When a politician starts talking about “income inequality” and promises to use the authority and force of government to “correct” it, that person is a Marxist, and the people who voted for him because he made such a promise are also Marxists.

A Facebook friend did not believe it was a moral problem for people to vote for somebody who was going to use his or her political office to take money from some people to give it to other people. It’s the American way! All you need is a majority. Here’s my response:

Would it be OK to get a majority to rob a neighbor because he has more stuff than you do? But somehow it’s OK to elect people to political office to take some of your neighbor’s stuff and pass it around to you and your friends.

He claimed that “Bill de Blasio does not embrace Marxism, but rather, adheres to ‘democratic socialism.’” I feel so much better knowing that, and apparently you should too. He even helps us out with a definition:

According to the YOUNG DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISTS OF AMERICA, “Democratic socialists believe that both the economy and society should be run democratically—to meet public needs, not to make profits for a few. To achieve a more just society, many structures of our government and economy must be radically transformed through greater economic and social democracy so that ordinary Americans can participate in the many decisions that affect our lives.”

I was hoping that he was only being sarcastic. He wasn’t.

He went on to write, “De Blasio’s hope, as far as I can tell, is to bring greater economic health/balance to NYC via ‘democratic’ means that will help those who are economically less fortunate than the uber-wealthy who are inhabiting The Big Apple.”

There you have it. Theft and coercion by majority vote. He’s OK with this. He actually appealed to the Bible, quoting Matthew 22:21: “Then render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and to God the things that are God’s.” Even the Caesars of this world are bound by God’s law.

I pointed out that we don’t live under Caesar, and if we did, we should do everything in our power to relieve ourselves from his tyranny and rule.

The naiveté of so many Christians is frightening, especially when such acculturated Marxist sitting in church each Sunday appeals to the Bible to use it as a way to empower Caesar, the same Caesar that crucified Jesus and put Christians to death. Notice how he wraps his confiscatory policies in redemptive terms:

[W]e have the scarlet thread of redemption [in the Bible] that is seen against the backdrop of many principles that are God-centered; principles by which we are to live: i.e., compassion, love, gentleness, understanding, tender-heartedness, mercy, etc. Today, we live in a democratic-republic society where, at least on the local level, people CAN and DO make decisions based on votes. Sorry, that’s the way it is. That’s the system we have. If you don’t like it, well … go vote for what you do like. As for Cuba, North Korea, and Communist Russia/China, making reference to those kinds of regimes in a friendly discussion about De Blasio is a bit … over the top.

This discussion is first about ethics and only secondarily about politics. Yes, we know people vote for immoral policies. That may be the “way it is,” but it’s not the way it should be. Posting pictures of adorable babies is not a remedy for what they might face 20 years from now. The decisions we make today will impact them tomorrow.

It’s always “over the top” until the people who were put into power come after your property. When the Sixteenth Amendment was proposed, the people who naively supported it were told that it was a way to extract money for the super-rich. It was for “the other guy.” The people were warned and duped.

I’m sure those who warned the people about the regimes of Hitler, Castro, Stalin, and Mao were accused of being a “bit over the top.”

It’s not “compassion, love, gentleness, understanding, tender-heartedness, mercy” when politicians take money from some people so they can give it to other people. A person can’t be compassionate with other people’s money. And it’s not “compassion, love, gentleness, understanding, tender-heartedness, mercy” when people vote to take money from some people so it can be given to other people.

It’s called theft. If you want to be loving and merciful, then use your own money as millions of people in America do every day. The politicians want the people to believe that they are the ones who are being compassionate when they vote for higher taxes and more wealth distribution.

What my Marxist sympathetic friend does not understand is that policies like those of de Blasio have created more misery, poverty, and despair than the “uber-wealthy” have ever done.

So the next time you go to church, you may be sitting next to a Marxist who will vote to have some politician pick your pocket in the name of Jesus and call it biblical truth.