The civil war within the Democrat Party is on full display.

The war pits the overt socialists versus crony capitalists and corrupto-crats and was entirely predictable. Beginning in the ‘60s, sensible conservative Democrats in Congress – the REAL moderates unlike those labeled as such by the legacy media these days – were forced out and replaced by ever more liberal (socialist) Democrats over the years.

A conservative Democrat was one who was generally strong on national security matters and more socially and fiscally conservative than other Democrats. Most were from states in the South and Midwest and were grouped as “Dixiecrats” and then, later in the 1980s, “Blue Dog Democrats.” Examples include George Wallace, Lyndon Johnson, Sam Ervin, Sam Nunn, and Fritz Hollings. They and the rest disappeared over time, as the Democrat Party moved inexorably leftward. These days, there is only one left in the Senate – Joe Manchin (D-WV) – and he has become a reliable vote for Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on all of the truly important issues (like the impeachment votes).

Democrat politicians have always schemed to create circumstances in which they would be overwhelmingly reelected year to year. Tax-and-spend was their great ticket to political hegemony in the 1960s – basically pandering to voters by promising “free” social programs. That was what Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society” programs were all about – public welfare programs that bought a LOT of votes and in less than a generation moved African-Americans from their natural Republican home to the Democrat Party. And they’ve been pandering to voters ever since – which is EXACTLY what the current crop of Democrat candidates have been doing this year: Green New Deal, Medicare for All, reparations, debt forgiveness, etc.

One of their greatest and subtlest schemes has been to corrupt the public education system over time. Their goal has been to capture the teachers’ unions (accomplished long ago!) and to insert increasingly socialist and leftist curricula into schools across the country, including cultural Marxist claptrap like intersectionalism, social justice, radical environmentalism, and identity politics (especially feminism and LGBTQ nonsense). The long-term goal has been to churn out generation after generation of liberals who are inclined to vote Democrat and thereby perpetuate the political domination of the Democrat Party in Washington, DC forever. And the plan has worked beyond their wildest dreams (and beyond the nightmares of the rest of us).

The Millennials and Gen Z are sold on environmental radicalism and social and economic, steeped in identity politics, and convinced that socialism is a much better socio-economic system than capitalism. A YouGov poll last fall provides the shocking news that 70% of Millennials say they’d vote for a socialist presidential candidate:

Young Americans continue to lose faith in capitalism and embrace socialism, according to a new YouGov/Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation survey of more than 2,000 Americans 16 years and older. 50% of millennials and 51% of Generation Z have a somewhat or very unfavorable view of capitalism — increases of 8 and 6 percentage points from last year. Meanwhile, the share of millennials who say they are “extremely likely” to vote for a candidate who identifies as a socialist doubled. 19% of millennials and 12% of Gen Z said they thought the Communist Manifesto “better guarantees freedom and equality for all” than the Declaration of Independence. That’s compared to just 2% of baby boomers and 5% of Gen X. Just 7% of boomers said they had at least a “somewhat favorable” view of communism — compared to more than a third of millennials and more than a quarter of Gen Z.

Boomers like the Clintons, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and most older Democrats in Congress – who make up the Democrat Establishment – pay lip service to socialism because that is what they have been selling for decades (without saying the actual word), but the reality is that most are corrupt corporate capitalists who have gotten rich by leeching off Wall Street and feeding at the public trough over the years. They are not about to take the leap to full-blown socialism to join the likes of Bernie Sanders. But their political machinations in the public school system and in America’s cultural institutions has created a monster – a growing radicalization of the Democrat Party base.

That radicalization was first glimpsed in 2016 when Bernie nearly beat out Hillary Clinton (the conventional wisdom is that the nomination was “stolen” from him by the Democrat Establishment). And the leftward movement in the Democrat Party has only accelerated with the election to Congress of the radical “Squad” in 2018 who have pushed socialist schemes like the Green New Deal into the forefront of Democrat Party politics. What we are witnessing in the current “Bernie surge” in the Democrat primaries are the socialist chickens coming home to roost. There are leftwing organizations like the Justice Democrats and the Indivisible Team sprouting up all over who are backing radicals like The Squad for Congress in 2020, too. And the Democrat Establishment know that their own political power and authority are at great risk with a Bernie candidacy because Americans still favor capitalism over socialism by wide margins in all polls conducted over the past 50 or more years.

The law of unintended consequences is biting the Democrat Establishment in the butt bigly. They miscalculated completely and forgot the cardinal rule of all leftist revolutions – that those who make revolution are themselves victimized and replaced by subsequently more extreme people. That has happened in France, Russia, and elsewhere since the Middle Ages. And now it’s happening to the Democrat Establishment, who thought that their takeover of America’s cultural institutions would keep them in power ad infinitum through undermining the US Constitution and the rule of law (the essence of their revolution to destroy the American Republic as founded). The Democrats didn’t plan for the Justice Democrats, the Indivisible Team, The Squad, or the likes of a Bernie candidacy. If they had, they would never have allowed Bernie to run in Democrat Party primaries in the first place.

A message to the modern-day Democrat versions of Robespierre: get ready for the political version of the guillotine because the sun is setting on your world.

The end.

Stu Cvrk served 30 years in the US Navy in a variety of active and reserve capacities, with considerable operational experience in the Middle East and the Western Pacific. An oceanographer and systems analyst through education and experience, Stu is a graduate of the US Naval Academy where he received a classical liberal education which serves as the key foundation for his political commentary. He threads daily on Twitter on a wide range of political, military, foreign policy, government, economics, and world affairs topics. Read more by Stu Cvrk