When I pressed him for examples of Democrats as Communists, he of course immediately pointed to Zoran Mamdani, mayor of New York City, who has famously called for the city to open and run free grocery stores to ease the economic worries of lower income New Yorkers, and who is, in actual fact, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).
I responded that yes, Mamdani is an avowed (Democratic) socialist in a very unique political environment (NYC)... but could he name other examples around the country of Democrats who are socialists--I mean, besides Bernie Sanders and AOC and other avowed Democratic Socialists such as Mamdani?
In a surprising answer (to me, anyway), he pointed to the governors of New Jersey and Virginia as further examples of recently-elected Democrats who are (according to him) socialists.
"Mikie Sherril was a captain in the Navy," I exclaimed. "She's no socialist!"
"It doesn't matter that she's a veteran," he insisted, "She's a socialist, or even a communist!"-- suggesting that his view is based on her support for universal health care, a dramatic increase in taxes, and....
His voice trailed off. He couldn't name anything else, specifically, when pressed, but implied that he *knows* that Sherrill is a socialist, and that nothing I could say would convince him otherwise.
Now, this person is someone who has *never* (to my knowledge) voted for a Democrat and who generally gets his news from Fox News and Newsmax (but who insists he also watches CNN and ABC ("for balance")). He's a (somewhat) principled fiscal conservative, who has always believed that government is *the* biggest problem in the US, and that freedom (in the sense of very limited government and "free markets") is the central quality that has made the US great since its founding 250 years ago.
(I used the word "somewhat" above in the context of his principled conservatism, because he has voted for Trump three times, and despite the allegiance Trump has garnered from many in the Reagan wing of the GOP, there's no way (in my view) that Trump qualifies as a fiscal conservative, given the way that Trump has overseen a huge increase in the national debt during his terms in office. Maybe Trump qualifies as non-socialist because he constantly berates democrats? But I digress.)
Implicit in this person's worldview is that anyone who believes in an increased role for government in the US is *therefore* a socialist or even a communist. I pressed him: "What about Social Security and Medicare? Are those "socialist"?
"That’s different! People have *earned* those."
I could have asked about other examples of government programs, including recently expanded veterans disability programs, highway construction, and management of ports and airports, but the conversation was clearly over. He *knows* what's socialist and what's not, and he *knows" who's socialist and who isn't. Democrats are socialists, period.
I rolled my eyes. So we're at the point where Republicans are the True Americans and Democrats are socialists or even communists, allied more with China (and Norway and Denmark and Russia and Venezuela) than with the USA.
The belief that Americans are more divided politically today than they have ever been, and that the dividing line isn't a matter of degree (like "Democrat" vs. "Republican" perhaps used to be) is widespread among committed Republicans, and even some Democrats are committed to the idea that this divide is absolute and will never be overcome through debate or compromise. This belief, from my standpoint, is possibly the death-knell for drmocracy as a political mechanism (and it's epitomized by many Republicans' insistence that we are actually *not* a democracy, but rather a "republic" which was *never* intended (by the founders) to be "government of the people, by the people, and for the people" (Lincoln) but instead to be rule by something like the *fittest" (which probably means those who are most successful in business or otherwise most "American" --whatever that means).
While I believe the actual distinction between "democracy" and "republic" is actually fairly subtle (as expressed in the phrase "democratic republic"), I *don't" believe that the gap between "socialism" and "communism" can be so easily elided. According to Wikipedia,
Socialism is "an economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership."
And Communism "is a political and economic ideology whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic classless order centered on common ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange that allocates products in society based on need."
These are different, primarily in the sense that socialism allows for the occurrence of class differences, and doesn't insist on the allocation of resources based solely on need, but actually allows for market allocation of goods and even private ownership of property, whereas communism aims for allocation not by markets but by some other mechanism and, in its ideal form, doesn't allow for private ownership of anything. It's also important to recognize that socialism is very often one philosophy that competes along with other philosophical systems within democracies, whereas communism seeks to replace democratic decision-making with...something else, which isn't well defined, and in actual historical practice has never been realized. "Socialism" is compatible with democratic governance, whereas "communism" suggests that government itself will cease to exist.
Granted, within the context of American political debate, the differences between socialism and communism may be too subtle to expect people to differentiate them, and in any case those who are viscerally opposed to socialism (like my friend mentioned above) don't care about the differences, but seek to conflate them for the purpose of denigrating both (and, mostly, to denigrate Democrats).
The DSA, however, does differentiate itself from communism. On its website is this passage:
"We believe that working people should run both the economy and society democratically to meet human needs, not to make profits for a few."
Further:
"Capitalism is a system designed by the owning class to exploit the rest of us for their own profit. We must replace it with democratic socialism, a system where ordinary people have a real voice in our workplaces, neighborhoods, and society.
"We believe there are many avenues that feed into the democratic road to socialism. Our vision pushes further than historic social democracy and leaves behind authoritarian visions of socialism in the dustbin of history. [Emphasis added.]
"We want a democracy that creates space for us all to flourish not just survive and answers the fundamental questions of our lives with the input of all. We want to collectively own the key economic drivers that dominate our lives, such as energy production and transportation. We want the multiracial working class united in solidarity instead of divided by fear. We want to win “radical” reforms like single-payer Medicare for All, defunding the police/refunding communities, the Green New Deal, and more as a transition to a freer, more just life.
"We want a democracy powered by everyday people. The capitalist class tells us we are powerless, but together we can take back control."
It's critical to note that Democratic Socialists want to replace capitalism (often referred to as a system of "free markets") with democracy as the principal mechanism in society for making decisions about the allocation of resources. Democratic Socialists are opposed to capitalism as the deciding system with regard to social goods, such as health care, education, the arts, and science. However, unlike communism or "authoritarian" systems in which the privileged decide, democratic socialists want a "market" of ideas in which allocation isn't subject to control by *any* particular group, but rather is open to participation by all (regardless of any distinction between those who are supposedly "fit" to decide and those who are not).
Here, I think it's helpful to mention that the concept of "fitness" is suffused with concepts related to Darwin's theory of natural selection. So-called "social Darwinists" took Darwin's theory (used as an explanation of evolution) to justify capitalism as an economic system: something like natural selection could be what Adam Smith referred to as the "invisible hand" that would decide larger questions of economic and political allocation of resources in an allegedly "fair" or "unbiased" way that would reward those who have "earned" rewards and punish (somehow) those who have not.
Here's where we get to something at the center of the visceral opposition among some Americans to socialism. These Americans believe that to reward those who *haven't* earned those rewards--i.e. the lazy, those who have immigrated illegally, those benefitting from Affirmative Action, and so-called "welfare queens" who have learned how to game the system over generations--is to promote the idea that you don't *have* to work for anything, but should just receive it. The root worry seems to be that giving people that which they have not earned will *teach them" to *expect* rewards, and therefore will undermine the supposedly "neutral" system of allocating rewards based on so-called "merit."
Every American who has been paying attention in school or at work or whose parents have taught them "middle class values" is familiar with the basic concepts at the root of the idea of *meritocracy.*
Older Americans, especially, have been taught over decades that communism ("to each according to their needs; from each according to their ability," as expressed in the Communist Manifesto of Marx and Engels) fundamentally undermines what is thought of as the "American ideal": that every American can *earn* a good living through hard work, following the rules, and applying their "God-given talents" in ethical participation in the institutions of economic and political society.
This reminds me of another conversation I had recently with another Republican about the consequences that would allegedly ensue if so-called "illegals" were given high-quality healthcare along with American citizens: they would learn, she said, that they could have "something for nothing," which would encourage them to *do nothing,* and also encourage them to bring the rest of "their people" to the US to also get access to health care and other social goods through doing nothing.
Among those who viscerally oppose "socialism" in any form, these are the "obvious" and "inevitable" consequences of giving even an inch on the principles of meritocracy.
At the root of this view, from my perspective, is the belief that human beings are intrinsically *selfish* (i.e., evil) and that the only way to overcome this "nature prone to sin" (John Calvin) was to teach accountability to a "higher law" that wasn't just "Love the Lord God with all your heart, and love your neighbor as yourself" (Jesus), but also the idea that in this life, you get what you deserve.
(Unspoken here, but implicit, is the theological view that eternal reward (heaven) only comes to those who have earned it, and that others, who haven't earned it, "deserve" eternal damnation (hell.) This, of course, is complicated by the theological diversity of religions, some of which hold all persons of a given faith to be "the chosen," or "the Elect" while others hold that anyone who participates in the sacraments (baptism, communion, etc.) are "saved" through the intervention of the Church.
"But wait a darn minute!", some of you are thinking. "How did we get from opposition to socialism to a discussion of theology?"
Well, let me remind you that the *root* of Ametican opposition to socialism is a belief in American exceptionality, that Americans are fundamentally different from other people in that Americans are committed to the basic pursuit of "happiness" (Jefferson) through economic means, based on a competition for (limited) resources driven by an ethic of hard work, so-called "fairness", and the success of only those who deserve it.
(The question of whether resources actually *are* limited is complicated by the view that capitalism has the potential to dramatically expand available resources, a possibility that is too complicated to get into here.)
The beliefs at the core of opposition to socialism *fundamentally* suppose a differentiation among humans around the world: a differentiation that supposedly justifies differential *success* in life with a definition of *who deserves what* based on who does the *right* things vs. who does the *wrong* things, a distinction allegedly based on who has *learned* what's right vs. who has not.
At its core, then, opposition to socialism is based on an *educational* theory that is rooted in a *theological* conception (or, if you prefer, an "existential" conception) about the fundamental nature of nature and of humankind's place within it.
In short, opposition to socialism is akin to a *religious* belief--we can think of this as the American Religion), and the fear of "creeping socialism" in America is the fear that maybe America is no better than any other country in the world and that maybe Americans are no better than any other nationality in the world.
Fear of socialism is fear that the distinctions than many Americans make between those who deserve success and those who don't is entirely mythological and that maybe it's time to accept our place as just another country full of people who are just like other humans and that maybe, just maybe, our "success" might be at least partly to blame for the lack of success of many of those beyond our borders.
No wonder these beliefs are so hard for some Americans to let go of.
