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One of the potential final pairings in the coming US Presidential is Bernie Sanders vs Donald Trump. Even from an outward appearance there is a stark contrast between the two, with Bernie's unkempt white locks on one side and Donald's Full Head of Hair (TM) on the other.
Bernie's campaign is asked about his appearance on a regular basis, and their response has moved to "enough about the hair already". His appearance is less of the traditional politician, and one of Bernie Sanders, the leftist politician.
While hair may seem a minor detail for the leader of the United States compared to qualifications like experience or political position, but this Princeton study states that a quick appraisal of a picture of the candidates appearance is in line with 70 percent of U.S. senate and state governor elections in 2006. The original paper from 2007 can be found at PNAS.org.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @08:22AM
Bernie is nowhere near the Left.
He kinda-sorta matches Liberal Democrats FDR and LBJ.
Bernie is pro-war and pro-Capitalism.
Neither is a Leftist position.
A critique by someone who actually IS a Socialist of Bernie's explanation of “democratic socialism”. [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [wsws.org]
A Socialist *does* stand for the collective ownership of the means of production.
In his speech, Bernie says specifically that he isn't for that.
Can we stop using the term "Leftist" as a pejorative?
...especially where it doesn't even apply.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @08:43AM
A Socialist *does* stand for the collective ownership of the means of production.
That's a definition of socialists where you assume socialism==communism. I don't know whether that's a US thing, but here in Europe, the two concepts are considered vastly different.
In general, socialist over here stand for unions, universal healthcare, unemployement benefits, tax-the-rich and so on, but they usually don't try to nationalize private means of production. There are many examples where socialists in power have actually privatized state-owned companies more than any liberal, pro-capitalism, party (hint: France, Jospin's government).
TL;DR: A *Communist* stands for the collective ownership of the means of production.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @10:09AM
I can't pound the knowledge into your head.
I linked to an article by an actual Socialist on an actual Socialist website.
YOU have to make the choice to become less ignorant.
Most of the rhetoric left over from the Cold War is bullshit.
If you want to continue to embrace it, it simply shows your gullibility.
...and as an example of things being named: "Democratic People's Republic of Korea".
I have already used the term Liberal Democrat.
(Sometimes they're called Social Democrats.)
If you want to wise up, start there.
-- gewg_
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @11:23AM
Dude, chill down, YOU must have misunderstood the point of my post. I'm well educated thank you and I'm just letting you know that the US definition of socialism is far away from the one we have in EU. There is at least one socialist party in every state here, they, actually or pretendingly, aim for a better equality in society, better repartition of wealth, etc. (i.e. the whole package they call social equality) but none of them wants to nationalize means of production. Now in every EU country there is also at least one communist party (or "revolutionary league party", or "anti-capitalist party", whatever). THESE guys are all about nationalization and power to the people. THESE are the one you'd call socialist in the US.
There is nothing uneducated about that, you can even bother to factually check every word of it. Just pointing out a difference of vocabulary between EU and US.
The article (very interesting thank you) you pointed at is likely written by a US citizen with the US definition of socialism which is what we call communism and vastly differs from what we call socialism over here in EU.
I don't give a fuck whether Sanders is a socialist (per EU or US's definition), a right-wing nutjob in disguise or an unemployed hairdresser.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @11:43AM
You have the same with "liberals". In the US they are often considered left winged... In the Netherlands (and I guess other EU countries as well) they are for the more wealthy inhabitants of the country and try to break down social securities as much as possible, and can be found on the right wing.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @12:24PM
It's less about one buzzword over another and ultimately about whether or not an individual in a given country is a free person or a slave. Even in the soft gloved European version of socialism as you describe, "better repartition of wealth", tax-the-rich, etc. literally equate to slavery. Oh, sure, it's not necessarily the whips-and-chains version of slavery, but the individual under socialism is still subject to "do as we say or die".
If an individual is free, the situation is the opposite: "don't try to attack me and we both live". I'll note that the USA is/was supposed to be a free nation but is a defacto slave nation according to its (almost entirely criminal) government.
(Score: 2) by unzombied on Sunday November 22 2015, @09:26PM
(Score: 2) by srobert on Sunday November 22 2015, @04:41PM
"In general, socialist over here stand for unions, universal healthcare, unemployement benefits, tax-the-rich and so on, but they usually don't try to nationalize private means of production."
We're more likely to achieve these things if we don't call them "socialism". If we define socialism in the way Sanders does, then FDR was a Socialist. But it was FDR's opponents who tried to hang the label on the New Deal policies as a pejorative. FDR avoided calling it socialism because of the connotations of communism. Sanders is trying to explain what he means by the term and show that it's not inconsistent with what most Americans want. He might be able to educate people in Vermont that way. But he may be underestimating the deliberate persistence of ignorance in certain other parts of the country.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by khallow on Sunday November 22 2015, @09:26AM
Bernie is pro-war and pro-Capitalism.
Neither is a Leftist position.
Position != belief. I note also that no actual demonstration of "pro-war" and "pro-capitalism" is demonstrated. Sanders is "pro-war with ISIS" which is a sensible position given how many people they've already killed, how many people they've already driven out of Syria, and ISIS's potential for increasing both of those problems in the future.
A critique by someone who actually IS a Socialist of Bernie's explanation of “democratic socialism”.
The author, Patrick Martin quickly starts with the Marxism rhetoric. Marxism is only a narrow flavor of leftist and a flavor which happens to be particularly idiotic and particularly lethal. I notice also that Patrick Martin is comfortable [globalresearch.ca] with genocide as long as it doesn't further US imperialism.
Yatsenyuk’s theme was then taken up by Samantha Power, the Obama administration’s own ambassador to the United Nations, in an hour-long speech in Kiev yesterday, delivered to an audience of rabid Ukrainian nationalists. Power is the personification of “human rights” imperialism, having first come to public notice as a critic of the Clinton administration’s refusal to intervene in the Rwandan genocide of 1994—a slaughter that was bound up with the rivalry between French and American imperialism in the region.
Power, an Obama foreign policy aide for a decade, is identified with campaigns for US intervention in Sudan under the pretext of preventing genocide in Darfur, as well as similar efforts in central Africa, Libya, Syria, Nigeria and now Ukraine. Like all defenders of US imperialist interests, Power maintains a crass double standard where the crimes of US allies are concerned (to say nothing of the crimes of US imperialism itself in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries). She has shown no outrage over mass slaughters by Israel in Gaza or by Egyptian military dictator al-Sisi, and she supports the ongoing campaign of starvation and bombing by Saudi Arabia in Yemen.
To summarize, when the genocide is in countries that Martin doesn't care about, then it's extending US imperial interests. I'll just point out that belatedly supporting Tutsi rebel groups during the episode of the Rwanda genocide also saved hundreds of thousands of lives. He doesn't care.
Moving on:
A Socialist *does* stand for the collective ownership of the means of production.
In his speech, Bernie says specifically that he isn't for that.
Because otherwise he would not have a chance to become US President. And note your link merely states that Sanders doesn't believe in government ownership of the means of production. That would be a flavor of fascism (which can be leftist). Private ownership doesn't preclude community ownership. Sanders can still continue to support privately run co ops, for example, which is typical socialist fare as well.
Can we stop using the term "Leftist" as a pejorative?
When you guys stop making politically irrational assumptions like assuming a political position is an actual belief of a politician rather than a thing the politician needs to do to get elected (this gets to the core of the common idiotic claims that someone isn't leftist while ignoring both the person's beliefs, life history, and the political realities in the process). Or disowning the Marxists in your midst who want to double down on the current worst known political ideas out there. Or ignoring actual human behavior and nature. But OTOH, like you, I have no problem with you embracing politically self-marginalizing behaviors that in turn help prevent societies from embracing your harmful ideas.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @10:12AM
government ownership of the means of production. That would be a flavor of fascism (which can be leftist)
I get so tired of the way you just make up shit.
-- gewg_
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday November 22 2015, @06:31PM
government ownership of the means of production. That would be a flavor of fascism (which can be leftist) I get so tired of the way you just make up shit.
Learn what words mean. Then I don't have to tell you what they mean. A key economic characteristic of fascist governments was complete subordination of the means of production to government authority, hence, ownership by government.
Also learn how to see things from other peoples' viewpoints. All this argument over Sanders not being a "leftist" is simply because you don't understand how elections work and what sort of opinions most of the electorate has in the US. When you do understand these things, you will understand that least for the next few election cycles, no one will run on a hardcore leftist agenda and get elected. There's just not enough support in the electorate to make that work. A flaming leftist who gets elected will have the same positions as politician leaning a little left of center because that's what the fairly conservative electorate will go for.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @02:16PM
Leftists don't support "war", they support "revolution", "resistance", "liberation", etc, other words for hiring people with guns to go to other places and kill the people there and take their stuff, but don't call it war.
and the Left has out-competed everyone else in the tech sector to the point where companies can make you repeat Maoist slogans on your personal social media accounts to keep your job or else you will get blacklisted across the industry. The Left is not only pro-Capitalism these days but better at it than anyone else.
A Socialist stands for worker control of the means of production. Not your collective bureaucracy in another city that causes the same problems as corporate remote ownership.
Too bad that being worse than Hitler is generally frowned upon. When people stop using "right-wing" as a pejorative, we will consider it.
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Sunday November 22 2015, @04:34PM
He is Jewish, I think that is close enough for them. The left does not really care about you, or your thoughts of opinion, they just judge you on your racial identity.
Trump is white, so he is a patriarchal pro war capitalist and is bad for wanting to keep out immigrants.
Bernie is Jewish, so he is a feminist socialist by definition in their books, and no one talks about how he wants to keep out Mexican immigrants.
(Score: 5, Informative) by richtopia on Sunday November 22 2015, @04:50PM
Bernie's approach typically mimics the Nordic model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_model [wikipedia.org] which combines a welfare state with private ownership. Not communist, but left of center for the United States of America, and left of most major US candidates.
I was also confused about the pro-war position; first I don't think that communism is inherently pro/anti war. Otherwise Sander's record has been to no support the actions in Iraq. His stance on ISIS is to support the fight but not to lead, which is in-line with many politicians. More importantly to me he has spoken out against NSA surveillance programs which are typically justified by the war on terror.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 22 2015, @08:45PM
the Nordic model
Yes. I have used the terms Liberal Democracy and Social Democracy.
Bernie wants to return to the social safety net established under Roosevelt's New Deal and Johnson's Great Society (which were dismantled piece by piece by Reactionaries after the deaths of those Right-Center Populists).
...and Barry Goldwater (called Mr. Conservative in his time) was in favor of paying people properly for their labor as well as making sure they were healthy and had a stable existence in old age.
The biggest problem is the terminology used by Fox so-called News, et al, which calls radicals "conservative" and calls Right-Centrists "leftists".
It is dishonest and meant to get weak minds to accept that garbage without questioning it.
Bernie's approach typically [is] left of center for the United States
Again, only if you accept Lamestream Media's dishonest spin on where the vertical centerline is. [politicalcompass.org]
Note that the only member of the Democrat Party who made it onto that chart and was actually left of center (and south of the Authoritarian-vs-Civil Libertarian dividing line) is Dennis Kucinich.
Again, if you don't hold that collective ownership of the means of production is necessary for a stable society, you are **not** "Left".
If you think (as Adam Smith suggested in his work over 200 years ago and, more recently, Thomas Piketty has identified in his 700-page work) that Capitalism leads to a very unequal society with the wealthy in complete control of both business and government and the Working Class having zero voice in matters, you *are* thinking like a Leftist.
I don't think that communism is inherently [...] anti war
Substitute the word "anti-Imperialist" for "anti-war" and see if it makes more sense to you.
I challenge you to name a military engagement since the end of WWII[1] that wasn't a big guy trying to expand his sphere of influence.
When you have to go thousands and thousands of miles to find an enemy, that is clearly not "defense".
The last time USA fought a defensive action was the Battle of New Orleans in 1815.
[1] ...and it can easily be argued that WWII was completely avoidable because it was about Imperialism which resulted from issues that weren't properly addressed after WWI.
Sander's record has been to [not] support the actions in Iraq
Bernie has dragged his feet enough to allow people to say that sort of thing but he caves fairly easily on funding military actions by USA.
If you want to see someone who actually anti-war, look up Congresswoman Barbara Lee.
justified by the war on terror
Terrorism isn't an ideology--it's a method.
Declaring war on a method is really dumb.
Terrorist methods are crimes.
The way you deal with crimes is to deploy cops.
If your cops are really good at what they do, plans are thwarted before they turn into actions.
(A narrow, preventative focus--not broad, random murderous aggression.)
Within your own borders you can have freedom but there can be no guarantee of total safety.
Destroying freedom to get a bad version of safety is just lame.
Going thousands of miles to murder brown people's children doesn't make us safer; it just gets those people even more pissed off at us.
...and, in any western country, you have a bigger chance of being killed by lightning or having a fatal fall in the bathtub than being killed by a terrorist.
Terrorism is a manifestation of the problem but the actual problem is Extremism.
...and abortion clinic bomber Eric Rudolph and anti-gov't nutjob Tim McVeigh show that the threat defined as being from brown-skinned foreigners without an air force or navy who were last successful 14 years ago is out of all proportion.
-- gewg_