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Galindez writes: "At Georgetown University on Thursday afternoon, Bernie
Sanders outlined his vision of what democratic socialism is. Earlier that
morning, Hillary Clinton gave an address on fighting ISIS. MSNBC showed all
of Hillary's speech but ignored Bernie."
Senator Bernie Sanders. (photo: Reuters)
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Senator Bernie Sanders. (photo: Reuters)
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Sanders' Address on Democratic Socialism: Amazing and Blacked-Out
By Scott Galindez, Reader Supported News
20 November 15
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Georgetown University on Thursday afternoon, Bernie Sanders outlined his
vision of what democratic socialism is. Earlier that morning, Hillary
Clinton gave an address on fighting ISIS. MSNBC showed all of Hillary's
speech but ignored Bernie. There has been some media coverage of the speech,
but nobody cut live to Sanders like they did for Clinton.
I did see more coverage of the lead carnival barker, Donald Trump, saying he
would implement a registry for Muslims, while one of the most important,
substantive speeches of the election cycle was almost ignored.
The media blackout of Sanders is not going away anytime soon. Bernie
supporters must go around the media and use the social media to help the
campaign get their message out. Share stories widely, support independent
media, help Bernie 2016 TV get off the ground. If we don't do these things,
we will surely be watching Hillary Clinton win the nomination.
Luckily for those of us feeling the bern, Georgetown University streamed the
speech on Ustream. I watched the stream on Bernie 2016 TV with nearly 3,000
others using Twitter and other platforms to discuss the speech as it took
place. People were very excited as Bernie laid out his vision.
Bernie opened by invoking the vision of FDR:
In his inaugural remarks in January 1937, in the midst of the Great
Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt looked out at the nation and
this is what he saw.
He saw tens of millions of its citizens denied the basic necessities of
life.
He saw millions of families trying to live on incomes so meager that the
pall of family disaster hung over them day by day.
He saw millions denied education, recreation, and the opportunity to better
their lot and the lot of their children.
He saw millions lacking the means to buy the products they needed and by
their poverty and lack of disposable income denying employment to many other
millions.
He saw one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished.
And he acted. Against the ferocious opposition of the ruling class of his
day, people he called economic royalists, Roosevelt implemented a series of
programs that put millions of people back to work, took them out of poverty
and restored their faith in government. He redefined the relationship of the
federal government to the people of our country. He combatted cynicism, fear
and despair. He reinvigorated democracy. He transformed the country.
And that is what we have to do today.
A tall order for sure, but the time has come for another transformation.
FDR's "economic royalists" are today's Wall Street ruling class that needs
to be challenged before they consolidate more power. The Billionaire class
owns the media and increasingly owns the government. Establishment politics
will do nothing to curb their greed. It's time to fight back.
Bernie went on to say:
And, by the way, almost everything he proposed was called "socialist."
Social Security, which transformed life for the elderly in this country was
"socialist." The concept of the "minimum wage" was seen as a radical
intrusion into the marketplace and was described as "socialist."
Unemployment insurance, abolishing child labor, the 40-hour work week,
collective bargaining, strong banking regulations, deposit insurance, and
job programs that put millions of people to work were all described, in one
way or another, as "socialist." Yet, these programs have become the fabric
of our nation and the foundation of the middle class.
Thirty years later, in the 1960s, President Johnson passed Medicare and
Medicaid to provide health care to millions of senior citizens and families
with children, persons with disabilities and some of the most vulnerable
people in this county. Once again these vitally important programs were
derided by the right wing as socialist programs that were a threat to our
American way of life.
That was then. Now is now.
Prior to World War II and McCarthyism, socialism was not a dirty word. Many
American icons were self-described socialists. Albert Einstein, Helen
Keller, Margaret Sanger, John Dewey, W.E.B. Du Bois, A. Philip Randolph,
Bayard Rustin, James Farmer, and of course Martin Luther King, whom Sanders
quotes further down in the speech.
In 1952, a young King wrote in a letter to Coretta Scott: "I am much more
socialistic in my economic theory than capitalistic." In a 1966 speech to
his staff, King declared: "Something is wrong . with capitalism. Call it
democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better
distribution of wealth within this country for all of God's children."
Next time your conservative friends slam socialism as unpatriotic, remind
them that the author of the pledge of allegiance, Francis Bellamy, was a
socialist, a Christian socialist known for his fiery sermons on economic
justice.
Back to Bernie:
Today, in 2015, despite the Wall Street crash of 2008, which drove this
country into the worst economic downturn since the Depression, the American
people are clearly better off economically than we were in 1937.
But, here is a very hard truth that we must acknowledge and address. Despite
a huge increase in technology and productivity, despite major growth in the
U.S. and global economy, tens of millions of American families continue to
lack the basic necessities of life, while millions more struggle every day
to provide a minimal standard of living for their families. The reality is
that for the last 40 years the great middle class of this country has been
in decline and faith in our political system is now extremely low.
The rich get much richer. Almost everyone else gets poorer. Super PACs
funded by billionaires buy elections. Ordinary people don't vote. We have an
economic and political crisis in this country and the same old, same old
establishment politics and economics will not effectively address it.
If we are serious about transforming our country, if we are serious about
rebuilding the middle class, if we are serious about reinvigorating our
democracy, we need to develop a political movement which, once again, is
prepared to take on and defeat a ruling class whose greed is destroying our
nation. The billionaire class cannot have it all. Our government belongs to
all of us, and not just the one percent.
Now that sums it all up. Are we ready to follow Bernie's lead and take our
country back? It's time to get off the sidelines. Bernie needs all of us to
have his back. He is fighting the bankers, today's robber barons. They are
not going to just roll over, they are fighting back and they will get dirty.
We need to be prepared to take them on and defeat them.
I'm not one to say that this is our last chance; progress can help us move
forward in the future. But we have not had a better chance to take on the
ruling class, and it may be a long time before we have a vehicle like we
have now. Let's not blow it.
We need to create a culture which, as Pope Francis reminds us, cannot just
be based on the worship of money. We must not accept a nation in which
billionaires compete as to the size of their super-yachts, while children in
America go hungry and veterans sleep out on the streets.
Today, in America, we are the wealthiest nation in the history of the world,
but few Americans know that because so much of the new income and wealth
goes to the people on top. In fact, over the last 30 years, there has been a
massive transfer of wealth - trillions of wealth - going from the middle
class to the top one-tenth of 1 percent - a handful of people who have seen
a doubling of the percentage of the wealth they own over that period.
Unbelievably, and grotesquely, the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns nearly as
much wealth as the bottom 90 percent.
Today, in America, millions of our people are working two or three jobs just
to survive. In fact, Americans work longer hours than do the people of any
industrialized country. Despite the incredibly hard work and long hours of
the American middle class, 58 percent of all new income generated today is
going to the top one percent.
Today, in America, as the middle class continues to disappear, median family
income, is $4,100 less than it was in 1999. The median male worker made over
$700 less than he did 42 years ago, after adjusting for inflation. Last
year, the median female worker earned more than $1,000 less than she did in
2007.
Today, in America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, more
than half of older workers have no retirement savings - zero - while
millions of elderly and people with disabilities are trying to survive on
$12,000 or $13,000 a year. From Vermont to California, older workers are
scared to death. "How will I retire with dignity?" they ask.
Today, in America, nearly 47 million Americans are living in poverty and
over 20 percent of our children, including 36 percent of African American
children, are living in poverty - the highest rate of childhood poverty of
nearly any major country on earth.
Today, in America, 29 million Americans have no health insurance and even
more are underinsured with outrageously high co-payments and deductibles.
Further, with the United States paying the highest prices in the world for
prescription drugs, 1 out of 5 patients cannot afford to fill the
prescriptions their doctors write.
Today, in America, youth unemployment and underemployment is over 35
percent. Meanwhile, we have more people in jail than any other country and
countless lives are being destroyed as we spend $80 billion a year locking
up fellow Americans.
The bottom line is that today in America we not only have massive wealth and
income inequality, but a power structure which protects that inequality. A
handful of super-wealthy campaign contributors have enormous influence over
the political process, while their lobbyists determine much of what goes on
in Congress.
Amen. Now this is leadership. No empty soaring rhetoric. Bernie Sanders is
speaking truth to power. The comparisons to FDR are coming into focus for
me. This guy is ready to transform our country in the same way Roosevelt did
with the New Deal. Leaders like this come about once in a generation.
We can't afford to wait for another leader emerge who is ready to take on
the ruling class. We need to rise up now! As Bernie regularly says, "Think
big, it's not time to play it safe." Incremental change won't work; we need
to take bold action.
In 1944, in his State of the Union speech, President Roosevelt outlined what
he called a second Bill of Rights. This is one of the most important
speeches ever made by a president but, unfortunately, it has not gotten the
attention that it deserves.
In that remarkable speech this is what Roosevelt stated, and I quote: "We
have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom
cannot exist without economic security and independence. Necessitous men are
not free men." End of quote. In other words, real freedom must include
economic security. That was Roosevelt's vision 70 years ago. It is my vision
today. It is a vision that we have not yet achieved. It is time that we did.
In that speech, Roosevelt described the economic rights that he believed
every American was entitled to: The right to a decent job at decent pay, the
right to adequate food, clothing, and time off from work, the right for
every business, large and small, to function in an atmosphere free from
unfair competition and domination by monopolies. The right of all Americans
to have a decent home and decent health care.
What Roosevelt was stating in 1944, what Martin Luther King Jr. stated in
similar terms 20 years later, and what I believe today is that true freedom
does not occur without economic security.
People are not truly free when they are unable to feed their family. People
are not truly free when they are unable to retire with dignity. People are
not truly free when they are unemployed or underpaid or when they are
exhausted by working long hours. People are not truly free when they have no
health care.
Free the people!!! I have been poor so I understand where FDR, Dr. King, and
Bernie are coming from. I know what it's like to suffer because I couldn't
afford health care. I know what it's like to not be sure if I could find a
warm place to sleep or a warm shower. I was in America, but I was not free.
I was prisoner to just finding what I needed to survive. I was not happy.
Life was a chore. All around me I saw great wealth. I often wondered, what
did I do wrong to deserve to be punished?
I fought back. I became an activist. I worked with Mitch Snyder, Phil
Berrigan, William Thomas and others who helped me get back on my feet. Then
I met Marc Ash after the stolen election and decided the most effective
thing I could do was help build an independent media organization.
While I am doing better, I have not forgotten what it is like to struggle,
not from paycheck to paycheck but from day to day, hour to hour. We must
stand up for those still struggling hour to hour. They need us to transform
America into a country that puts human need above corporate greed.
So let me define for you, simply and straightforwardly, what democratic
socialism means to me. It builds on what Franklin Delano Roosevelt said when
he fought for guaranteed economic rights for all Americans. And it builds on
what Martin Luther King Jr. said in 1968 when he stated that; "This country
has socialism for the rich, and rugged individualism for the poor." It
builds on the success of many other countries around the world that have
done a far better job than we have in protecting the needs of their working
families, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor.
Democratic socialism means that we must create an economy that works for
all, not just the very wealthy.
Democratic socialism means that we must reform a political system in America
today which is not only grossly unfair but, in many respects, corrupt.
It is a system, for example, which during the 1990s allowed Wall Street to
spend $5 billion in lobbying and campaign contributions to get deregulated.
Then, ten years later, after the greed, recklessness, and illegal behavior
of Wall Street led to their collapse, it is a system which provided
trillions in government aid to bail them out. Wall Street used their wealth
and power to get Congress to do their bidding for deregulation and then,
when their greed caused their collapse, they used their wealth and power to
get Congress to bail them out. Quite a system!
And, then, to add insult to injury, we were told that not only were the
banks too big to fail, the bankers were too big to jail. Kids who get caught
possessing marijuana get police records. Wall Street CEOs who help destroy
the economy get raises in their salaries. This is what Martin Luther King,
Jr. meant by socialism for the rich and rugged individualism for everyone
else.
In my view, it's time we had democratic socialism for working families, not
just Wall Street, billionaires and large corporations. It means that we
should not be providing welfare for corporations, huge tax breaks for the
very rich, or trade policies which boost corporate profits as workers lose
their jobs. It means that we create a government that works for works for
all of us, not just powerful special interests. It means that economic
rights must be an essential part of what America stands for.
It means that health care should be a right of all people, not a privilege.
This is not a radical idea. It exists in every other major country on earth.
Not just Denmark, Sweden or Finland. It exists in Canada, France, Germany
and Taiwan. That is why I believe in a Medicare-for-all single payer health
care system. Yes. The Affordable Care Act, which I helped write and voted
for, is a step forward for this country. But we must build on it and go
further.
Medicare for all would not only guarantee health care for all people, not
only save middle class families and our entire nation significant sums of
money, it would radically improve the lives of all Americans and bring about
significant improvements in our economy.
People who get sick will not have to worry about paying a deductible or
making a co-payment. They could go to the doctor when they should, and not
end up in the emergency room. Business owners will not have to spend
enormous amounts of time worrying about how they are going to provide health
care for their employees. Workers will not have to be trapped in jobs they
do not like simply because their employers are offering them decent health
insurance plans. Instead, they will be able to pursue the jobs and work they
love, which could be an enormous boon for the economy. And by the way,
moving to a Medicare for all program will end the disgrace of Americans
paying, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs.
Democratic socialism means that, in the year 2015, a college degree is
equivalent to what a high school degree was 50 years ago - and that public
education must allow every person in this country, who has the ability, the
qualifications and the desire, the right to go to a public colleges or
university tuition free. This is also not a radical idea. It exists today in
many countries around the world. In fact, it used to exist in the United
States.
Democratic socialism means that our government does everything it can to
create a full employment economy. It makes far more sense to put millions of
people back to work rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, than to have a
real unemployment rate of almost 10%. It is far smarter to invest in jobs
and educational opportunities for unemployed young people, than to lock them
up and spend $80 billion a year through mass incarceration.
Democratic socialism means that if someone works forty hours a week, that
person should not be living in poverty: that we must raise the minimum wage
to a living wage - $15 an hour over the next few years. It means that we
join the rest of the world and pass the very strong Paid Family and Medical
Leave legislation now in Congress. How can it possibly be that the United
States, today, is virtually the only nation on earth, large or small, which
does not guarantee that a working class woman can stay home for a reasonable
period of time with her new-born baby? How absurd is that?
Democratic socialism means that we have government policy which does not
allow the greed and profiteering of the fossil fuel industry to destroy our
environment and our planet, and that we have a moral responsibility to
combat climate change and leave this planet healthy and inhabitable for our
kids and grandchildren.
Democratic socialism means, that in a democratic, civilized society the
wealthiest people and the largest corporations must pay their fair share of
taxes. Yes. Innovation, entrepreneurship and business success should be
rewarded. But greed for the sake of greed is not something that public
policy should support. It is not acceptable that in a rigged economy in the
last two years the wealthiest 15 Americans saw their wealth increase by $170
billion, more wealth than is owned by the bottom 130 million Americans. Let
us not forget what Pope Francis has so elegantly stated; "We have created
new idols. The worship of the golden calf of old has found a new and
heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an economy
which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal."
It is not acceptable that major corporations stash their profits in the
Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens to avoid paying $100 billion in
taxes each and every year. It is not acceptable that hedge fund managers pay
a lower effective tax rate than nurses or truck drivers. It is not
acceptable that billionaire families are able to leave virtually all of
their wealth to their families without paying a reasonable estate tax. It is
not acceptable that Wall Street speculators are able to gamble trillions of
dollars in the derivatives market without paying a nickel in taxes on those
transactions.
I couldn't interrupt Bernie on that roll. Democratic socialism in other
words is economic and social justice. It's my belief system. It is what
William Thomas dedicated his life to when he vigiled in front of the White
House for years for nuclear disarmament. Thomas, as we called him, saw that
greed was destroying our country. Mitch Snyder fasted many times to draw
attention to the plight of the homeless and build the largest homeless
shelter in the United States within a few blocks of the Capital. He
understood that he had to fight the greed of the ruling class that was
neglecting those in need. Phil Berrigan was a Christian who understood that
the war machine was taking resources that could be used to help the poor.
They were my mentors. I know that they would be backing Bernie if they were
alive today. Well, maybe not Thomas, it would have been hard to get him to
trust a politician.
But Bernie is not a traditional politician, he is a public servant who wants
to build a just society. If you feel burned by Obama, Bernie is no Obama.
Obama ran and governed as an establishment centrist. Those terms are far
from any words I would use to describe Bernie Sanders. Have faith, we can
trust Bernie.
Democratic socialism, to me, does not just mean that we must create a nation
of economic and social justice. It also means that we must create a vibrant
democracy based on the principle of one person one vote. It is extremely sad
that the United States, one of the oldest democracies on earth, has one of
the lowest voter turnouts of any major country, and that millions of young
and working class people have given up on our political system entirely.
Every American should be embarrassed that in our last national election 63%
of the American people, and 80% of young people, did not vote. Clearly,
despite the efforts of many Republican governors to suppress the vote, we
must make it easier for people to participate in the political process, not
harder. It is not too much to demand that everyone 18 years of age is
registered to vote - end of discussion.
Further, it is unacceptable that we have a corrupt campaign finance system
which allows millionaires, billionaires and large corporations to contribute
as much as they want to Super Pacs to elect candidates who will represent
their special interests. We must overturn Citizens United and move to public
funding of elections.
If we don't get the money out of politics, and don't bring people back into
the process, we might as well elect a king or queen and stop having
elections. They are a waste of our time and money.
If we continue to sit on the sidelines, we might as well just let the
oligarchy take full control. Heck, we might even get lucky and royalty will
throw us some big crumbs. I'm just kidding, trying to motivate those who
think the system is beyond hope. I believe, as Bernie says, that if we stand
together there is nothing we can't accomplish.
So the next time you hear me attacked as a socialist, remember this:
I don't believe government should own the means of production, but I do
believe that the middle class and the working families who produce the
wealth of America deserve a fair deal.
I believe in private companies that thrive and invest and grow in America
instead of shipping jobs and profits overseas.
I believe that most Americans can pay lower taxes - if hedge fund managers
who make billions manipulating the marketplace finally pay the taxes they
should.
I don't believe in special treatment for the top 1%, but I do believe in
equal treatment for African-Americans who are right to proclaim the moral
principle that Black Lives Matter.
I despise appeals to nativism and prejudice, and I do believe in immigration
reform that gives Hispanics and others a pathway to citizenship and a better
life.
I don't believe in some foreign "ism," but I believe deeply in American
idealism.
I'm not running for president because it's my turn, but because it's the
turn of all of us to live in a nation of hope and opportunity not for some,
not for the few, but for all.
Now that is change we can believe in. One reason we can believe it is he
tells us that he can't do it alone. Democratic socialism is not something we
should fear. What we should fear is unchecked crony capitalism. If we let
the billionaire class consolidate their power, America will become an
oligarchy and Democracy will no longer exist. We need socialism to save
America.
Author's note: Next week I will look at the rest of the speech, which
focused on ISIS and foreign policy. The transcript I used for this article
was from his remarks as prepared for delivery. -SMG
_____
Scott Galindez attended Syracuse University, where he first became
politically active. The writings of El Salvador's slain archbishop Oscar
Romero and the on-campus South Africa divestment movement converted him from
a Reagan supporter to an activist for Peace and Justice. Over the years he
has been influenced by the likes of Philip Berrigan, William Thomas, Mitch
Snyder, Don White, Lisa Fithian, and Paul Wellstone. Scott met Marc Ash
while organizing counterinaugural events after George W. Bush's first stolen
election. Scott will be spending a year covering the presidential election
from Iowa.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission
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