ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Socialism, in the face of President Donald Trump’s rise to the White House, has seen a surge of activism, with membership to the Democratic Socialists of America jumping to record levels and tripling in size over the last year.

Call it the year of the snowflakes.

“People really felt that they had to do something to combat the incoming Trump administration,” said David Duhalde, deputy director of the DSA’s national leadership, in the Los Angeles Times. “We’re not only somebody you can resist Trump with. We’re somebody you can build a better world with.”

Really? Where?

It’d be nice if socialists could offer up a solid example of where in the world their particular brand of government take-over has proven a success. Sweden used to be their go-to example. But lately, Sweden, with its over-generous use of taxpayer dollars to fund cradle-to-grave entitlements, has been swarmed by needy refugees from mostly Muslim nations who’ve not exactly proven adaptable to polite society. This, from Zero Hedge: “In the most recent example of authorities suggesting that Europeans should adapt to threats rather than compelling authorities to protect citizens, police in Sweden’s Ostersund advised women not to walk around by themselves at night.”

Even if Sweden weren’t being overrun with crime-committing migrants right now, the country’s still not the best example of socialism. It’s more like a mass entitlement nation — like an America under Democratic control, on steroids.

But the Bernie Sanders believers of this country don’t get too in the weeds on the definition of free stuff. Their overall belief is if taxpayers are paying, they’re for it — and whether that’s socialism, or democratic socialism, or some other -ism, isn’t much of a concern. So now the DSA’s membership rolls have risen to 19,000.

Those are reportedly paying members.

And that’s a number that’s higher than the DSA, which was founded in 1982, has ever had.

Why now? Why this time in history?

Political analysts will point to the Trump factor, and say it’s because the new president is so vitriolic, so hateful, so racist and bigoted and so forth. But that’s a surface scratch analysis. Trump didn’t turn Americans into socialists.

No. Blame the public school systems for that — the school systems and parents who’ve raised incompetent snowflakes who can’t take care of themselves and don’t believe in anything aside from their own desires.

We’ve got schools across America that fail to teach the historical greatness of our country because doing so is seen as offensive to minorities. George Washington? Thomas Jefferson? Samuel Adams? Racist white men. The Constitution? A racist document. The original tea party — the one in Boston? A terrorist event.

Sovereignty’s bad — selfish even. The United Nations and a worldview are good. And government’s rightful role? To provide for citizens — to provide everything for citizens.

These are the messages being school-fed the younger generation. And against this backdrop is the demise of the traditional American family, the one where both parents — a man and a woman — are considered ideal and necessary for the raising of proper children, who can properly contribute to the society at-large. God and church, the once-mainstays of American life? Forget about it. The rising generation of believers in nothing — the Nones, as Pew and other research groups have called them — are now assuming positions of leadership and power.

Government has become both parent and God.

So rising membership in DSA? Trump may be the excuse the group uses to recruit. But he’s certainly not the root of how this socialist message has spread across U.S. soil.

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