Did you hear? There is a new definition of Socialism making the rounds of leftist circles. According to Barbara Ehrenreich and Bill Fletcher, Jr. writing in the May 25th issue of The Nation socialism is “the human capacity to solve our common problems collectively in an egalitarian participatory and democratic fashion.” We all really have become socialists if this is the current definition. Even my colleague on this blog, John Attanas, who considers himself a moderate Republican, is now actually a socialist! By that definition Ron Paul, Ted Kennedy, John McCain, and Nancy Pelosi are all socialists. Hell, I’ll bet Rush Limbaugh would even fit under a socialist tent that wide!
Excuse me, but I thought socialism was the collective ownership of the means of production and finance; the leveling of the economic divide; the elimination of the influence of money on our deliberative assemblies. We socialists have split again and again over the exact strategies to achieve these objectives, which has contributed to our electoral ineffectiveness, but never have we abandoned them.
Sorry Barbara and Bill. Webster has it right: “so-cial-ism – 1) any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.”
Jonathan Fluck
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment