Not a single person lives today who either was enslaved in the United States or has owned slaves in the United States. Indeed, generations have passed since anyone could claim either status. Nevertheless, one presidential candidate pledges to address this long-dead issue. From the Daily Mail:
Bernie Sanders committed [Wednesday] to formally apologizing for slavery on behalf of the United States if he becomes president.
Sanders told heavily black audience [at] Tindley Temple United Methodist Church, ‘There’s nothing that anybody can do to undo the deaths and misery, how many people we don’t even know who died on the way over here in the ships.’
But the United States has to make an attempt to ‘wipe the slate clean’ by acknowledging the truth, he said after an audience member asked him point blank if he’d offer a presidential-level apology and he said, ‘Yes.’
The absurdity of this pledge cannot be overstated. Sanders has nothing to apologize for, and no one to apologize to. The notion that America must “‘wipe the slate clean’ by acknowledging the truth” suggests widespread institutional denial of the historical record. No such denial exists. We would have to search long and far for a single person, let alone an institution, that fails to acknowledge that slavery happened. An apology today, from a non-slave-owner to a constituency of non-slaves, means precisely nothing.
But that’s not the worst of it. Sanders openly advocates slavery. It’s his entire platform! His expressed goal is to enslave the American population one to another, putting taxpayers on the hook for every conceivable need a resident might have. There exists no fundamental difference between forcing someone to pay for your college and forcing them to pick your cotton. None. It’s the same thing. It is slavery, and Bernie Sanders is for it. Worse than impotent posturing, Sander’s commitment to apologize for slavery is a vile expression of hypocrisy.
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