Bernie Sanders: ‘Socialist Hero’ Under Fire For ‘Gaming The System’
Bernie Sanders ran one of the most talked-about presidential campaigns of all time in one of the most unusual election years. Largely seen as the antidote to money in politics, he was the individual who many cash-strapped college students saw as their salvation.
But a new commentary from a popular political pundit has painted Bernie Sanders in a different light. In fact, the pundit says, Sanders used his followers to “game the system” and become exactly what he railed against on the campaign trail.
On a recent episode of The Ben Shapiro Show, the titular host took aim at Bernie Sanders for refusing to reveal his campaign finances.
What will happen to Bernie Sanders’s political revolution? https://t.co/dD1Vs30c5M pic.twitter.com/L9VoNzuBdh
— The Atlantic (@TheAtlantic) August 25, 2016
Shapiro wasn’t buying Sanders’ excuse that it “doesn’t make any sense” to release his financials since he is no longer running for the presidency. Bernie Sanders’ exact take was that completing such a filing would be “a waste of time.”
Shapiro explained that Bernie Sanders was “supposed to file his current financial information May 15, but got an extension.”
“Now if you’ll remember, during the primaries, Bernie Sanders called for ‘complete transparency regarding the funding of campaigns,'” Shapiro said, then quoting an NBC News article and saying, “Voters couldn’t know whether Sanders, historically one of the Senate’s least wealthy members, suddenly parlayed his political fame into personal profit or, for that matter, whether he sustained financial distress.”
Had Bernie Sanders filed his campaign financials, it would have detailed his information through the middle of May 2016, but to Shapiro, there is a reason he didn’t do so.
“Like all good socialists, he’s a little touchy about his own finances, and he games the system,” Shapiro explained, adding that socialists “never take personal responsibility for their own personal economics or for their campaign economics or for their economic policies at all.”
Pointing to Venezuela as an example of the socialist policies Bernie Sanders endorses, Shapiro remarked how the citizenry is “busy killing horses to eat them” and “murdering one another over loaves of bread down there, and they’re doing that because Venezuela has used Bernie Sanders’ economics.”
Contrast that with Sanders, Shapiro said, who is “sitting pretty with three homes and a wife who bankrupted a college thanks to her frivolous spending.”
He continued, “Yes, seriously. Because it turns out when it comes to the socialists, what’s good for the goose is not good for the Sanders.”
This is not the first time that Shapiro has taken aim at Bernie Sanders of late. Earlier, in response to a Sanders tweet challenging Republicans to “get another job” if they did not have the guts “to defend your ideas in a free election,” Shapiro responded, “You endorsed Hillary, then you bought a vacation home, socialist hero.”
Shapiro often stirs controversy when he goes to speak on college campuses. A former Breitbart editor, he is also an outspoken critic of Donald Trump and is widely known as the editor who resigned his position when Breitbart did not support a journalist who said she was attacked by Trump’s former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski.
Our Revolution, @BernieSanders‘ new political group, won’t have to disclose its donors: https://t.co/sqACBn1Bgv pic.twitter.com/HJnPqb6Uoz
— Sunlight Foundation (@SunFoundation) August 26, 2016
That said, he raises an interesting point with regard to Bernie Sanders. Given what the Vermont Senator stood for and the large crowds of supporters he drew, does he owe it to the American people at this point to be transparent with his finances, especially if he’s going to go on the attack for Hillary Clinton?
What do you think, readers? Did Bernie Sanders game the system as Shapiro accuses? Sound off in the comments section.
[Image via Randy Bayne | Flickr Creative Commons | Resized and Cropped | CC BY-NC-ND 2.0]
