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There is an old saying that tells an eternal truth: History repeats itself and those who dont understand that are doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over.

This piece of wisdom really rings true in our present political arena. Some in the Democratic Party have taken a sharp turn to the left, endorsing their new brand of democratic socialism and railing against the capitalism that has made our country the strongest, most successful nation in the history of the world.

Support for this political doctrine has been especially strong amongst our young people. They seem clearly drawn to the promises of free stuff, and have little or no understanding of the fact that nothing is free; someone must pay for it all. Also, they have lived in a time of relative peace and prosperity. Few have had any firsthand experience with the horrors that socialism/communism have brought to our world.

Are they being taught about these things in school?

Also, contrary to what the news media and some people say, our country, our form of government and capitalism is superior to any other system in the world. Thats why everyone wants to come here. And we are not a bad country. We are a good country, a country that has made mistakes, but we always try to do whats right in the end.

When I was young and searching for my political identity, I studied and compared different forms of government and partisan ideologies. I made a point of reading our Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, our Bill of Rights and the Communist Manifesto. What I learned from them forever shaped my thinking.

The documents read like point and then counterpoint. The Communist Manifesto would decree something. And the Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights would prohibit that same thing.

Our Constitution was written in 1787 and the Communist Manifesto was written in 1848, only about 60 years apart. The same ideas and methods for enslaving people have been around for centuries. Technology changes but government and human nature dont. Our Founding Fathers and their parents and grandparents lived under these forms of oppression. They understood how they worked and what their end results were. So they wrote our founding documents to protect the newly founded republic and their descendants from its tyranny.

Socialism has been around since the beginning of government and has been reinvented an untold number of times, but always with the same results: oppression, misery, death and destruction. Venezuela is the most recent and visible example. It went from the third richest country in the world to an economic and social basket case in 20 years.

In 1921 Adolf Hitler was elected chairman of the National Socialist German Workers Party in Germany. Under his guidance, it eventually morphed into the Nazi Party that started World War II and killed 73 million people.

More than 100 million people have died in the last century in China, the old Soviet Union, Cuba, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos in the name of socialism/communism. And hundreds of millions more people have suffered from starvation and torture. These countries are now considered Communist.

Communism is just a different form of socialism and socialism almost always turns into communism.

Now we are facing another new brand of socialism fueled by the unproven and exaggerated fear of man-caused climate change and environmental disaster. Operating under the United Nations, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change is making rules and laws that affect the whole world. The UNFCCC is made up of almost 200 countries, most of which are dictatorships, communist- and socialist-led countries, and monarchies. Most are labeled as poor developing countries.

The United States and a small number of countries are categorized as developed countries. Under the rules of the organization, developed countries are called upon to provide new and additional financial resources to meet the costs that developing countries incur while trying to meet environmental standards set by the UNFCCC. What a scam. The countries that get the money help determine how much money they get and what they have to do to get it.

Also, its common knowledge that little of the money sent to third world countries ever makes it past the corrupt political leaders. U.S. taxpayers will be financing a huge part of this scheme, but will have very little say over the situation.

Winston Churchill, one of the most admired leaders in the 20th century, once said: Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance and the gospel of envy; its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.

You can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig. We must learn from history and reject any brand of socialism.

Dugger retired as a journeyman carpenter from Clearwater Paper. He lives in Lewiston.

Excerpt from:
History should teach each generation the horrors of socialism - Lewiston Morning Tribune