Who's the Socialist?

He's the socialist!

This is Brian Moore, the Socialist Party USA nominee for president. And he's tired of Sen. McCain and Sen. Obama calling each other socialists, since as he said last night on The Colbert Report, they're both "capitalists."

Lesson of the Day

So Sen. Obama's a socialist (hiss, boo), huh? Let's define socialism with some help from our friend Wikipedia.

Socialism refers to a broad set of economic theories of social organization advocating state or collective ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and the creation of an egalitarian society.^[1][2] Modern socialism originated in the late nineteenth-century working class political movement. Karl Marx posited that socialism would be achieved via class struggle and a proletarian revolution which represents the transitional stage between capitalism and communism.^[3][4]

Egalitarian society? What is that?

Egalitarianism (derived from the French word égal, meaning equal) is a political doctrine that holds that all people should be treated as equals, and have the same political, economic, social, and civil rights.^[1] Generally it applies to being held equal under the law and society at large. In actual practice, one may be considered an egalitarian in most areas listed above, even if not subscribing to equality in every possible area of individual difference.

OK, now we've gotten our terms defined. But has anyone bothered to ask any REAL socialists (i.e. those who are affiliated with a number of socialist parties) if Sen. Obama measures up.

First, here is an article from September published in Human Events, a conservative magazine founded in 1944.

Here's what Greg Pason of the Socialist Party USA had to say:

Barack Obama's programs are not socialist. The vast majority of his proposals are anti-worker (or he might say ‘pro-business’). His health care proposals are more to save the for-profit insurance industry and do not have the goal of ending for-profit insurance. He has refused to support a Senate version of HR676, which would create a single-payer program (not socialist but much better than we have, and [which has] the support of labor and community organizations across the US). Many of his other economic proposals are pro-corporate.

A socialist program (even a reformist one) would not be a program that props up capitalism when it fails, but one that transforms the economy. None of Senator Obama's proposals do that. Senator Obama’s tax plan is regressive and even less ‘progressive’ than programs put forward under such conservative administrations like the one of Richard Nixon.

Not even close.

What about F.N. Brill of the World Socialist Party?

Obama is as much a socialist as the Pope is an atheist. Income redistribution isn't a socialist act. It might aid in ameliorating income disparities within a capitalist economy for a limited time. But the logic of capitalism demands the rich grow richer (more capitalization is needed) and the poor grow poorer (their work creates the needed capital used by the rich).

So the REAL socialists say no.

Here's some more from the Chicago Tribune.