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A new socialist movement is cohering in the US, thanks in large part to the popular class politics of Bernie Sanders. But as that movement grows and progresses, it is bound to run into dangerous obstacles and thorny contradictions. The new US socialist movement is without a single "line" or monolithic political position. That's a strength of the movement, since none of us has all the answers. Still, many people in the movement, ourselves included, feel strongly about certain approaches to strategy. One approach we feel strongly about is what we call "the democratic road to socialism," or the idea that we need to make good use of the democratic structures and processes available to us (and to improve and expand them) in order to advance our cause.

A country like the United States has both a well-developed capitalist state, beholden to the capitalist class and armed to the teeth, and mechanisms for democratic participation in that state that allow people to exercise some measure of control over their representatives. Even though their choices are limited, their representatives are bought off by the rich, and the capitalist class holds the entire system hostage with the threat of devastating economic retaliation if things don't go their way, the system does have some basic democratic elements that its citizens largely affirm and occasionally participate in.

This is a tricky situation to navigate. If the democratic capitalist state were less developed, it might be possible to convince people to simply storm the gates, tear up the old rules, and start fresh in a socialist society. This is what socialists tried to do in Russia in 1917: the state was weak and after centuries of autocratic rule it didn't have much legitimacy in the eyes of most Russians, so revolutionaries could get popular support for scrapping it and starting over.

The United States is hardly an exemplary democracy, and socialists must push to further democratize elements of the state. But even if people are unhappy about much of our corrupt political system today, it does hold a strong degree of legitimacy in most citizens' minds. Despite Republicans' continued efforts to restrict the franchise, most people can vote, and they see the results of elections as basically lawful and valid. People often (rightfully) feel dejected and cynical about US electoral politics, but they don't consider the system so illegitimate that they're willing to risk their lives to destroy it anytime soon.

Mass numbers of people are going to treat elections as the main arena for their political frustrations and aspirations, at least for the time being. These are objective conditions over which we have no control. The question we must face is whether we join them in the democratic sphere, giving socialist and class-struggle character to fights playing out in the electoral arena, or sit those fights out and miss the opportunity to engage with people by getting in the ring ourselves.

The democratic road strategy does not assume that we'll simply stack up reforms until we look up one day and have socialism. Social change is more complicated than that, happening as it does in fits and starts, often with brief periods of great advance and long dry spells in between. Capitalists won't let us slowly but surely inch our way toward a new society; at some point, probably around the time our advances start decisively challenging their control over industry and their profits, they're going to try to tear us down by any means necessary.

But reforms do have a major role in building socialism, and not just for the purpose of spreading our message. By engaging in mass democratic politics, and electing politicians faithful to our movement who can spearhead the fight for real reform (including democratizing the current state), we can tip the balance of power in favor of the working class.

That balance is decidedly not tipped in our favor today. The power of the capitalist class is now so great that it can punish cities, states, and countries whose working-class movements have successfully won gains for workers against bosses. The punishment doesn't even have to be intentional: by simply following their mandate to maximize profits, employers are naturally inclined to close shops whose labor costs make them uncompetitive and move to regions where workers are less powerful, demoralizing movements and wreaking economic havoc on the people who fight back the hardest. Thisis the story of manufacturing in the United States, especially over recent decadescompanies have constantly moved operations, first within the country, from high-wage markets to relatively low-wage ones, then across the border or overseas, to countries with even lower wages like Mexico or China. Bosses don't have to be evil to do this; the market compels them to. They may not want to tear down a community's economic foundation, but if they don't, their competitors will undercut them.

To stop this race-to-the-bottom cycle undercutting workers' power and lay the groundwork for revolutionary change, we must erode the power of the capitalist class. We can accomplish that by, for example, imposing capital controlsmeasures that stop the free movement of capital in response to changing social and economic conditions. But to pass economic reforms as significant as these, we can't just agitate in the streets, as important as that is. We have to be in power.

Luckily for us, while contesting for that power comes with plenty of dilemmas we must be careful to avoid, it's also a fantastic opportunity. Without capital on our side, the project of contesting for state power becomes by necessity a democratic one. We achieve success in the electoral sphere when we've won over masses of people to our political agenda. Elections can be used to build mass working-class movements, and the project of wielding state power can be used to clear the path for those movements as they confront their class enemies.

Chris Maisano describes the democratic road as a strategy that pursues "election of a left government (likely over multiple contested elections) mandated to carry out a fundamental transformation of the political economy, coordinated with a movement from below to build new institutions and organizations of popular power in society."

Eric Blanc offers a similar formulation. Eventually, after the Left has won significant gains at the ballot box and in civil society, the capitalist class will take the gloves off against socialists and do whatever it takes to destroy our movement. We'll need to fight back. The democratic road to socialism seeks not to elide this confrontation, but to make it possible. To replace capitalism with socialism, writes Blanc, "(a) socialists should fight to win a socialist universal suffrage electoral majority in government/parliament and (b) socialists must expect that serious anti-capitalist change will necessarily require extra-parliamentary mass action like a general strike and a revolution to defeat the inevitable sabotage and resistance of the ruling class."

Though socialists are likely to be met with capitalist resistance that at times will turn violent, "revolution" doesn't necessitate mass bloodshed and though we believe in self-defense, we certainly do not advocate violent means. A future socialist government, the late Marxist thinker Ralph Miliband wrote, "has only one major resource, namely its popular support." To pull off a revolution in our circumstances, that popular support would need to be mobilized both inside and outside of government.

Adherents of the democratic road strategy don't claim to know the precise sequence of events that will lead us to socialism, nor do we pretend it will be a cakewalk to eliminate capitalism, even with our people in power. Past attempts to make such transformations in countries like Chile and France have been stymied, as we'll get to later in this chapter. But we do know that the United States will not be able to achieve anything like socialist governance, and join other nations in the project of building international socialism, without both a mass movement of workers and the formal power to stop capitalists from undermining that movement as it engages in class struggle. We see engagement in electoral politics as an important tactic for accomplishing both of these goals, and ultimately bringing about a scenario in which the working class can actually win.

We've seen that left elected officials can not only win office, but can widen the scope of political possibility even when they're only a small minority of legislators in a given elected body. For a socialist movement that's been in the wilderness for at least half a century, these new developments are crucial. But it's not enough for socialists to be a tiny minority in the House of Representatives, or run inspiring but failed campaigns for president, or hold only 10 percent of seats in a city council. Our aims have to be much bigger than that. We don't want simply to fight against some other political majoritywe want to become the majority, and believe we can get there.

Once we do, we will have to think very seriously about what our program should look like and how we will fight the capitalist backlash that will follow. If we aren't prepared for it, we're doomed to fail.

# # #

Adapted from "Bigger than Bernie: How We Go from the Sanders Campaign to Democratic Socialism," by Meagan Day and Micah Uetricht, to be published on April 28, 2020 from Verso. All rights reserved.

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Why Bernie Sanders is just the beginning of an American turn to the left - Salon

If there was ever any doubt as to the true intentions of democratic socialists, then look no further than a sobering article in Slate written by two of the movement's most prominent leaders.

In their piece, which is an adaptation of a forthcoming book, writers Micah Uetricht and Meagan Day of Jacobin, a socialist publication, argue that Sen. Bernie Sanders is merely the first step in a broader strategy to push the United States to the far left.

Uetricht and Day posit that the Vermont democratic socialist's presidential campaign is the tip of the spear of what they describe as "a new socialist movement." The two make a case for manipulating "democratic structures and processes" to march the country toward full-scale socialism.

While the two note that the American system is inherently designed to work against their cause, to achieve "revolutionary change," Uetricht and Day call for eroding "the power of the capitalist class."

In other words, they call for systemic changes and a "fundamental transformation of the political economy," through a series of economic reforms that would bring the economy under their control and the control of their ideological allies. "To replace capitalism with socialism," an author the pair cites wrote, socialists must achieve the following two goals:

The two also warn that the type of "revolution" they call for could result in bloodshed, though they do not openly call for violence. "To pull off a revolution in our circumstances," Uetricht and Day write, "that popular support would need to be mobilized both inside and outside of government."

Additionally, they caution that though they do not know "the precise sequence of events that will lead us to socialism," achieving "socialist governance" will require "both a mass movement of workers and the formal power to stop capitalists from undermining that movement as it engages in class struggle."

To get there, Uetricht and Day insist on winning elections. "[I]t's not enough for socialists to be a tiny minority in the House of Representatives, or run inspiring but failed campaigns for president, or hold only 10 percent of seats in a city council," they write. Adding, "We don't want simply to fight against some other political majoritywe want to become the majority."

In other words, the two seem to caution fellow socialists to put intra-socialist debates aside and focus on winning the presidency. By electing Sanders to the White House, the duo imply their socialist movement will be in a much stronger position to then launch a much broader, full-scale assault on the American free market system and way of life.

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Sanders is an important step to full-blown socialism and 'huge leftward shift,' say leading leftists - TheBlaze

Add democratic to socialism and presto a tidy rallying cry emerges for Sen. Bernard Sanders, now leading the Democratic field in the presidential race. In his world, socialism is transformed into a family-style activity with free stuff for all and good feelings all around. The candidate, in fact, has called his democratic socialism a vibrant democracy in several interviews.

You are the reason why we stand an excellent chance to win. Thank you for everything. Let us go forward together, Mr. Sanders advises fans in a new campaign message for Our Revolution, his campaign entity which bears the motto organize to win.

This is quite a leap from the socialism of yore. The transformation of this belief system is evident elsewhere. A recent Axios analysis of public opinion declared that the Soviet stigma associated with socialism has disappeared. Meanwhile, a cute new socialism chic is popular among the young and restless of Manhattan and its surrounding boroughs according to New York Magazine complete with a socialist dating service. This cultural metamorphosis is underway despite a high-profile denial of socialism from one nation familiar with this form of government.

I know that some people in the U.S. associate the Nordic model with some sort of socialism. Therefore, I would like to make one thing clear. Denmark is far from a socialist planned economy. Denmark is a market economy, Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told a surprised audience at Harvard University and that was five years ago.

Now comes a new question: Is there a difference between socialism and democratic socialism? A new Yahoo/YouGov poll finds that 38% of registered U.S. voters say the two terms are the same. The survey found that 62% of Republicans, 41% of independents and 16% of Democrats agree.

But wait. Another 38% said the two terms are different; 18% of Republicans, 34% of independents and 58% of Democrats agree. About a quarter 24% were not sure about the matter; 20% of Republicans, 25% of independents and 26% of Democrats agree.

The greatest divide, however, is found among those who voted for President Trump in 2016, and those who chose Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. The poll revealed that 69% of Trump voters said socialism and democratic socialism were the same, compared to 13% of Clinton voters. Meanwhile, 15% of the Trump fans said the terms were different, compared to 60% of Clinton voters, with the rest undecided.

SO HOW IS BERNIE DOING?

Sen. Bernie Sanders, on the strength of his performances in Iowa and New Hampshire, has surged nationally and now holds a sizable lead over all of his rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, states a Washington Post-ABC News poll released Wednesday.

If he were to become the nominee, about half of all Americans say it makes no difference in their vote that Sanders is a socialist, including about 7 in 10 Democrats. But nearly 4 in 10 adults say that fact makes them more likely to oppose him, including 37% of independents and 79% of Republicans. Just under 1 in 10 adults say it makes them more likely to support him, the analysis noted.

In terms of electability, Democrats believe Bernie is their man.

In a measure of how Democrats see Sanders as a candidate against President Trump, 72% say they believe he would defeat the president. Among Democrats, 69% think Michael Bloomberg would win against Trump, and 68% say that of Joe Biden, the research said.

A PAUL RYAN SIGHTING

Former House Speaker Paul D. Ryan dishes on his time in Congress and the current state of American politics at the University of Virginia on Friday certainly of interest to news organizations who hope hell weigh in on President Trump in one form or another.

University of Virginia Center for Politics director Larry J. Sabato will interview Mr. Ryan, who was first elected to the House in 1998. He became the running mate to Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney during his quest for the White House in 2012, which seems like an incredibly long time ago. Mr. Ryan became speaker of the House in 2015 and retired four years later. He then founded the nonprofit American Idea Foundation and currently serves on the board of directors of Fox Corp., parent company for Fox News. But wait, theres more.

Ryan clashed with President Trump recently after publication of the book American Carnage, by Tim Alberta, chief political correspondent for Politico. Im telling you, he didnt know anything about government, Ryan said in the book. Trump lashed out in a series of tweets, calling Ryan the failed V.P. candidate and a lame duck failure, Politico reported six months ago.

Of note: Fridays forum is part of Democracy in Perilous Times: Unprecedented Challenges and Controversies, an ongoing program on the campus.

A GENUINE BLITZ

A federal agency may set the record for an astonishing public outreach. The U.S. Census Bureau has expanded its already massive multimedia advertising campaign for the upcoming census count and now says the push is designed to reach over 99% of the nations households.

Almost every person living in the United States will be reached an average of 40 times during the lifetime of the campaign, which will take place on TV, radio, newspapers, online and at outdoor locations such as billboards and bus stops, the agency notes.

The messages will run in English and a dozen other languages including Arabic, Haitian Creole and Russian all part of a $500 million public education campaign devised to assure people that the census is easy, safe and important.

POLL DU JOUR

51% of U.S. voters have a favorable view of capitalism; 72% of Republicans, 54% of independents and 32% of Democrats agree; 43% of women and 61% of men also agree.

21% of voters overall have an unfavorable view of capitalism; 12% of Republicans, 22% of independents and 30% of Democrats agree; 21% of women and 22% of men also agree.

19% of voters overall have a neutralview of capitalism; 10% of Republicans, 17% of independents and 28% of Democrats agree; 23% of women and 14% of men also agree.

8% overall are unsure on the issue; 6% of Republicans, 7% of independents and 10% of Democrats agree; 11% of women and 4% of men also agree.

Source: A Yahoo News/YouGov survey of 1,530 registered U.S. voters conducted Feb. 12-13.

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Inside the Beltway: Voters mystified by the meaning of "Democratic socialism" - Washington Times

Last weeks Democratic debate was more of a brawl than a discourse. Seeing anti-billionaire candidates Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren pitted against billionaire Michael Bloomberg made me consider the wealth disparity in America. The question that came out of the debate was: how ready is America ready for socialism?

I would not call either Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren socialists, even if conservative Republicans are eager to paint them with that brush.

Ms Warren is more a pro-market leftist than a socialist. Born into poverty, she has fought hard all her life to reach the position she is in now. She calls herself a capitalist to the bones.

Brooklyn-born Mr Sanders on the other hand is a self-declared socialist who in 1985 travelled to Nicaragua to celebrate the Soviet-backed Sandinista government and four years later, to communist Cuba to laud the countrys free healthcare, education and housing.

He has recently toned down his rhetoric. He no longer idolises communist regimes but looks to progressive countries like Denmark and Sweden as examples of workable socialism in particular their health and education policies. Both he and Ms Warren intend to fix Americas broken education system.

I have lived in socialist countries (France and the UK) most of my adult life. I have used state healthcare, given birth in a public hospital and my son went to a sous-contrat school in Paris that was subsidised by the French government.

A 1983 graduate recently told me, In my day, peoples parents were teachers or journalists or maybe lawyers the average middle class. Now most parents are bankers

While there are problems with the French system including often enforcing memorisation rather than creative thinking it largely works. Most people in France use the state system rather than private schools, and universities are accessible to most if you get the grades.

No massive economic hurdles or crippling student loans prevent youngsters from attending or staying in tertiary education.

In comparison, Mr Sanders and Ms Warren have forced me to think about how radically unfair the US educational system is. In New York City, where I now live, private schools offering elite education cost about $50,000 (Dh183,660) a year. Students are rigorously prepared to enter the elite Ivy League universities which then cost around $80,000. Nowhere is economic injustice more apparent than within the educational model.

To be fair, the wealthier the university the more financial aid it is able to give. Others can attend public universities which have fewer resources. Ms Warren got financial aid and worked her way through law school. Mr Sanders went to the public Brooklyn College before transferring to the University of Chicago.

The New York City private school system has exploded since the financial boom of the 1980s, with competitive parents plotting their childs high school from their day of birth. This is a new phenomenon. Prior to the money boom most people just went to school.

One 1983 graduate of Dalton, one of the best elite schools in New York, recently told me that it was very different three decades ago: In my day, peoples parents were teachers or journalists or maybe lawyers the average middle class. Now most parents are bankers.

It is frustrating to think that a level of superior education is only available to elite students either because they have money or are groomed to attend such schools. They are selected on account of their potential to be leaders.

In recent years, more students that fill the diversity quota are admitted. But even so, if you do not have a family that sets you on the Ivy track early on, you do not stand much of a chance. If your family struggled to pay rent, it is unlikely they are thinking of enrolling you in extra-curricular activities or pricey university preparation classes. It is precisely these students, who do not stand much of a chance, that we need to reach most. They are the ones left behind.

Earlier this week, I had a meeting with a dean from a large north-eastern American public university (a state school that offers lower tuition to local students). Her dilemma was how to keep low-income students enrolled for the full four years and help them pay off small debts. Some of them have to drop out because they owe $200 in parking tickets or library fees, she said. Some of them have to support families or work in order to pay for food or housing.

Everyone knows the value of education, whether it is educating girls in Afghanistan or countering violent extremism. But I often wonder guiltily because even though he is on a full scholarship, my son goes to a private school and I teach at Yale University, an Ivy League school how different American society would be if young low-income students were set on leadership paths early on. What if we could reach the kind of students that Elizabeth Warren grew up with in Oklahoma? What if they had the opportunities to take unpaid internships, overseas fellowships or get help securing their first job. It is not a secret that the Ivy League brand is pretty much an assurance that you graduate with a job offer in hand, and probably a high-paying one. Recruiters dont visit the state universities; they want the best and the brightest.

This takes me back to Ms Warren and Mr Sanders. Ms Warren believes that every kid in America should have the same access to a high-quality public education no matter where they live, the colour of their skin or how much money their parents make.

Mr Sanders believes we should re-invest in education, and use the first African-American Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall as an icon his plan largely focuses on combating racism, free universal school meals and rebuilding schools.

So while I dont think of either one of them as true, blue socialists, I do think what they are proposing in terms of education is radical and very much needed. They want to tear down the system and rebuild it. This may spell anarchy but without it, the elite who run America will continue to do so.

Janine di Giovanni is a Senior Fellow at Yale Universitys Jackson Institute for Global Affairs

Updated: February 24, 2020 05:14 PM

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Socialism and education in the US: what it will take for everyone to be able to afford school - The National

February 21, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) With the rise of Bernie Sanders, many Americans are asking themselves a simple question. What is the difference between a democracy and a socialist democracy? For anyone who has gone through the experience of living under a socialist regime, the difference between the two is like the difference between a chair and an electric chair. You don't believe me? Read on.

As I understand it, it is not that young Americans love socialism but that they think that capitalism and liberal democracy are guilty of much of the evil in the world: inequality, poverty, global crisis and even climate change.

As a survivor of socialism, I can tell from my own experience, that socialism is in fact the worst political system ever invented and yet, somehow, it still has the support of much of the mainstream culture. Socialism desires to be loved by everyone and that is why it proposes free healthcare, free education, equality, the elimination of corrupt extreme wealth. It is also why socialism sees the family and religion as rivals for the love of the people.

Socialism, regardless of whether it is imposed by brute force in the 20th century, as it was in Poland from 1945 to 1989, or as it is still practiced in Venezuela, has some striking similarities with the medieval medical practice of phlebotomy or bloodletting. That pseudo-science prescribed a treatment that consisted of extracting the blood from the patient for the supposed treatment of almost all ailments. Both in medieval medicine and under socialism, the loss of blood is supposed to heal everything. Unfortunately, in both cases, the unsuspecting patient usually ends up dead.

Socialism asserts that its ultimate goal is to transform human relations under a spirit of equality and justice, and that it is the natural enemy of exploitation. These are beautiful and far-sighted goals. The problem is that socialism not only does not solve any of the problems it sets out to address, but worsens them with an unrivaled effectiveness.

Socialism has a feature that it can never get rid of: that is, when it ascends to power, it acquires the characteristics of a state religion. The secretary general or head of the party becomes a deity who will never give up his throne. Those who do not profess the official state religion immediately become pariahs in their own country. Whether political opponents can be condemned to mere civic or actual physical death depends only on the stage that has been reached on the unavoidable devolution of socialism. Under socialism you can forget about God & Country, under socialism there is no god but the state and the secretary general is its prophet.

Universal history has proven this same pattern in every corner of the world where socialism has risen to power. And that is why the socialist state needs more and more police force, officials, guards and above all a secret army of volunteers: some of them mere gossipers and others willing snitches eager to betray their own friends or even their brother.

If no one trusts anyone, how can the welfare state be built? Socialism knows very well that it needs to protect the illusion of a benevolent state at all costs and more often than not it will do so with police force, because sooner or later the illusion is always challenged by free-thinking citizens who do not believe the falsehood presented by the reality of a socialist state.

Another thing that characterizes the socialist state is a permanent economic crisis, because a centralized, government-controlled economy always fails. History has taught us that it is the free market, with its immutable law of supply and demand that can adequately regulate the economy. The permanent economic crisis of a socialist democracy does consistently deliver one thing that it promises - that is, an unnatural form of equality, one in which everyone is average, and nobody envies anyone else because everyone lives under the yoke of poverty.

Have you ever wondered why the "socialist utopias" of the world always cause a mass exodus of the best workers and the most enterprising of men? Have you ever heard of a similar mass exodus from capitalist countries? Would anyone wish to live in a country that promises an island of full happiness but always ends up as a prison where there is neither bread nor toilet paper, and instead puts up a fence with barbed wire so you don't even think of choosing another "paradise"?

It is no joke, toilet paper was a thing of dreams for the Poles of my youth, not to mention ham or chocolate! Of course, such poverty requires free and frequent access to the doctor and the dentist. But how is this to be done? The doctors in socialist utopias inevitably flee to the capitalist countries where their work is compensated. And as for hospitals, in the socialist utopia of Poland, as must be the case in Venezuela, Cuba and most others, there are always a limited number of hospitals, to match the few qualified doctors; and so, being patient number 340 in the queue, most people in these utopias prefer to take care of themselves.

But don't worry! Socialism, as the extraordinarily corrupt system that it is, will offer you a fast and high quality alternative, but only in exchange for a handsome bribe. This is the point when you find out that free health care can actually be very expensive.

In socialist utopias, the bribe is the unfailing key to success. Wherever you go with a bribe, you will receive what you expect; you just have to learn how to bribe discreetly. In a socialist utopia, the bribe is king, if you learn to discretely bribe the doctor, the public official, the store manager, the police officer and all of those on whom your life depends, you might even live a comfortable life in your socialist utopia. Of course, it will not be easy to give away a bundle of money for these bribes, not only because you will not have it, but also because of the omnipresence of an amateur but efficient network of sneaks and snitches.

This is socialism in all of its glory: corruption and fear with a pinch of hate.

You hate people because, in this permanent crisis of poverty, the law of the jungle is applied, and everyone around you represents a threat. You also learn to hate your own country, because it constantly humiliates you and condemns you to an unbearable life (that is precisely why free education in socialist utopias is so useful for everyone.) The sooner you learn to become a proficient liar the better off you will be. Of course, at every level of your "free" education, right up to the university, the state will expect you to be a humble cog in the system, but the most important thing is that education is free, right?

In the end, the real goal of the socialist utopia is to destroy all competition for the love of the people; imagine no religion, no family, and no inequality. To get there socialism will destroy churches, family values, and take all the wealth from the last few remaining rich who are able to survive the glorious socialist revolution.

Of course, none of these dystopic dreams ever become a reality. People are made to love God. People are made to be raised by families. And yes, some people will accumulate more wealth than others. At least on this last point, socialism seems to work quite well, not openly, but efficiently nonetheless. Socialism and great personal accumulation of wealth coexists perfectly with the socialist apparatus of power, with the leadership of the party and with the forces of repression. All of them will accumulate obscene wealth and power, while everyone else will live in poverty and repression.

This is the socialism that I know. It is the real face of socialism. Perfect for the international socialist elite and a nightmare for everyone else.

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Dear Bernie Sanders: I survived socialism. Its the worst political system ever invented - Lifesite