Nonsense. Not supporting Bernie Sanders this time around (my first choice is Elizabeth Warren), but the hammer and sickle are the symbols of the now defunct USSR (Union of Soviet SOCIALIST Republics).
The old Soviet Union was not socialist, regardless of what was in the name. Neither is Cuba, North Korea or China.
There have been various systems that CALL themselves socialist, but they aren’t really. Just because it’s in a name does not make it so, or else you would have to conclude that the People’s Republic of China and the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea are “Republican populist” states.
Even Bernie is no communist, much less an actual socialist.
He is a solid New Deal Democrat who just doesn’t want to join the party unless he can be its nominee for president.
“Socialism” espoused by American PROgressives who call themselves “democratic socialists” is more akin to the kind of regulated Keynesian market economics practiced in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Canada, Finland New Zealand, Iceland or the Netherlands, and the United States under the New Deal until first Nixon and then Reagan started dismantling it.
In all of these countries, there are private businesses and for-profit corporations (IKEA, Nokia, Volvo, Skype, Ericsson, Saab), but they are extensively regulated to protect workers, consumers and our shared environment, as well as (except the U.S.) providing a comprehensive safety net to provide universal education through college and health care as public policy matters in the same way as we handle police, firefighters, emergency disaster relief and public education in K-12.
They are not free, but provided as a public good through taxes. Higher taxes are more than offset by not paying the costs of massive profits and overhead for corporate middlemen who siphon of dollars but contribute NOTHING to actual education or health care.
THAT is the kind of model American “democratic socialists” aspire to.
Nonsense. Not supporting Bernie Sanders this time around (my first choice is Elizabeth Warren), but the hammer and sickle are the symbols of the now defunct USSR (Union of Soviet SOCIALIST Republics).
The old Soviet Union was not socialist, regardless of what was in the name. Neither is Cuba, North Korea or China.
There have been various systems that CALL themselves socialist, but they aren’t really. Just because it’s in a name does not make it so, or else you would have to conclude that the People’s Republic of China and the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea are “Republican populist” states.
Even Bernie is no communist, much less an actual socialist.
He is a solid New Deal Democrat who just doesn’t want to join the party unless he can be its nominee for president.
“Socialism” espoused by American PROgressives who call themselves “democratic socialists” is more akin to the kind of regulated Keynesian market economics practiced in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Canada, Finland New Zealand, Iceland or the Netherlands, and the United States under the New Deal until first Nixon and then Reagan started dismantling it.
In all of these countries, there are private businesses and for-profit corporations (IKEA, Nokia, Volvo, Skype, Ericsson, Saab), but they are extensively regulated to protect workers, consumers and our shared environment, as well as (except the U.S.) providing a comprehensive safety net to provide universal education through college and health care as public policy matters in the same way as we handle police, firefighters, emergency disaster relief and public education in K-12.
They are not free, but provided as a public good through taxes. Higher taxes are more than offset by not paying the costs of massive profits and overhead for corporate middlemen who siphon of dollars but contribute NOTHING to actual education or health care.
THAT is the kind of model American “democratic socialists” aspire to.