Miriam, it seems that the way to get you to label anything Marxist is
just for me to say it. Socialism was around before Marx ever was around
and the word meant something before Marx was even born and before he
ever started writing anything about it. It is true that the socialism
that came before Marx was mostly utopian socialism or anarchism, but it
was still there. The word actually does mean something. Even if it is
utopian or anarchist socialism. Here is what a socialist is. A socialist
is one who advocates for the public ownership and democratic control of
the means of production. Again, that predates Marx and just because I am
the one who says it that does not mean that it is Marxist theory. This
definition is extremely broad. It not only includes utopian socialists
and anarchists, but it includes many flavors of Stalinists, Trotskyists
and myself and some very good people and some very bad people. It
includes people with whom I do not want to be associated. The first time
I offered that extremely broad definition on this list it was Sylvy who
practically accused me of sectarianism by telling me that there
different kinds of socialists, not just my little group. When I was
being that broad it is incredible that anyone would think that I was
only counting some little insular group. But you are nearly doing the
same thing. You want to broaden the definition of socialism to the point
that it is so vague that it means nothing. And that speaks to another
thing that I have addressed. The more definitions that a word has the
vaguer it is and the more definitions that it takes on the vaguer it
becomes until when a word means everything it means nothing at all. If
you want the word socialism to mean everything then you may as well call
Donald Trump a socialist or you may as well call Ronald Reagan a
socialist. Then there will be no point in using the word socialism at
all because it will have no meaning. Now, of all those varying kinds of
socialist that there are even a social democrat can be a socialist,?? but
I tend to think that the only socialist social democrats that are left
are the left wing social democrats. Let's look at the history of where
social democrats came from. Before the Russian revolution if an
organization was called social democrat it was pretty much the same
thing as calling it communist. In fact, before the Bolshevik Communist
Party was founded the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party was the
party of Lenin and it was a revolutionary party. Leading up to the
Russian revolution, though, there was a split in the RSDLP. The
followers of Lenin wanted the party to continue as a revolutionary party
while the followers of Karl Kautsky wanted to essentially transform into
a bourgeois electoral party. Their argument was that socialism should be
fought for by any means necessary and that included becoming a part of
bourgeois parliaments. According to them they should participate in
bourgeois elections and once they got elected they could then pass laws
that would gradually?? move toward socialism. It did not seem to even
occur to them that the bourgeoisie would resist that path and if they
actually showed a prospect of succeeding that the bourgeoisie would
strike back at them ruining their parliamentary plans. But furthermore,
they ran into another problem that has plagued reformist movements over
the centuries. That is that when you try to join the system in order to
change it the only thing that gets changed is yourself. And boy, did the
Menshevik social democrats ever get changed. Ever since the
Menshevik/Bolshevik split the Mensheviks have been drifting further and
further to the right and since over a century has passed now there are
some social democrats who have drifted so far to the right that they are
not just right-wing social democrats, but just plain right-wingers.
Look, for example, at the British Labour Party. What does the Labour
Party have to do with socialism? What does even some sections of it have
to do with either labor or liberalism? The social democrats have
integrated themselves in the bourgeois system of governance that they
defend capitalism and have no perspective toward socialism at all. If a
socialist is someone who advocates the public ownership of the means of
production then I will have to admit that some of the left wing of the
social democrats might still be socialists even though I think they?? are
all wrong about how to get socialism. But most social democrats simply
falsely call themselves socialists. Then along comes Bernard Sanders. He
is not even affiliated with any social democrat organization. He just
decided to slap the socialist name on himself. At least he started out
keeping himself apart from the twin bourgeois parties, but he even
stopped doing that and joined the solidly bourgeois Democrat party and
became one of its staunchest defenders. There is nothing in his program
that even comes close to advocating public ownership of the means of
production. He only advocates running capitalism with a few more
regulations. I am sorry, but that is not socialism. As for the bourgeois
electoral system being set up so that parties other than the
Republicrats don't stand a chance of being elected, well, it really does
seem to me that that is an argument for making change in some other way
than just joining up with the enemy to perpetuate their system.
---
Carl Sagan
??? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. ???
??? Carl Sagan
On 6/16/2019 5:35 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Correct. It isn't Marxist socialism. It's Democratic Socialism or FDR Democracy
or whatever label one wants to give it. But the point is that everyone, except
people who follow classical Marxist socialist theory, are calling it socialism
and the label is immaterial at this point. What's important is that what
Sanders is calling for is the kind of changes most likely to help a majority of
people in comparison to what the other Democratic candidates are calling for.
And since our system is set up so that third party candidates don't have a
snowball's chance in hell of winning, it's important to get the best possible
Democratic candidate as possible.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Loran Bailey<rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx> Sent: Sunday, June 16, 2019 3:22 PM
To: Miriam Vieni<miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] Bernie Sanders on Democratic Socialism,
Elizabeth Warren and the Media
If what he is for is FDR style new deal then that is not socialism.
People who get falling down drunk on a daily basis can claim to be tea totaling
sober people too, but they are wrong.
---
Carl Sagan
??? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. ???
??? Carl Sagan
On 6/16/2019 10:18 AM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Roger,
These days, Democratic Socialism is equivalent to FDR's New Deal and the bill
of economic rights that he set forth. It is very different from today's
Liberalism and also, within the left of the Democratic party, there are
gradations. Also, if you listen to some of the Marxist economists on podcasts
these days, like Richard Wolfe, or you read what they write, they are talking
in concrete terms about something very different from the Marxist theory
espoused by the old fashioned Communist parties. But Bernie Sanders is not
representing himself as a Marxist socialist.
The usage of words does keep changing. Hillary Clinton is represented as a
Liberal, as is Joe Biden. You can't even put Elizabeth Warren in the same
category as them. But she just wants to repair the system we have. Bernie
Sanders wants to make much more significant changes in the basic system.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Loran Bailey<rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, June 15, 2019 9:16 PM
To:blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; Miriam Vieni
<miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] Bernie Sanders on Democratic Socialism,
Elizabeth Warren and the Media
I think what he really needs to explain is how his so-called socialism differs
from liberalism. I just don't see anything that sets it apart.
---
Carl Sagan
??? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. ???
??? Carl Sagan
On 6/15/2019 5:09 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Bernie Sanders on Democratic Socialism, Elizabeth Warren and the
Media By Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone
15 June 19
The Vermont Senator???s campaign is still trying to find its rhythm
??? but its message is clear
If it seems like Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is fighting for his
political life amid a series of negative articles, it might be
because he always is. The Sanders campaign is grounded in a principle
that an absence of controversy would be the real indication of trouble.
It???s not a clich??: Sanders is always, literally, embattled, among
other things because his version of politics is a battle, a zero-sum
clash of economic interests in particular. ???The way he fights is
unique,??? says his campaign manager, Faiz Shakhir. ???He goes to
Walmart and confronts the CEO over wages. He goes and stands with striking
McDonald???s workers directly.???
The latest brush-fire, a series of negative articles trumpeting a
poll surge by Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren as the latest
indication of Bernie???s oft-predicted demise, is just par for the course.
Sanders this week gave a major address, explaining why he calls
himself a ???Democratic Socialist.??? He did this in 2015, and after
much discussion this spring it was decided he needed to do so again.
Speaking at George Washington University, Sanders described his
campaign as a continuation of FDR???s legacy, specifically the
so-called Second Bill of Rights, as enumerated in the 1944 State of
the Union Address. He plans on releasing an ???Economic Bill of
Rights??? that will essentially provide government guarantees for a
living wage, affordable housing, health care and a complete education.
Echoing a famous line by Roosevelt, he talked about his confrontations with
corporate interests.
???They are unanimous in their hatred of me, and I welcome their
hatred,??? he said, to cheers.
Unlike the last election, when the policy difference between himself
and opponent Hillary Clinton was so great it scarcely needed
explaining, Sanders in 2019 is running in a much-altered Democratic
Party environment. In part due to his own efforts in 2016, and in
part due to a growing movement driven by the likes of Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez and others, he???s now chasing the nomination in a
field full of candidates expressing varying degrees of support for
policies once considered radical: Medicare for All, a Green New Deal, free
college, even a guaranteed income.
This is an accomplishment on the one hand, but also a complication:
How does Sanders stand out now in a political landscape that
(policy-wise, anyway) has made wholesale moves in his direction since 2016?
In an odd way, Sanders defines his campaign by the negativity it attracts.
Other campaigns that might talk the talk on issues like climate
change can???t be taken seriously, Bernie Sanders tells me in a phone
call from Washington, D.C., unless they ???frontally confront the
fossil fuel industry.??? If you???re not ???embattled,??? you???re not real.
In this vein he derides the ???middle ground??? platform of someone
like current frontrunner Joe Biden, which Sanders says ???antagonizes no one,
stands up to no one, and changes nothing.???
Asked why he chose this week in particular to give an address on
Democratic Socialism, Sanders says the motivation was ???twofold.???
???The first is to try to move this country away from an austerity
policy,??? he says. ???We must recognize that economic rights are
human rights. People are entitled ??? and I underline the word
entitled ??? to a decent job that pays a living wage. They???re
entitled to health care. They???re entitled to a complete education, to
affordable housing.???
He goes on to elucidate probably the biggest difference between
himself and Warren.
???In the words of Roosevelt,??? he says, ???the Republic at the
beginning was built around the guarantee of political rights. But he
came to believe that true individual freedom can???t exist without economic
security.
???It???s time to guarantee economic rights. [FDR] said this 80 years ago.???
Warren and Sanders have nearly identical critiques of how screwed up
American capitalism has become in the global economy age. The main
difference is that while Warren seems to want to fix the problem by
re-invigorating those original political rights, Sanders wants to
take what he calls the ???next step??? into guaranteeing economic security.
I ask him about the headlines of this week, and how he would best
characterize the difference between himself and Warren, whom he
describes as a ???friend.??? He answers by describing how he came to his
decision to run.
???I thought long and hard about this,??? he says. ???My wife and I
thought about it for months and months. We talked about it more than
we ever talked about anything else. We???d be sure of one thing on
Monday, then Tuesday it would be different.???
He pauses. ???I reached the conclusion that I???m the strongest
candidate to beat Donald Trump, but that wasn???t all. I wouldn???t just have
to beat Trump ???
the goal would be to create a movement to fundamentally transform the
country, so the future wouldn???t be threatened by later Trumps, either.???
Sanders then explains that the only kind of candidacy that could
succeed now would be one like his own. ???It won???t work,??? he
says, ???unless you have the courage to take on the very powerful
special interests that are entrenched and wield so much influence. If
you want to fix the climate change problem, you can???t do it unless
you frontally confront the fossil fuel industry. You want to rebuild
the infrastructure? You have to take on the 1-percent, get them to pay their
share.
???I believe from the bottom of my heart my approach is the only
way,??? Sanders says. ???The middle of the road approach isn???t going to cut
it.???
I asked him if he???s settled into a psychological strategy for
dealing with the media negativity, which seems relentless.
Specifically, did he ever think about taking the Trump approach, and
embracing the negative media, turning it to his advantage?
He laughs, but only a little.
???It???s hard,??? he says. ???My views on the press are nothing like
Trump???s. I don???t believe that the media is the enemy of the
people. ???They???re not terrible people, it???s not fake news ???
there are a lot of great reports in the New York Times, we use their work every
day here on the campaign.
???But,??? he says, ???at the end of the day, the media work for huge
multinational corporations. And as you know ??? you???re one of the
few who does know ??? anyone with my agenda is going to attract a lot
of opposition. I mean, last time, I think in a day or two, we had 16
different negative stories in the same paper [the Washington Post].
???As for finding a new way to handle it, psychologically, I think
we???re getting there. I think we???re figuring that out.???
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