https://socialistaction.org/2020/01/14/anatomy-of-bernie-sanders-socialism/
Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’ socialism
Socialist Action
/
24 hours ago
By NICK BAKER
A 2019 Pew Research Center poll of Americans’ political views found that
42 percent support socialism, up from 31 percent found by Pew in 2010.
Fully half
of youth under 30 indicated their “positive or very positive impression”
of socialism. The biggest change that the new poll registered was among
those
30–49 years old, where 47 percent supported socialism today – up from 37
percent in 2010. Reporting the new figures with a bit of obfuscation in
mind,
the Washington Post headline read “New Poll: Capitalism More Popular
than Socialism.” No doubt the Post editors, not to mention the corporate
elite, were
a bit concerned!
Over the past decade we have seen the effects of modern capitalism
operating with full force, including its inability to provide decent,
stable jobs, the
crushing debt it imposes on students and the broader population, lack of
health care, apocalyptic threat of climate change-induced destruction of
the planet
and endless imperialist wars. Fully aware that sending already
radicalizing American youth to fight in unpopular wars around the world,
the U.S. warmakers
increasingly resort to “quiet” wars, to drone wars, secret CIA wars,
privatized/mercenary army wars, proxy army wars, as well as sanction and
trade embargo
wars. These are accompanied by record levels of corporate profit at the
expense of workers everywhere.
It’s no surprise that socialism is gaining in popularity in the face of
this blatant expression of capitalism’s inherent evils. But what exactly
does “socialism”
mean to people who are now turning their eyes to it? They often aren’t
sure exactly what socialism is, and the ruling class would like to keep
it that
way. Last month, Pew published a follow-up report about the reasons
given by the 42 percent who said they support socialism. The most
popular reasons:
31 percent said socialism creates a fairer, more just society while 20
percent said that it “builds on and improves capitalism,” with some
indicating their
belief that the U.S. already had “some socialism” in the form of social
welfare programs. Others pointed to European “socialist” countries.
This kind of support for socialism, mixed with uncertainty about what
exactly socialism is beyond better and broader social programs, will no
doubt be
exploited by the Democrats and Republicans, the two main parties of
capitalism, in the 2020 presidential campaign. Democrats like Bernie
Sanders and Elizabeth
Warren have already gotten the message. At a time when socialist ideas
are gaining prominence, the Democratic Party, the historic “graveyard of
social
movements,” will once again aim to round up the disillusioned and
disaffected with pledges of fealty to justice and fair play. While never
neglecting to
assert that their personal candidacy is the only surefire alternative to
their incomparably evil Republican opponent, the corporate admission
price exacted
from all players in this “lesser evil” charade is an unconditional
pledge in advance to support whichever Democrat emerges on top of the
heap at the end
of the primary process. Returning or delivering the disillusioned back
into the fold of capitalist politics—a dead end for the working class
that promises
nothing but continued suffering—is the prime objective of the $8-9
billion election time operation underway today.
After the unexpected 2016 election defeat of Hillary Clinton, the
Democrats have the Bernie Sanders campaign once again taking the
temperature of the masses
while providing an outlet to express their frustrations with the
Democratic Party and the Obama administration for presiding over the
jailing and torture
of immigrants, the ongoing Afghanistan war of 18 years and the suffering
during the Great Recession where the bankers, insurance companies and
major corporation
were bailed out to the tune of $32 trillion while mortgage foreclosures
reached modern time highs. Former Republican and corporate attorney
Elizabeth Warren
has joined the field being posed as a progressive technocrat, while Joe
Biden and Pete Buttigieg are assigned the role of safe centrist stalking
horses.
The Sanders campaign has a clear message: the barrier to “socialism” is
the “Democratic Party establishment,” not the capitalist class. Working
people
can “take back” the Democratic Party, according to Sanders – as if it
were ever ours – and make it a vehicle for socialism that fights for
the interests
of the working class!
But this can never be. The Democratic Party is the institutional
expression of a wing of the capitalist class, and is inherently opposed
to the interests
of working people. Its only “base” is that section of the capitalist
class whose method for disciplining and controlling the workers is, at
this time,
to tell them that their concerns are valid and need to be addressed, all
the while ensuring that these concerns are channeled away from
independent mass
protests in the streets and away from the formation of independent
working class-controlled organizations and parties.
Sanders’ campaign proposals
Bernie Sanders’ supporters write articles with socialist-sounding titles
like “Bernie Wants You to Own More of the Means of Production.” Real
workers’
direct ownership and control of the means of production is at the core
of revolutionary socialism—that is, Marxism. Its achievement requires
the abolition
of the capitalist system of private ownership and its associated
exploitation of workers to ensure capitalist profit. Headlines like
Sanders’ supporters
employ are no accident. Offered as an “electoral road to socialism” and
perhaps as a Marxist-oriented government, like his “political
revolution,” they
are aimed directly at people interested in socialism. But when it comes
to “owning more of the means of production,” what does Sanders mean?
That headline referred to what Sanders calls his “Corporate
Accountability and Democracy” plan, which he says will shift society’s
wealth “back into the
hands of the workers who create it.” In this plan, companies that record
more than $100 million in revenue a year or are publicly traded would
gradually
transfer 20 percent of their stock into a trust held for the workers
that pays dividends and provides voting rights at shareholder meetings.
According
to Sanders’ campaign estimate, this would provide an average dividend to
all workers of $5000 per year. Not nothing for workers whose wages have
been declining
for decades, but a far cry from owning the means of production.
In the same plan, Sanders promotes limiting executive pay to merely 150
times that of the average worker. CEO’s currently make 278 times what
the average
worker earns, so 150 is certainly less—but it’s also a far cry from
socialism. In 1965, CEOs made 20 times the average worker’s salary!
Sanders’ figure
of 150 times would be a return to mid-1990’s levels of CEO pay. In other
words, the workers create the wealth and the CEOs should benefit 150
times more—only
a modest amount.
The way Sanders proposes to promote this policy is telling as well – by
penalizing companies that pay executives above that level by disfavoring
them in
the provisioning of federal contracts. That is, he poses his plan as a
market-based reform, to be contested in the arena of the market, where
the capitalist
reigns supreme.
This isn’t socialism. It’s a light reform of the most obnoxious excesses
of modern capitalism in the past few decades, totally acceptable to the
boss class
and especially so when it allows for the pretense of restricting them
without disturbing in any way their right to lord over the workers.
Sanders’ plan for the military
Sanders, who voted for the largest military budgets in history during
the Obama administration, today says he will ask Congress to “take a
hard look at
the military budget” and “try to pare it down.” He frequently says that
the U.S. should not spend more on its military than the next 10
countries combined
but declines to say anything more concrete about the military budget.
These days asserting that the U.S. military budget should be cut at all
sounds radical
– but only because the preposterous profit-fueling growth of military
spending has reached such incredible levels.
U.S. military spending has grown over 75 percent in the last 20 years –
nearly doubling. And indeed it is more than the next ten countries
combined. Including
the hundreds of billions each year in the secret “black budget” and the
CIA’s largely secret expenditures, total annual U.S. military
expenditures exceed
$1 trillion. After a 20 percent cut, the U.S. would spend more on the
military than the next seven countries combined. Even after a 50 percent
cut the
figure would be far more than any other country in the world—and would
only be slightly less than the war budgets of the Clinton administration.
No self-respecting Democrat would ever propose any kind of substantial
cut to the most profitable business on the planet Earth. Anyone who even
thought
such a thing would be laughed out of the Democratic Party. Here again,
Sanders only proposes to mildly pare back the absurdities of the last
couple decades,
to put American imperialist capitalism on a stronger footing by making
it appear able to fix itself—without any fix involved.
Green New Deal
Not even under his Green New Deal plan does Sanders say anything about
cutting the military, even though the U.S. military is the world’s
largest polluter.
Any plan that does not begin with eliminating the world’s largest
polluter is a farce. Sanders talks a lot about “taking on” the fossil
fuel companies.
His Green New Deal plan says repeatedly that he will “end the fossil
fuel industry’s greed.” How does he plan to do it? By nationalizing the
energy industry
and removing the profit motive? Of course not. The main thrust of
Sanders’ plan is the introduction of strong regulations and market-based
reforms that
will supposedly force the fossil fuel industry to convert itself to
green energy.
But the real con in Sanders’ rhetoric is the idea that the Democratic
Party, a party of the ruling class capitalist elites, has any interest
in ending
the use of fossil fuels. There are 1.73 trillion barrels of proven oil
reserves in the world today, and capitalism is incapable of doing
anything but using
its already existing rigs and drills to get it out of the ground and
turn it into profit.
The U.S. is the world’s largest oil producer (17.94 million barrels per
day, 18 percent of the world’s total production) and largest oil
consumer (19.69
million barrels per day, 20 percent of total consumption—more than the
next two, China and India, combined). The U.S. is the world’s largest
natural gas
producer and also has the largest oil refining capacity of any country.
All of these facts led the head of the International Energy Agency in
2018 to project
that the U.S. will be the “undisputed global gas and oil leader” for
decades. Readers will forgive our irony in noting that this top official
declined
to add that a Sanders election victory in 2020 would render his
estimates inaccurate. In truth, Sanders’ much touted Green New Deal
pledge to allocate
$16.3 trillion over the course of ten years to save the U.S., not to
mention the earth itself, from climate Armageddon, is sheer bluster and
bluff, unless,
of course, he contemplates the abolition of capitalism itself, a
proposition as absurd as the rest of his “socialist” hoopla.
Much of U.S. warfare and trade policy is dedicated to securing control
of oil in the countries with the largest proven reserves, such as
Venezuela, Iraq,
Iran, and Libya. Both Democrats and Republicans have dutifully refused
to commit to any binding climate goals that might present even the
smallest threat
to the mega-profits of the fossil-fuel companies. The Obama
administration ensured that the Paris Climate Agreement was non-binding
and therefore meaningless,
while overseeing the largest growth of fracking in U.S. history, making
the U.S. the world’s greatest fracker. Since the Paris Climate Accords
in 2015,
30 major banks have invested $1.9 trillion in fossil fuel companies,
knowing that their investment was more than safe.
Working-class politics: the only way
Millions of people in the United States are recognizing that capitalism
is at the heart of the problems that they face every day and see around
the world.
They believe that socialism would make things better, but they aren’t
exactly sure what makes socialism different from capitalism. Some think
of it as
just a nicer form of capitalism.
The purpose of the Sanders campaign is to bring the confused and
disaffected back into the embrace of the Democratic Party. Sanders is no
socialist. He’s
for keeping the ruling class in power through the Democratic Party and
maintaining the means of production safely in the hands of the
capitalists – while
fostering illusions of real change to make the workers feel a little
better about the whole thing in the hopes that they won’t cause any trouble.
In sharp contrast to Bernie Sanders and the whole range of today’s
posturing Democratic Party contenders, the goals of socialists and the
means to achieve
them are fundamentally at odds with the rapacious capitalist system
itself – a system of war, racism, sexism, LGBTQI discrimination,
environmental destruction,
and the ceaseless exploitation of human beings for the profit of the few.
That is why socialists fight for working-class opposition to and
independence from all the institutional forms of ruling class rule,
beginning with their
twin parties. The only way forward to a just society – a truly socialist
society – is to win ownership and control of society’s wealth by the
revolutionary
action of the working class itself. The prerequisite to achieving this
is the construction of a mass revolutionary socialist party fully
inclusive of the
best fighters who have won the respect and confidence of the vast
working-class majority.
If working people who consider themselves socialists are convinced to
support Sanders based on the words he utters rather than the class
interests of the
party he represents, they will inevitably be disappointed with the end
result – yet another capitalist politician in power regardless of party,
personality,
and populist-sounding rhetoric. On the other hand, if the present broad
interest in socialist ideas finds expression in serious fighters for a
better world,
they will in time find their way to Socialist Action. Join us!
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January 14, 2020
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Uncategorized.
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Sam Harris
“ I know of no society in human history that ever suffered because its people
became too desirous of evidence in support of their core beliefs. ”
― Sam Harris,
