By Robert Wenzel
While at times it may be entertaining to watch the political circus move across the continent, here's a warning: Don't take this talk of revolution and populist revolt to seriously.
Yes, the masses are fed up but they have no clue as to what a sound replacement would be to the current establishment overlords.
Bernie Sanders is a social democrat, and even that is probably cover for his real hardcore central planning views. The support he is getting is clear indication that the masses do not understand the evil that central planning is.
With Donald Trump, we have someone who does not appear to be anchored to any political philosophy. At time he sounds like Andrew Jackson but he most often sounds like Mussolini.
As Justin Raimondo
puts it:
Trump is an erratic personality, to say the least, and can hardly be trusted to be consistent in anything but his own egotism. His populist Jacksonian patter could just as easily veer from an inward-looking “isolationism” to an extroverted ultra-nationalist militarism if provoked – and from what I can see, it wouldn’t take much to provoke him.
Trump and Sanders are not the kind of men around which a sound revolution toward liberty is going to be built. They would be merely a change in the style and focus of oppression.
The libertarian movement has come a long way since the days when the entire movement could pretty much fit in the living room of Joey and Murray Rothbard, but we are far, far away from a mass revolution that would move us seriously away from oppression.
This presidential election cycle is not going to do it.
What must be done is for libertarians to continue to study, debate, and intellectually challenge current central planning leanings in others. It is a battle that can be fought on may fronts. A battle that can be taken directly to the masses with sound, clear and powerful presentations of the libertarian ideal. It can be fought on a higher intellectual level by challenging the intellectuals who sell out for a cozy government or academic positions.
Everyone from the full time scholar to the passing commenter at blogs can play a role in this battle. We need liberty battalions. There are many to be moved to get the oppressors off our chest. It can not be done by simply cozying up to the populist cheerleaders surrounding Trump and Sanders. We must capture their minds and that of future populists and turn them into our shock troops. This is not an easy task, but it is the task that must be done.
Right now, it is too early for a libertarian revolution. The troops aren't there.
-RW
