The Sanders Contract

Free college! Crackdown on the banks! Bernie Sanders is gaining steam quickly, capitalizing on the anger of people who believe (not without reason) that they are being oppressed by the Corporations, the CEO's, the "1%". When the crowds form, though, they don't understand what Sanders truly stands for, and what they are truly signing up for when they support him.

Let's say that you live in a neighborhood with a few lower-income housing areas, a bunch of reasonably nice houses, and this one mansion up at one end. It is owned by a total jerk. He wolf-whistles at women when they try to jog through the neighborhood. He throws loud parties at night. His vehicle's engine has been modified to sound like a roar, and it grates on your nerves every time he drives by. He is making your neighborhood unhappy.

Now, if he were any of you, he would be taken down by noise ordinances and harassment laws. However, the government keeps granting him special privileges and special permissions, because he is rich, and he pays more through taxes than the rest of you combined. He is, to borrow the phrase, "too big to fail".

One day, a Federal agent comes to your door and offers to rid you of this problem. "I can initiate house inspections on his mansion whenever I please, and cite him for the silliest infractions," he says. "I can change the environmental standards to make his car modification illegal. I can even set caps on the size of house he is allowed to own, and change them at will."

Everyone likes this idea. He offers them a contract, and they barely glance through it before signing it. Now they'll finally get rid of the nuisance.

However, the contract contains these clauses. They give the Federal agent the right to initiate house inspections on any house in the neighborhood whenever he pleases. He can change the environmental standards on all cars in the neighborhood. He can set neighborhood-wide caps on the houses that everyone is allowed to own, and change them at will. In short, anything he is allowed to do to this jerk neighbor, he is allowed to do to you. A couple of people notice this and ask him about it. His response: "Oh, I'm sure that you will never have a big enough house or a loud enough car for this to affect you."

Do you trust him?

What is the alternative? Hillary Clinton is the one claiming that the jerk is too big to fail. What about the Republicans? Well, most of them are of one mind on the issue. Picture now a different Federal agent entering the neighborhood.

"Well, if we were to have the power to harass him in his home, we would have the power to harass you in your homes, and I don't think you want to give that away. If we could decide how big his house can be, we would decide how big yours can be. Do you really want to limit your ambitions? What we can do is to remove the government privileges which safeguard him from harassment charges and nuisance fines. No, it probably won't drive him out of the neighborhood altogether, but at least he will know that he has to behave himself, and it'll be better for all of you."

So here's the question, then. Are you so determined to "punish the rich", to hate the "1%", to see to the ruin of another human being (however justifiable it may seem), that you are willing to give the government the power to decide whether or not you will be the next target?

If so, then vote for Bernie Sanders, and may he have mercy upon you.