-----Original Message-----
From: Miriam Vieni
Sent: Friday, January 17, 2020 4:27 PM
To: 'Roger Loran Bailey' <rogerbailey81@xxxxxxx>
Subject: RE: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE:
[blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’ socialism
OK. We're not having an argument, and you don't need to refute anything. I
guess that my point wasn't clear. It was that it doesn't really matter. I hope
that whatever he is, and whatever the people are who are supporting him are, I
hope he wins the election because that's the only glimmer of hope there is. But
he probably won't win, given all the forces arrayed against him. And if he
does, the system will probably swallow him and his followers up and chew them
all into little pieces. Yes, truly it would be wonderful if corporate
capitalism could be made to disappear without being supplanted via a bloody
revolution by an authoritarian state, if we could have a stateless world with
cooperative enterprises supplying what we all need and everyone living in
harmony.
Miriam
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Loran Bailey
Sent: Friday, January 17, 2020 3:08 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE:
[blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’ socialism
You make a lot of assumptions that I have addressed before and right now I
don't want to take a lot of time refuting them, especially when I have done it
so many times before. But the question was whether Bernie Sanders is a
socialist as he claims. The article that I posted refutes his claim and I
refute his claim. The definition of a socialist is really simple and it covers
a lot of territory. I did not invent the word and I did not define it. No one
alive today invented it nor defined it. It is a word that describes someone who
advocates a certain economic system. As broad as the definition is it still
does not include everyone. If it did then the word would have no reason to
exist. And as broad as it is Bernie Sanders does not qualify. He advocates for
capitalism. He advocates for a narrow capitalist philosophy of government
called liberalism. That is not socialism. Furthermore, something else that is
not socialism is the various capitalist government bureaus or programs.
___
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,
On 1/17/2020 9:39 AM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Roger,
I'm not disputing all the history of which you are so aware. But your
explanations don't change the reality of the world in which we find
ourselves. The people whom you would define as true socialists, are in the
minority in public life and they have little power. You see what has just
happened to the left wing of the British Labor party. Whatever the hopes for
Russian socialism, things didn't turn out very well for the Soviet Union. So
to be honest, given the real world, we haven't seen a socialist revolution
turn a country into a place where most of us would like to live. And
Capitalism has screwed most of us, also. But for a few decades, white working
class people gained a relatively comfortable middle class income and life
style in a regulated Capitalist America. The regulations were removed and
international capitalism is continuing on its destructive way. Human nature
continues to be unchanged, which means that there are some good, altruistic
people and a lot of self interested people, and some who are downright
sociopathic and want power. Our country continues to seek economic domination
over the entire world.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx On Behalf Of Roger Loran
Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2020 10:08 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy]
Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE:
[blind-democracy] Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’ socialism
Okay, I've gone through this before, but here I go again. The social
democrats were once what became communists. They came out of the
International Workingmen's Association that was founded by Karl Marx
and was also known as the First International. When that collapsed
they were the founders of the second International, commonly known as
the Socialist International and the Russian Social Democratic Labor
Party
(RSDLP) was part of the Second International. It was in the lead up to the
Russian revolution that the RSDLP split. It was the Menshevik/Bolshevik
split. The Mensheviks followed Karl Kautsky who had the idea that socialism
could be achieved by running in bourgeois elections, getting elected and
passing laws that would gradually achieve socialism. Their program was at
least radical enough that they proposed to achieve their goals by any means
necessary including playing by bourgeois rules. They seemed to ignore the
fact that social democrats were being murdered by the tsarist police for even
daring to have social democratic views, let alone taking action on them. The
Bolsheviks had the position that armed self defense was necessary. But the
Mensheviks were not only willing to play by the enemy's rules, but they
actually expected the enemy to play by its own rules and they have been
betraying the international working class ever since by doing that. In fact,
the most recent example of what happens when you do that is what you can see
in Venezuela right now. Their betrayal became blatant when World War I
started and the individual sections of the Second International threw their
support behind the governments of their own countries. They did that even
when other sections in opposing countries were throwing their support behind
their own countries thus, effectively, making different sections of the
Second International war enemies of each other. Then during the war and after
the war they continued to electorally join bourgeois governments and to
support bourgeois governments as part of the so-called loyal opposition. I
would emphasize the word loyal in the phrase loyal opposition. They always
remained loyal to the capitalist masters. By the way, I remember when Karl
Kautsky's book that explicated the original principles of the Mensheviks was
added to Bookshare and I just now looked for it and it is not there. I
suppose it must have been withdrawn. But it has been a long time since they
bothered to follow their founding principles anyway. Once they started
regularly winning seats in parliaments and functioning as the loyal
opposition in those parliaments they started regarding the bourgeois
politicians as their colleagues and acted like it. They would strike deals
with the bourgeoisie, back down when they were outvoted in parliament and
form coalitions with bourgeois forces in those parliaments. That is, they
entirely lost their original class perspective. The social democrats
essentially became capitalist parties. They kept calling themselves
socialists, but were they really socialists? I will point to the British
Labour Party and ask if they are really socialists then why has the Labour
Party shied away from the word for so long now. I think there has been a
slight resurgence of the word recently, but then they back down from it as if
they are afraid of it. But let me go back to what socialism actually is. For
one thing, it is not capitalism. It is the dialectical contradiction of
capitalism. At a minimum if someone is going to be a socialist he or she must
be in favor of the social ownership and democratic control of the means of
production. If that is not socialism then you may as well trash the word
socialism because it would mean nothing. If there is nothing to distinguish
between socialism and capitalism then there is no need for either the word
socialism nor the word capitalism. If you think that is not socialism then
the simple fact is that you know nothing about the subject. As harsh as that
might seem it is true. If you don't accept the minimal definition of the word
then there is little reason to even suggest that you know what you are
talking about at all. By the way, you recently said something about the
Marxist definition of socialism. Actually, I am not sure that there is a
Marxist definition of socialism any more than there is a Marxist definition
of fascism. Fascism did not yet exist in Marx's time, but socialism did and
it was well known what it was. Marx simply took the word for what it meant
and proposed a methodology for achieving it. He did not invent the word nor
did he try to redefine it. I will point out again that this minimal
definition encompasses a lot of different ideologies. It includes people that
I am in extreme opposition to. It is a very broad definition. And since you
mentioned Silvy recently I will say that it was at this point that she said
what you were alluding to.
Right after I defined the word so that it included movements that I am
totally opposed to she condescendingly told me that there were different
kinds of socialism and that my little group is not the only kind. It is
incredible how exasperating it is that I can put forth so much effort to
explain things and then have someone show that I was not the least bit being
listened to. But, anyway, do the social democrats count as socialists by that
minimal definition? I will say that some of them do.
Ever since that betrayal of the international working class in World War I
they have as a whole been drifting further and further to the right. They
have drifted so far to the right that actually most of them do not qualify as
socialists anymore. They do not even have a perspective of opposing
capitalism at all. Their perspective is still one of reforming capitalism,
but it is no longer even one of reforming it out of existence. It is a
perspective of somehow making capitalism nicer and then only if it does not
offend the right wing capitalists. That is, not only have they become
indistinguishable from liberals, but they have become liberals. As for the
ones who are still technically socialists, those are the left wing social
democrats. Yes, some of them do still think that if they keep getting elected
and are careful to be ever so nice to the capitalists that they can
eventually reform capitalism out of existence. I think they are dead wrong
about how to abolish capitalism, but if they do still want to abolish it then
I will have to admit that they are technically socialists. So is Bernie
Sanders one of those left wing social democrats? I don't see any evidence
that he is.
He does not even belong to a social democrat organization. At least
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez can make that claim, but Bernie Sanders does not
even try. Does he advocate the replacement of the capitalist system with
socialist property relations? There is not even a hint of it from him. Well,
if there is a left-wing of the social democrats then there must be a
right-wing of the social democrats. In Europe the right-wing social democrats
are often to the right of American liberals, sometimes way to the right of
American liberals. That tendency is pronounced in the British Labour Party
where they are even ashamed to use the word socialism anymore. I suppose they
have good reason to be ashamed of it because they certainly no longer make
any socialist proposals nor advocate anything that is socialist. I will say
that at least Bernie Sanders is not to the right of most American liberals,
but there is nothing there to distinguish him from a liberal. So he must be a
liberal. If people to the right of him can call themselves social democrats
then I suppose he has as much right to do so as they do, but I don't see that
either they nor him have much right to call themselves socialists.
___
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,
On 1/16/2020 5:18 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Bernie Sanders is, as far as I'm concerned, a Social Democrat, or at least,
that is the kind of government he is promoting at this point in time. He may
very well have been a socialist in the past. But what he is doing is
attempting to organize a very heterogeneous public around the necessity of
reigning in the excesses of Capitalism. And he, and others, are using the
word, "socialism", to symbolize that. And because labels are less important
to me than they are to you, and because what he has been doing is working,
I'm not complaining. There are huge numbers of young people, not just the
folks I hear on podcasts, who want things to change. Those huge numbers of
people are not flocking to the Socialist Workers' Party, but they are
flocking to Bernie. Yet again,I have this new home health aide, a friend of
the really capable young woman who left to join the army in order to get an
education. This one, also originally from Jamaica, about 25 years old with a
high school education, was listening to the part of Democracy Now yesterday
morning with me, in which Bernie Sanders made a statement about what he
thinks is important, his goals, what people should be concerned about. She
asked me what his name is, and when I told her, she said, "He's right. He
knows what he's talking about". And he was talking about what he always
talks about, the right of working people to have a living wage, decent
housing, good health care. He was saying that we should use our tax dollars
for that and not for war. To me, that's what matters, that someone with no
political knowledge or sophistication can hear and respond to that message
and perhaps vote for Sanders in the primaries, is important, not that he's
misusing a word.
Also, there really are different kinds of socialism. There's state
socialistm. But a small community of people living and working together
according to socialist principles is also socialism. A business
co-operative, owned and operated by the workers is socialism.
Donald Trump, the Koch Brothers, and all the other fossil fuel companies, as
well as the nuclear industry, want government to help them, and it does. It
gives them subsidies. It goes to war on their behalf. The young people on
the left, with tongue in cheek, call that, "socialism for the rich".
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx On Behalf Of Roger Loran
Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2020 3:23 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE:
[blind-democracy]
Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’
socialism
Okay, if it isn't right to correct people when they try to express what they
mean then you should not have started this thread out by trying to correct
the author of the article when he explained why Bernie Sanders is not a
socialist. But if you want to just ignore the meanings of words like
socialism then think about this. If Donald Trump started calling himself a
socialist without making any other changes would you just accept that he was
a socialist because he was trying to express himself?
How about the Koch brothers? Would they be socialists if they decided to
just call themselves socialists? I certainly hope you would say no and if
you say no to that then you might want to reconsider accepting Bernie
Sanders's claim to be a socialist while he continues to defend and promote
capitalism. Otherwise we may as well start calling otters socialists or
calling rocks socialists. If you want to just ignore the meanings of words
then maybe we should start calling cyanide vanilla pudding. If someone
dropped dead after tasting it then that would be okay because it just
doesn't matter what you call something. It's just a way of expressing
yourself.
___
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,
On 1/16/2020 9:33 AM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Roger,
I'm not having a debate with you about what words mean. Yes, certainly,
words have meaning. There are dictionary definitions and then there is the
way that they are used in academic discourse, and then there is popular
useage. In popular, everyday discourse, people tend not to follow the
rules set down by academics or grammarians or other experts. Amd I wasn't
talking about what I think socialism is. But I was saying that people use
the word differently, and they will continue to do so in order to try to
communicate their ideas, and since I think that we believe in freedom of
thought and freedom of expression, it isn't right to correct people when
they're trying to express what they mean, even if one doesn't think they're
doing so accurately.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx On Behalf Of Roger Loran
Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2020 11:59 PM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE:
[blind-democracy] Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’ socialism
Miriam, it is not my personal opinion. Words mean things and I can't help
what they mean. I had nothing to do with things becoming defined the way
they are. But if we are going to communicate with each other and convey our
meanings it behooves all of us to learn what things mean rather than to
talk in vague meaningless phrases. And let me point out something else. The
phrase Marxist theory has a meaning too. It covers a lot, but it still has
meaning. Without going into all the aspects of it, it means the process of
analyzing social and economic processes in the way that Karl Marx taught us
to do, that is , scientifically. I will point out also that Marx did not
invent science, so Marxist theory is not entirely his either. But one thing
it does not mean is every post that I, personally, make. It is exasperating
when you dismiss every single post of mine as Marxist theory when it has
nothing to do with Marxist theory. I am also reminded of what you had to
say about the Marxist definition of fascism. There is no such thing as a
Marxist definition of fascism. That is because during Marx's entire
lifetime there was no such thing as fascism. He could not have defined it
because it did not exist. It did not come into existence until the
twentieth century. It was defined by its founders and proponents and a
better understanding of it came about by analyzing the conditions under
which it took hold and how it developed in actual history. When you started
talking about the Marxist definition of fascism that was basically the same
thing you do when you call each and every post of mine Marxist theory. Just
because I was the one who was trying to explain what fascism is you decided
that I was talking about some nonexistent Marxist definition. Nevertheless,
it means something. Fascism has a rather broad meaning too, but it is not
broad enough to just mean someone you don't like. When you just call anyone
a fascist who you don't like you are going to have a hard time talking
about fascism when the real thing comes along. That practice is just like
using the word awesome to mean even the mildest approval. When you do that
what are you going to call it when something really awesome comes along.
Now I suppose you have the right to go ahead and use words that have
specific meanings without even knowing what those meanings are and I
suppose you have the right to just decide that everyone else is wrong
except for yourself, but when you do that you are only hurting your own
ability to communicate.
___
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,
On 1/15/2020 9:48 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
You are a very literal person. But many people have a different view.
Remember when Sylvie said something similar? You have a right to your
opinion, and I understand it. But it's your view, not shared by everyone
else, and it's OK if you privately think that everyone else is wrong.
Miriam.
-----Original Message-----
From: Roger Loran Bailey
Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2020 8:47 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; Miriam Vieni
<miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Anatomy of
Bernie Sanders’ socialism
Nevertheless, if you defend and promote capitalism you are not a socialist
and if you defend and promote capitalism and call yourself a socialist you
are contributing to making the word meaningless. That is also what Carl is
doing when he calls every government program socialism. When you let a
word mean everything it means nothing.
___
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,
On 1/15/2020 3:15 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Clearly, most Americans who are talking about socialism, are not talking
about communism. They're not talking about socialism as defined in
Marxist theory. Their definitions vary. Of course, among the Marxists,
definitions also vary which is why there are Leninists, Trotskyites, and
God knows what other groups. At this point, given the military power of
the US empire, the dangers of nuclear war and environmental destruction
due to global warming, it seems imprudent to be worried about all of the
theoretical distinctions. We may never get to the point when it becomes
necessary to sort them out. We need to stop war, save the planet, and
find some way of feeding everyone. We need to stop countries from
competing with each other for financial dominance in the world, and we
need to find a way of controlling big tech companies. If we keep arguing
with each other about which is the proper method for doing all this,
rather than working together and using all of the tools at our disposal,
we won't achieve any of our goals.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx On Behalf Of Roger
Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2020 1:57 PM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Anatomy of Bernie Sanders’ socialism
https://socialistaction.org/2020/01/14/anatomy-of-bernie-sanders-s
o
c
i
alism/
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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