Real Socialists

Bernie and AOC are back on the trail, with the same tired old tropes...

(Comrades in arms, Bernie and AOC, on the trail back in 2020… to “save democracy,” presumably from wrongthinking voters.)

“If socialists understood economics, they wouldn’t be socialists.”

~ Friedrich A. Hayek

Joel Bowman with today’s Note From the End of the World: Tiranë, Albania...

Poor ol’ Bernie Sanders. If original thinking were ever made a crime, the man would be declared innocent on all counts.

Indeed, and let it be known to the court, never was Bernie so much as seen in the same room as a novel idea, his lifelong commitment to public disservice having afforded him the perfect alibi. For five unrelenting decades has Bernie raged against the free market machine, trotting out a never-ending litany of pro-government sloganeering to slack-jawed, college-brained collectivists.

And now, half a century after he first waded into politics, full of recycled economic illiteracy and rehashed “eat the rich” platitudes, the senator from Vermont is on the campaign trail once again, stirring up nescience with junior comrade-in-arms, Congressperson Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Yes, dear reader, you read that right. The party that lost the American voter in the last general election... along with the House... the Senate... the Presidency... the popular vote... and every single swing state... has decided that the best way to recapture the “sensible center” is...

... to tack even harder to the far-left. No joke!

The Other, Other 1%

Here’s Bernie, taking a break from his “Fight the Oligarchy” tour, in which he and fellow traveler, AOC, jet around the Land of the Free in private planes in order to rally “they, the plebs.”

When questioned about lecturing “the other 99%” from the 1%’s preferred mode of travel, Bernie delivered a masterclass in what “rules for thee, not for me” socialism really looks like:

“You run a campaign and you do three or four or five rallies in a week. That’s the only way you can get around to talk to 30,000 people. You think I’m gonna be sitting on a waiting line at United … while 30,000 people are waiting?”

Shh... don’t tell Bernie about the vast majority of touring performers, who would be thrilled to fly coach in place of simply riding in one. Bernie is not going to wait while you wait, peasant. That’s just not how a man of the people flies. Nor a woman of the people. Nor a they of the people, if it comes to that.

Of course, it stands to reason that Bernie and AOC should unite, even if it’s not on United. The two share a common aversion to common sense after all. One can only imagine how perplexed they must be when, after having been assured of progressing progressive progress by their echo-chamber handlers, they note headlines like...

Rules for Thee

Might we humbly suggest, now that Bernie and AOC have racked up quite the stockpile of private frequent flyer miles, they make a quick detour to this neglected part of the planet, where their boneheaded ideas have already been put to the test in the real world... with predictably disastrous results.

Your peripatetic editor presently finds himself in the charming Balkan country of Albania (not the first mortal to be waylaid en route to Ithaca... more about which anon).

We spent the afternoon, in 90 degree heat, wandering the city’s cool parks and plazas, stopping off now and then for a cool drink or a bite to eat. In the trendy Ish-Blloku (“Ex-Block”) district, we came upon the palatial home of former “man of the people,” communist leader Enver Hoaxha. We could almost imagine a private jet, parked on the enormous lawn out back.

The streets here in the capital, Tiranë, are clean... the restaurant scene is lively... and we have not seen so many high-end luxury vehicles – Bentleys, Maybachs, Maseratis etc. – since we were last in Yerevan, Armenia. But it was not always so...

Recent history, which is to say the past century or so, has not been kind to this southern corner of the Adriatic. Once a strategic stronghold for mighty empires – from the Hellens to the Romans, the Venetians to the Ottomans – twentieth century Albania typically ranks as somewhat of a shameful footnote. And not without good reason.

After gaining its sovereign independence at the Conference of London in 1913, the long-suffering locals endured two short-lived monarchies (between 1914-1925 and 1928-1939) punctuated by an even briefer period as the Albanian Republic (1925-1928). Following the second, failed monarchical experiment, the people were entrusted first to fascist rule, under Italian occupation, then Nazi rule, under Germany, during WWII. Neither ruling power, as one might well imagine, was terribly gentle toward its subjects.

After half-century of kings... coups... war... foreign occupation... and psychopaths from the extreme ends of the political spectrum... to the average Albanian just trying to get along in this world, it might have seemed as though things couldn't possibly get any worse. Then, of course, they did.

For the Greater Bad

The end of WWII left behind a crippled and fractured nation. Fighting soon broke out around the country as rival groups vied for control, with spirited – though heavily outgunned – resistance in the Nikaj-Mertur, Dukagjin and Kelmend provinces. These skirmishes wouldn't last long. After crushing nationalist “rebels,” the communist party swiftly established itself as the unquestionable military and political force of the nation, which was eventually renamed the People's Socialist Republic of Albania. And at its head was Enver Hoxha, who stated his allegiance rather unambiguously:

“The world socialist system is showing with every passing day its indisputable superiority over the capitalist system. It has become the shield of all the progressive forces of the world, the impregnable bulwark of freedom and peace, democracy and socialism.”

Shortly after asserting power, Hoxha’s communist party enacted the Agrarian Reform Law (1945), a hallmark of collectivist ideology that saw large parcels of land "nationalized" for the "greater good."

Before long, the country was well on its way to becoming a full-blown socialist utopia, such that universal healthcare became so free that none could afford to provide it, and state-sponsored education indoctrination was not merely considered a right, but an inescapable obligation.

Even by notoriously wretched collectivist standards, Albania's own experiment ranks poorly. Private property having been duly rendered unto the State, freedom of expression was soon outlawed, too. Political dissent was dealt with by means of torture, "disappearances" and public execution. At one point, the Sigurimi (Albania's secret police, similar to Russia's KGB and East Germany's Stasi), had interrogated, or incarcerated in labor camps, one-third of the entire population. Travel abroad was strictly prohibited, except for those embarking on official State business.

Not a Prayer

Among the many liberties to come under the State's jackboot, freedom to practice one's religion was particularly, aggressively targeted. Lands owned by monasteries and dioceses were seized, centralized and put to the State's service.

Members of religious groups - particularly Islamic waqfs - were tortured and killed. Christian priests and Muslim ulema were targeted as examples to their followers and were dealt with in especially heinous fashion. Within a few years, religious activity had all but been outlawed in Albania. And in 1949, the “Decree on Religious Communities” required that all religious groups and their related activities be sanctioned by the State alone.

During holy periods – Lent, Ramadan, etc. – the State's schools served students food their religious affinities would have forbidden. Children who refused to eat were denounced to the Sigurimi... and dealt with accordingly. So too were their families. Even wearing a beard was strictly prohibited.

The twin pillars of civilized society – private property and freedom of expression (religious and otherwise) – having now been quashed, the communist party was left to embark on a multi-decade reign of terror and violence against its people. And so it did...

To severe political and social curtailments, add the weight of an economy fully collapsed under the yoke of failed centralization. Having isolated itself from Tito's Yugoslavia, Khrushchev's Soviet Union and, eventually, Mao's China, Albania found itself alone in the world. For three straight decades, it ranked as the poorest country in Europe.

Hoxha’s dream of eradicating disparity of wealth had almost come true, with an entire nation of people now reduced to a near equal state… of poverty and abject misery.

By 1990, after half a century enduring the workers’ paradise, the Albanian people were starting to look - and sound - as though they had finally had enough. Though the communist party prevailed in the 1991 elections - the first in the country in over half a century - a general strike later that year made clear the population's dissatisfaction with the result. In March 1992, amid economic collapse and widespread social unrest, the communists were finally routed.

Only then, once the collectivist fantasy was abandoned, could the Albanian people begin along the road to real world freedom.

Stay tuned for more Notes From the End of the World...

Cheers,

Joel Bowman

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