The latest Civitas Poll notes that almost a quarter (23 percent) of North Carolinians want the country to become “more socialist.” That seems like a high number. It reminds me of a headline a few years ago in a Texas newspaper that read “Only 38 percent of Texans support secession.” Of course, the word “only” is kind of dwarfed by that 38 percent number, which seems like a lot when talking about a topic like secession.
At any rate, could you imagine the 23 percent enthusiasm number for socialism ever being polled in North Carolina during the Cold War era? No way! “Wolverines,” to quote the defiant cry of the American teenage freedom fighters from “Red Dawn.”
A look at the crosstabs for the poll clearly shows that socialism has the highest favorability amongst the 18-34 age group. Thirty-four percent in that age range have at least a favorable or somewhat favorable view of socialism.
It’s certainly a reminder, in part, that ‘the long march through the institutions’ has indeed had a profound impact on the younger generations. The Left knew that capturing the colleges would eventually pay dividends. Politics and public-policy are downstream of culture and still, conservatism is largely unequipped to compete in the cultural arena.
Socialism, of course, as Alexis de Tocqueville noted so well, is just another form of slavery. It is completely inimical to America’s Founding and largely a 20th Century nightmare some of our world has still not recovered from.
The infamous economics professor Wilhelm Röpke probably summed up socialism best:
“The drab single-toned dreariness which socialism would bring into our lives and the happiness it would take away, are immeasurable.”
