The founders showed us how to survive a President Sanders

This doesn't happen much. I feel impelled to take my seat in front of my word processor and write two contradictory columns.

There's an excellent chance that avowed socialist Bernie Sanders will be the next president of the United States. I want to scold my fellow Americans for allowing this to happen. However, I want to scold even more those Americans too ignorant of eighth-grade Civics to understand all the protections offered by our Constitution and its provisions for how our system of government works.

It's rather easy to be frightened by an avowed socialist who made it to this side of the ramparts. The question arises, "If Bernie is elected, will the same people who voted for him then turn their votes to bringing Congress into the same camp, thus negating the checks and balances built into our Constitution?" I think that's unlikely and that Bernie Sanders will have a tough time implementing his socialist agenda. We saw those checks and balances at work during the impeachment fiasco. We'll see them again should Congress have to deal with a Sanders presidency.

Bernie is riding an incredible wave of political good fortune, as more and more people, woefully and perhaps willfully ignorant of the history of socialism, seem infatuated with his visions of "free stuff."

In the campaign of 2016, a reporter asked Bernie about the abysmal conditions in socialist Venezuela. "I'm not running for president of Venezuela!" snapped Sanders, "I'm running for president of the United States!" Well said, Bernie! How far do you think that explanation is going to get you between now and the next election? Sorry, Bernie, but you've had many opportunities to state the differences between Sanders-ism and Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and all of our long-forgotten Cold War adversaries.

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Those of us who grew up journalistically with the Hungarian Revolution (which killed thousands of Hungarian patriots and which differs only slightly from the history of communism in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua) will never forgive or forget the Tiananmen Square massacre or the countless other examples of what happens when socialism follows its prescribed, inexorable Marxist progression into communism. Don't bother trying to bring us into your cozy cocialism klatsch – we were there. We witnessed it. Don't try to fool us with word games, and don't try to get (or buy!) our vote, ever!

Oops! The other night Bernie even went on record praising Fidel Castro! Trying to show that Castro brought positive change to Cuba, he spoke glowingly of the literacy program the tyrant had implemented. This is actually a well-used leftist tactic, and it continues to fool lots of people. Just as Castro improved the literacy rate among Cubans (those he didn't have murdered!), the Black Panthers had a school breakfast program, and Hitler was a vegetarian who was kind to animals. These are all variations on "Mussolini made the trains run on time," and they are all specious and sophistic. Despite his praise for Castro's positive social programs, Sanders was still lauding the most murderous dictator in the history of our hemisphere. No amount of "good works" can counterbalance that.

Some Americans fear that if Bernie is elected, he will carry Congress along with him. Others throw their shoulders back and say "In a pig's eye!" If Bernie is elected you'll see an exquisite demonstration of checks and balances.

We don't need "rockets' red glare" to prove that our flag is still there. A simple mobilization of anti-socialist members of Congress should accomplish that for us quite nicely.