A short video has surfaced of a shirtless Bernie Sanders singing and partying with his Soviet buddies in 1988. Bear in mind that the Berlin Wall did not come down until 1989, and the Soviet empire did not officially end until 1991. Sanders was mayor of Burlington, Vermont at the time, but would shortly be elected to Congress and then the Senate. Sanders chose the Soviet Union as the perfect place to honeymoon with his new wife.
The video was reportedly released on twitter by a fan of Robert Francis “Beta” O’Rourke, presumably with the hope of embarrassing the Bernie Sanders presidential campaign.
The video is a reminder that Sanders has a long association with communism, not an ideal feature for a US presidential contender. Per the NY Post, “In college, Sanders joined the Young People’s Socialist League, the youth wing of the Socialist Party USA. He also organized for a communist front, the United Packinghouse Workers Union, which at the time was under investigation by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. After graduating with a political science degree, Sanders moved to Vermont, where he headed the American People’s History Society, an organ for Marxist propaganda. There, he produced a glowing documentary on the life of socialist revolutionary Eugene Debs, who was jailed for espionage during the Red Scare and hailed by the Bolsheviks as ‘America’s greatest Marxist.'”
Bernie Sanders nearly won the Democratic Party nomination for president in 2016, losing with 46% of the primary vote to Hillary Clinton’s 54%.
For anyone who still thinks that communism has merits and should be considered a legitimate option in current politics, here are ten films that might convince you otherwise.