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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Steve Lokness who wrote (92551)	10/30/2008 2:35:53 PM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541778

Find me an article proposing marxism for Americans from mainstream politicians and I may buy your argument that most people might fear marxism less than socialism - until then I believe your argument fails.... I suspect a marxist running for the senate would be a joke. The reason you don't see the word is because people use "socialist" instead. "Marxist" is a more sophisticated word. Ordinary people don't know it or use it. I'm confident that people flinging around either word are not making fine distinctions between Marxist and socialist. Clearly those calling Obama a "socialist" either don't know the meaning of the word or are just using it as an epithet. Apparently "liberal" just doesn't have enough oomph anymore. As for running as a Marxist, try it and voters would scratch their heads. The most socialistic of countries have higher earnings and better quality of life than Americans - not so marxist countries. Moves towards Marxism have failed miserably. A map of Marxist States; Speaking of fine distinctions, you're substituting Marxism for what is commonly known as communism--socialism plus atheism, Lenin style. I don't see the point of that. The link is even labeled "communism." Just call it "communism." No confusion that way. The bottom line re what failed is socialism--state/collective ownership and management of the means of production and distribution. Call the states that failed "Marxist," "communist," or "socialist" as you like, it really matters not. What failed is the state-controlled economic system common to all those labels. "Most socialistic" doesn't mean socialist. Those countries are social democracies. All those countries have backed off of socialism. The Brits still have their National Health Service but socialism in Europe is pretty much over. Now they're into private ownership, just like we are. We have gotten very far afield. My point was that, if you're going to use an epithet, "Marxist" is better than "socialist" because it's fuzzier so you have a better change of surviving a defamation suit. Epithets and defamation--the topic of the discussion that stimulated my engagement. I continue to have no idea of what Biden had in mind.