Mamdani who wants to take tax dollars from hard-working Americans to buy food, housing, medical care, child care, education and more for illegals, for nonworkers, for the entitled and lazy class.
He just took a time-out from his campaign to fly to his wealthy parents’ elitist property in Uganda to marry his fiancée in a three-day ceremony that came complete with masked security guards and cellphone jamming system.
This is the face of socialism and communism.
There are the few select at the top of the chain who spend their days issuing orders and redistributing other people’s money, all while claiming to care about the little guy; all while living the high life off others’ work and productivity and finances. Then there are the many, many at the bottom, the working class, the peon class, the classes and masses of those who work their butts off to pay for the cushy lifestyles of their socialist overlords and for their socialist overlords’ pet picks and projects.
That’s all.
There’s a few at the top. There’s a multitude at the bottom. There are no in-betweens — no middle classes.
That’s one reason socialism and communism are so soul-sucking and soul-killing: They are systems without enticements and incentives to improve.
If you’re not one of the lucky few born into a life of privilege, or hand-selected to join these privileged lifers, then the future is bleak, because the future belongs to the whims of the governing authorities. Want to move up the ladder with hard work and responsible planning? Maybe; maybe not. It all depends on how the political winds blow and how those in charge of controlling the winds decide is best for the collective.
But the collective is never deemed so important as to dent the desires of the elitist class.
“Outside the Mamdani house were more than 20 special forces command unit guards, some in masks, and there was a phone-jamming system set up — and all for the strictly invite-only Mamdani event,” one witness told the New York Post.
“One gate had around nine guards stationed at it,” the witness also said.
Wow. That’s more than socialists and communists — and Democrats — want to station at America’s entire southern border.
Remember this?
“President Barack Obama called Wall Street executives ‘fat cats,’ criticized their bonuses and tried to raise their taxes,” The Wall Street Journal wrote in 2012.
Or this, from American Enterprise Institute, in 2010: “Under Obama, Crony Capitalism Again Rules the Day.”
Or this, from Obama’s July 13, 2012, campaign speech in Virginia, when he said, “If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.”
Not to focus on Obama — but he does provide a wealth of remarks that show the dark underbelly of socialism. On the surface, it’s all about equality, and fairness, and propping up the neighbors and leaving no individual behind, and one hand helping the other so that all can achieve. But just below that thin veneer of happy, happy, happy is the price tag.
Somebody’s got to pay for all the propping.
And it sure ain’t the politicians.
“Mamdani celebrated his recent nuptials with a lavish, three-day affair at his family’s ritzy, secluded Ugandan compound,” the New York Post wrote. “The gates of the bustling, private compound, which sits in the wealthy Buziga Hill area … were heavily guarded by military-style, masked men this week, with guests streaming in and partying until midnight. … The neighborhood is home to some of Uganda’s richest.”
Nothing but the best for Mamdani, 33, and his 27-year-old bride. And that’s fine; that’s how it should be; that’s a private market, a capitalistic market, and personal choice all at work.
But it’d be better if he wanted that for the rest of the citizens of the world, as well.
His campaign platforms are to freeze rents; use tax dollars to stock grocery stores; provide “free” transportation to all and “free” child care for all and “free” medical care for some. By free, it’s meant, tax-paid.
He wants to “Trump-proof” New York City because President Trump, he said, on his campaign website, “is tearing at the fabric of New York City.”
If Mamdani’s platforms were all put into effect, the only millionaires and billionaires and people of affluence would be — those who were either born into elitism or who were chosen by the elites to join in their circle. In other words: The only ones who could afford a three-day, gate-guarded, masked security patrolled wedding party would be the few, the chosen, the lucky.
Socialists and communists aren’t just elitist. They’re hypocritical. And they want to make sure nobody can ever, ever “build that” unless given permission from the socialist-communist powers-who-be.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “God-Given Or Bust: Defeating Marxism and Saving America With Biblical Truths,” is available by clicking HERE.
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