As conservatives, we probably think we missed a huge bullet this year when it comes to self-proclaimed Democratic socialist Senator Bernie Sanders. I mean, as bad as Joe Biden is for our nation right now, a Sanders administration could have been far worse.
And we could all agree that Biden could have nominated Sanders to be part of his cabinet, such as was suggested in recent weeks when discussing who should be the new head of the Department of Labor. Thankfully, we missed that one too, just as we dodged the possibility of Senator Elizabeth Warren becoming the new Treasury secretary.
Let’s just say either choice would have been a bad one.
President-Elect Joe Biden mentioned the situation in a news conference on Friday, saying that while he believes his “friend” Bernie Sanders “could have done a fantastic job” at that position, it would require a special election in Vermont. And with the Senate being what it is, having a fragile but very real margin of majority, it just wasn’t wise to “put control of the Senate at risk on the outcome” of such an election.
And so, Biden claims that both he and Sanders agreed that the near socialist shouldn’t be nominated or take the position.
But with the Georgia runoff elections being won (or stolen) by the Democrats, that doesn’t mean we count ourselves all that lucky.
Apparently, due to the Senate’s tricky situation, Biden made way for Sanders to take on an entirely different and possibly even more powerful position: that of the Senate Budget Committee chairman.
Yes, that’s right – the Senate Budget Committee head is now set to be the most pro-big government and big spending man in Congress.
Such a reality should strike fear into Americans everywhere.
As the New York Times explains, “Republicans have long feared the prospect of Mr. Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist from Vermont, taking the helm of the powerful committee given his embrace of bigger government and more federal spending with borrowed money. With Democrats reclaiming the Senate, that fear is about to become a reality.”
They continued, noting, “Mr. Sanders, the most progressive member of the chamber, will have a central role in shaping and steering the Democrats’ tax and spending plans through a Congress that they control with the slimmest of margins.”
And if Sanders has anything to say about it, those tax and spending plans will begin being pushed through immediately. According to the Times and sources close to the newly appointed lawmaker, Sanders “will move quickly in his new role to push through a robust ad deficit-financed economic stimulus package soon after” Biden takes office.
But what is even more terrifying is that the man, in talking of his future plans in his new role, has begun to use the word “aggressively” to describe how he plans on getting nearly everything done.
Take a recent interview with Politico, for example. Here, he used the word several times, and all of them in a not so conservative light.
He said, “I’m going to use reconciliation in as aggressive a way as I possibly can to address the terrible health and economic crises facing working people today.” Then later he said, “We must move forward aggressively in dealing with the economic crisis facing working families today.” and then he noted, “We’ll be working with my colleagues in the House to figure out how we can come up with the most aggressive reconciliation bill to address the suffering of the American working families today.”
Now, you might notice that all these statements, while said separately, are involved in creating one thing: what he is calling budget reconciliation.
So what is that?
According to Sanders, it is how we make up for the economic losses our nation has faced this year, mainly by creating new jobs for all those who have lost them.
Now, that, in and of itself, is not a bad idea. It’s the types of jobs that should scare us. You know, ones that are based on “transforming our energy system away from fossil fuels to energy efficiency and retrofitting homes and buildings throughout this country, and moving to sustainable forms of energy, and creating jobs in health care.” He also adds that we need to begin “rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, our roads and bridges. And I would add affordable housing to that, as well.”
It’s starting to sound like all his presidential policies rolled into one, isn’t it? Free everything and no fossil fuels, all at the expense of and in the control of the government…
Yes, we should all be very worried.