Sanders on Democratic Socialism

This is Bernie's much awaited speech on what democratic socialism means, what his calls for a political revolution mean, and what is his political philosophy.

Democratic? Sure.

Socialist? Not at all.

The transcript.

He speaks many times of FDR, but much of what he says sounds like that earlier great progressive, TR.

He defends himself against conservative charges he is a socialist by defining down socialism, democratic socialism, to TR's strong progressivism both regarding matters economic and regarding political arrangements to strengthen the hand of the many and weaken the grip of the few.

But that's all right.

So much of what the great white hunter urged in 1912 is still undone, after all.

A stirring excerpt.

So the next time you hear me attacked as a socialist, remember this:

I don’t believe government should own the means of production, but I do believe that the middle class and the working families who produce the wealth of America deserve a fair deal.

I believe in private companies that thrive and invest and grow in America instead of shipping jobs and profits overseas.

I believe that most Americans can pay lower taxes—if hedge fund managers who make billions manipulating the marketplace finally pay the taxes they should.

I don’t believe in special treatment for the top 1 percent, but I do believe in equal treatment for African-Americans who are right to proclaim the moral principle that Black Lives Matter.

I despise appeals to nativism and prejudice, and I do believe in immigration reform that gives Hispanics and others a pathway to citizenship and a better life.

I don’t believe in some foreign “ism”, but I believe deeply in American idealism.

I’m not running for president because it’s my turn, but because it’s the turn of all of us to live in a nation of hope and opportunity not for some, not for the few, but for all.

The last portion of his speech contains much sensible stuff about the struggle against ISIS and the financing and spread of Jihader ideology, where of course he makes much more sense than the Republicans and sounds rather less vainly bellicose than Hillary.

He sounds like he wants regional, Muslim powers to provide the boots on the ground and take the lead, with the US playing an ancillary role through NATO and a broader alliance of European and Muslim powers against radical Islam.

Hillary, on the other hand, sounds very much like the "American leadership," "indispensable nation" kind of girl she is.

And all of that is good stuff that can readily appeal not only to committed Democrats and progressives but also to a pretty good swath of the American Center.

But right in the middle of his speech Bernie goes out of his way to renounce successful, perfectly sensible, and not very costly moves in the Cold War, half a century ago, that did not involve actual warfare, the point of which was to prevent successes for the Soviet Union and its Cold War allies.

To put himself thus openly on the wrong side of these long-ago fights with not the least contemporary relevance was an unnecessary shout to the leftover radical left that he is one of them in spirit that can only cost him votes in the American center and make it easier for the right to attack him.

In other words, if the right chooses to run against him by saying that, though he invokes FDR and LBJ and though his agenda is solidly progressivist but not at all socialist, his heart is with the reds and was throughout the last years when it mattered, they will be telling the truth and can prove it by pointing to such foolishness as this where, ostensibly writing of ISIS, he says this.

Our response must begin with an understanding of past mistakes and missteps in our previous approaches to foreign policy. 

It begins with the acknowledgment that unilateral military action should be a last resort, not a first resort, and that ill-conceived military decisions, such as the invasion of Iraq, can wreak far-reaching devastation and destabilize entire regions for decades. 

It begins with the reflection that the failed policy decisions of the past—rushing to war, regime change in Iraq, or toppling Mossadegh in Iran in 1953, or Guatemalan President Árbenz in 1954, Brazilian President Goulart in 1964, Chilean President Allende in 1973. 

These are the sorts of policies do not work, do not make us safer, and must not be repeated.

It may seem odd that he says not a word about the unnecessary Korean and Vietnam Wars, actual boots-on-the-ground wars, the first a useless success and the second an insignificant failure, both fought against purely national communist movements without the least intention or ability to reach beyond their own borders and posing never the least threat to the United States.

But that is because he wishes to signal, not retrospective disapproval of the more inept and too costly applications of the policy of containment that began with Acheson and Truman, but of the anti-communism that was its basis.

A point that will not escape the Republicans and may not escape notice by Hillary, and will quite unnecessarily weaken his candidacy.

And that is very regrettable, what with him being in so many ways preferable to Hillary or any other Democrat.

That he muddied the waters some by praising the post-war rise and European role of NATO will not much help.