Policy Debates Replaced by “Seen What Your Neighbor Owns?”
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Socialist campaign strategists have discovered an astonishingly effective electoral formula: Locate an unhappy voter, identify somebody wealthier and promise to introduce the two through the Internal Revenue Service.
The strategy has transformed American politics by eliminating the traditional requirement that candidates explain how their economic proposals actually work.
The Campaign Consultant Who Skipped the Economics
“People don’t want complicated fiscal policy,” explained campaign consultant Trevor Handout. “They want to know why the guy across the street has a Mercedes when they’re driving a twelve-year-old Hyundai.”
Handout developed the approach after spending three months interviewing voters about their financial frustrations.
He discovered that asking people how to improve their lives produced complicated answers involving education, employment, savings and difficult personal choices.
Asking them who should pay for improving their lives produced immediate consensus.
“Somebody rich,” respondents explained.
The campaign subsequently eliminated its economic policy department and replaced it with a large photograph of a billionaire.
At rallies, candidates point toward the photograph whenever audiences ask how their programs will be funded.
“That guy,” they explain.
The technique reportedly reduces the average economic explanation from forty minutes to three seconds.
Inside the Internal Memo
An internal memo circulated to field staff and obtained by reporters sets out the rules for canvassers: “Do not use the word ‘budget.’ Do not use the word ‘deficit.’ If asked about cost, point.”
Door-to-Door: How a Canvasser Turns a Homeowner Into a Socialist
A campaign volunteer demonstrated the process during a neighborhood canvassing operation.
“Are you happy with your finances?” she asked homeowner Gerald Porter.
“Not particularly.”
“Would you like more money?”
“Obviously.”
“Excellent. Do you know anybody who has more money than you?”
“My brother.”
“Congratulations. You’re a socialist.”
Porter initially resisted the classification, explaining that his brother had built a successful electrical contracting business.
The volunteer assured him that this was precisely the sort of activity the movement intended to investigate.
“The money didn’t just appear,” Porter protested.
“Exactly,” she replied. “Somebody must have taken it from somewhere.”
The “Make It Fair” Tax Calculator
Campaign officials have also developed a revolutionary tax calculator.
Users enter their annual income, identify a person whose income annoys them and click a button labeled “Make It Fair.”
The calculator immediately produces an estimate of how much happier the user would feel if the other person earned less.
Text messages between two campaign staffers, shared with a reporter by one of them, show the calculator’s first test run producing a happiness estimate of “112 percent.” One staffer wrote: “That can’t be right.” The other replied: “Ship it.”
Why Economists Say Growth Beats Redistribution
Economists caution that transferring money can address hardship but cannot substitute for policies that encourage investment, productivity and economic growth. The Bureau of Economic Analysis tracks the growth that those policies are supposed to produce, which is one reason nobody on the campaign has opened its website.
Socialist strategists consider these objections unnecessarily mathematical.
“Growth takes time,” Handout explained. “Envy is immediate. You can organize envy before breakfast.”
A poll of 700 likely voters by the Great Lakes Center for Public Attitudes found that 58 percent said they supported “making things fair,” while 71 percent said they were not sure what “fair” would cost them personally. Nine percent asked whether the poll was about the guy with the Mercedes.
The Victory Party and the Four-to-Six-Year Wait
The movement’s advertising campaign features ordinary Americans staring angrily at expensive houses, luxury automobiles and restaurant bills.
One commercial shows a man attempting to assemble furniture while his wealthy neighbor hires a carpenter.
The narrator asks, “Why should one family have professional assistance while another has to read Swedish instructions?”
The proposed solution is a federal furniture equity tax.
At the campaign’s victory celebration, supporters demanded to know when their promised money would arrive.
Handout smiled and explained that the government must first establish eligibility criteria, revenue targets and an administrative distribution agency.
“How long will that take?” one supporter asked.
“Four to six years.”
“What do we do until then?”
Handout pointed toward the photograph of the billionaire.
“Keep hating that guy.”
Five Humorous Observations
- The campaign replaced its economic policy department with a photograph. Honestly, that’s an upgrade. A photograph never asks for a raise and it can’t be subpoenaed.
- “You do know somebody who has more money than you? Congratulations, you’re a socialist.” That’s not an ideology. That’s how my cousin Denny got into the Elks Lodge.
- A button called “Make It Fair” that tells you how much happier you’d be if someone else made less. Finally, an app that does what my brother-in-law’s Christmas letter does, only without the stamps.
- One guy’s furniture came with Swedish instructions and now there’s a federal tax about it. I’ve been to that store. The tax should be on the meatballs, not the bookcase.
- Four to six years until the money arrives, and meanwhile you keep hating that guy. That’s the most honest retirement plan I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen mine.