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Democrats and democratic socialists were incorrectly linked by some to Nazism following the harrowing protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, over the weekend that led to one womans death. The allegations were a huge misrepresentation of what each of the terms means and a poor, surface-only reading of what German leader Adolf Hitlers party and government stood for.

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The assertions or accusations listed above appear to stem from the official name of the party that Hitler led to take over Germany in the early 1930s. It was called the National Socialist German Workers Partylater shortened to Nazi partyand gained power by promising voters to alleviate a German economy mired in depression while also restoring German cultural values, reverse the provisions of theTreaty of Versailles, turn back the perceived threat of a Communist uprising, put the German people back to work, and restore Germany to its 'rightful position'as a world power,"according to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

The party represented an extreme side of Germans right wing, and the key word in its title was not necessarily "socialism," but rather "national." During Hitlers ascension, nationalism was preached and took hold, and excludedanyone who wasnt fully German or considered superior.

"The Nazis opposed all traditional socialism, wanting to substitute something they called German socialism or Aryan socialism, Bryn Mawr College professor Barbara Miller Lane told PolitiFact in October 2015. This meant citizenship and privileges only for Aryans (meaning non-Jews), concentration camps for others."

Indeed, the American Nazi Party, first named the World Union of Free Enterprise National Socialists by its founder George Lincoln Rockwell in 1959 before he changed the name a year later, specifically states that National Socialism applies to whites. The partys official website describes the two main tenets of the term are the Struggle for Aryan Racial survival, and Social Justice for White Working Class people throughout our land.

By definition, a political party with Nazi roots or affiliations is not democratic since it would apply to only one race, whereas democracy is meant to apply to all people, not a specific race or ethnicity.

Around the countrytoday, a more true form of democratic socialism is not only taking form but growing in the form of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). Following last years election and the rise of self-proclaimed democratic socialist and Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), the group has reportedly seen its membership grow to about 25,000 people, according to The Guardian.

Earlier this month, the group was represented by 697 delegates from 49 states for its largest convention yet in Chicago. Its main tenets and calls for reform include a significant decrease of the influence money has in politics, as well as empowering ordinary people in workplaces and the economy.

We are socialists because we reject an international economic order sustained by private profit, alienated labor, race and gender discrimination, environmental destruction, and brutality and violence in defense of the status quo, according to one description of DSAs political perspective on its official site.

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Nazis Are Not Socialists Nor Democrats Despite What Alt-Right Might Say - Newsweek

Let me start with my favourite question. Why is it that, of the thirty/forty nascent nations which emerged from the yoke of imperialism in the first half of the twentieth century in Asia, Australasia, Africa and South-America, India comprises the only country of its size and diversity to have remained a vibrant functioning democracy, while innumerable contemporary wrecks and ruins of constitutionalism litter the global landscape?

No doubt the first answer is possibly sheer good luck. But a close second is that while Gandhi and his atomic weapon of Ahimsa was vital to attain independence, India has remained a functioning & vibrant democracy because of Nehru as Indias first Prime Minister. India was singularly fortunate in getting its sequencing right: Gandhi first and Nehru later.

Nehru, intuitively, typified and practiced Voltaires famous dictum (also the essence of democracy) : I disagree vehemently with you but defend to death your right to disagree with me.

Three of the five tenets which he considered to be foundational to Indias destiny remain a vital part of the less visible non-institutional pillars of Indian democracy (the other two being Parliamentary Democracy and non-alignment). They are Secularism, Socialism and Federalism.

Secularism has been the heart and soul of Indian democracy from its inception, though it found express Constitutional expression much later. There is no more diverse spot on earth than India: the worlds largest democracy, the second most populous, the seventh largest in terms of area and the fourth largest by national GDP measured on purchasing power parity (PPP).

Its diversity is manifested in 22 scheduled languages, over 700 mother tongues, over 2000 dialects, the worlds largest population of 4 religions (Hindu, Sikh, Jain, and Parsi), the worlds second largest population of Muslims, and a significant number of other religious adherents. Every major racial grouping is present in India and it has thousands of bewildering rituals, foods, smells, sounds, music in all forms, dances and so on.

With such pluralities, Secularism is a self-protective mechanism for India. India has had a remarkable record of secular, non-theocratic governance, but if truth be told, the more one lets go in India, the more India binds and holds together. Conversely, the more one pulls or tries to bind or impose any uniform ethic, the more India is likely to break apart.

Secularism has been an effective vehicle to manage diversities. It has generated a sense of reassurance and security to Indias multiple diversities and provided a crucial underpinning for democracy. It is meant and intended to convey part ownership of democracy. Without this sense of belonging to and ownership of democracy by each aam admi, democracy cannot succeed.

As usual, the threats are almost entirely from within. There is a sinister and sustained attempt to impose a uniform ethic, to paternalistically decide what a citizen can wear, sing and eat, how he can behave, what he must think on certain occasions and what he must say on others. Instead of celebrating diversity, we mourn it as the biggest obstruction to nationalism.

We distort the idea of India by redefining the India of our dreams as the India of our demands. We live by a new ethic of suspicion and distrust, of glee at the fellow citizens discomfiture and of fear of speaking up in his favour when he is being tormented.

A second non-institutional pillar of democracy is federalism. It is vital for managing diversities. Federalism operates as a safety valve for the three Ds - dissent, discomfort and dissatisfaction. It channels these three Ds into relatively manageable outlets of constitutional structures, whether they are provincial legislatures, district level autonomous councils or models of local governance like Panchayati Raj. Indian federalism has quarantined conflicts within states or sub-state units and thus successfully prevented national conflagration.

Five significant developments have transmuted, over the last 70 years, the heavily unitary, quasi federal India at inception into a significantly more federal entity in operation, rightly resulting in it being called accidental or inadvertent federalism. Linguistic diversity resulted in creation of new states on the principle of linguistic contiguity and the three-language formula largely quietened the language riots of the 1960s.

Secondly, vigorous judicial review by the apex court since the new millennium has repeatedly quashed Article 356 incursions into federal autonomy. Thirdly, Panchayati Raj and local self-government, has created a humongous diaspora of elected local Panchayat officials (including 1.5 million women) who administer local self-government in the worlds largest model of fiscal and administrative decentralisation. Fourthly, economic liberalisation since 1988 and 1991 has considerably diluted the stranglehold of the central government in decision making. Finally, fiscal federalism, results in almost 45% receipts of the centre being transferred to the state either as the sharable tax revenues or as Central grants.

Threats to federalism include Central government discriminatory practices in fund devolution, selective waivers of financial demands according to matching or differing political colors of the Centre and the state concerned and a clearly Presidential style of central governance focused on micro managing everything. Catchwords or jumlebaazi like competitive or cooperative federalism cannot camouflage these aberrations.

Modern arm chair critics who retrospectively criticise Nehrus belief in socialism-a third non institutional pillar-- by saying that it consigned India to a low so called Hindu rate of growth between 3.5. to 4.5%, fail to realise that it was socialist philosophy which laid a firm foundation for the public sector in India and resulted in Indias solidity and self-reliance in core sectors like steel, chemicals, textiles, indigenous defence manufacturing and banking. It gave us both a self-reliant as well as a competitive edge, though, concededly, it overstayed its welcome. Our ability to weather the 2008 global financial crisis with minimum pain and regain the 8.5% annual trajectory of growth within one year owes a lot to these foundations.

One contemporary counterpart of Nehrus philosophy of socialism has been the worlds largest social welfare scheme, MNREGA, which despite opportunistic criticism when in opposition, has been largely followed and reluctantly lauded by the right wing successor government.

This vituperative criticism when in opposition and ready adaptation without attribution when in power model has been perfected by the present dispensation. Manifested across the board-from Aadhar, MNREGA, Food Security, GST to many others these compliments, albeit left handed, say it all.

In conclusion, Indias amazing diversity is its best insurance against degeneration of democracy or institutionalisation of dictatorship. To that must necessarily be added the intrinsic nature of India and of Indians viz. absorbent and highly argumentative.

Democracy in India has many miles to walk and many promises to keep. If it cannot be fairly castigated as an imperfect democracy, it is certainly also nowhere near being a perfect or near perfect democracy.

It is difficult to quantitatively calibrate whether we have covered half or more than 75% of the journey from imperfection to perfection. We have not achieved, for example, the more capacious concept of democracy beyond the narrower view of seeing democracy exclusively in terms of public balloting and not as the exercise of public reason i.e. the larger concept of providing opportunities for citizens to participate in political discussion and, more importantly, to informed public choices in methods that transcend the ballot box.

Personally, I have no doubt, that we are well past the midway mark in the journey and that we will get there in the fairly proximate future. But the story has never been only about the destination or the result. It has been, as much, if not more, about the journey and that has undoubtedly been exciting and unusual.

The author is MP; National Spokesperson, Congress; former Addl Solicitor General of India and Senior Advocate

Excerpt from:
Democracy beyond ballots: Threats to secularism, socialism - National Herald

Since his grassrootspresidential campaign took the world by storm last year, Sen. Bernie Sanders has been widely credited with bringing socialism back into the mainstream of American politics and introducing an entire generation to left-wing politics. As a major presidential candidate who unabashedly identified as a democratic socialist, Sanders essentially resurrected an idea that has been considered off limits in our political discourse for many decades: that there is an alternative to capitalism and the status quo.

This radical idea has become less taboo in recent years, and today an increasing number of millennials say theyreject capitalism,while a majority of Americans supportsocialistic policies likeuniversal health care(for the first time in a long time, single-payer is gaining mainstream momentum).Clearly, Sanders deserves the credit he has received for shifting the Overton window and reintroducing a form of left-wing class politics to America. It is safe to say thatno single person has done more to revive the American left than the Vermont senator.

But Sanders political rise did not happen in a vacuum, and its unlikely he would have achieved much success had the social and economic conditions not been ripe. Though the 75-year old senatorplayed an essential role in demystifying socialism to the public and instilling a radical spirit in the progressive movement, the current resurgence of class politics on the left has been in the works for many years, going back to the 2007-08 financial crisis.

It hasnt been white-haired socialists who have provided the foundation for this resurgence, but young people who grew up in the era of neoliberalism.This was evident last week, when progressivemillennials flockedto Chicago for the biannual Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) convention, where delegates came together to vote on various resolutions for the party. In the past year, the DSA has tripled its membership, and what is particularly telling about this growth is that the average age of DSA members has dropped by half virtually overnight,from 64 in 2015 to just 30 today.

This trend has led to a cottage industry of think pieces speculating about why millennials have embraced old school leftists like Sanders and British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, but it is hardly a great mystery. Millennials came of age during the worst capitalist crisis in 80years and live in a time when income and wealth inequality have reached historic levels as evidenced by the fact that the eight richest men in the world (seven of whom are white American men)own as much wealth as the bottom 3.6 billionpeople.

Millennials inhabit a planet that faces ecological collapse, and most grasp the threat of climate change on a visceral level. Young people are also crippled by record levels of debt and despite being better educated than their parents earn20 percent lessthan baby boomers did at this point in their lives. Finally, millennials have grown up in a time when moneyed interests have completely infiltrated the political process, creating anoligarchic form of governmentthat serves the economic elite rather than the majority.

In other words, millennials are increasingly ambivalent about capitalism because it is a system that has failed their generation. Not surprisingly, this has led to a significant number of young intellectuals who have also rediscovered the works of Karl Marx, the great diagnostician of capitalisms ills. Around the same time that the Occupy Wall Street protests erupted around the country in 2011, Bhaskar Sunkara foundedJacobin,the left-wing quarterly that has grown rapidly over the past five years, publishing the work of many millennial Marxists.

Of course, it is one thing to call yourself a socialist (or a democratic socialist) in America, and another thing entirely to identify as a Marxist. For the past century Karl Marx has been the ultimate intellectual bogeyman in the United States. For the majority of Americans who have no first-hand familiarity with the 19th-century thinker and his work, the term Marxism is synonymous with Stalinism and totalitarianism.

As withthe millennial embrace of an elderly democratic socialist, this Marxist revival has predictably confounded many liberal and conservative critics, who assume that youngsters simply dont know their 20th-century history. That Marxism is not viewed with a similar horror as Nazism is one of the greatest failings of contemporary education,tweetedClaire Lehmann, editor of the libertarian-leaning publication Quillette magazine, last month.

One of the greatest failings of contemporary education, one might counter, is that critics of Marxism know next to nothing about Marx or Marxism, other than the fact that some unsavory historical figures identified themselves with the term. This is obviously not a new phenomenon, and more than 50 years ago the American sociologist C. Wright Mills attempted to provide an objective account of Marxs ideas in his1962 book, The Marxists, meant to counteract the propaganda efforts of Cold Warriors.Mills book is just as useful today when it comes to explaining why Marx remains relevant in the 21st century. (Some might argue he is even more relevant today than in the mid-20th century, as capitalism has conquered the globe). In order to uncover what makes Marxs work so valuable, Mills makes an important analytical distinction between the philosophers methodology/model and his theories:

Amodelis a more or less systematic inventory of the elements to which we must pay attention if we are to understand something. It is not true or false; it is useful and adequate to varying degrees. Atheory, in contrast, is a statement which can be proved true or false, about the casual weight and the relations of the elements of a model. Only in terms of this distinction can we understand why Marxs work is truly great.

Marxs model, argues Mills, is what is great; that is what is alive in marxism. [Marx] provides a classic machinery for thinking about man, society, and history. That is the reason there have been so many quite different revivals of marxism. Marx is often wrong, in part because he died in 1883, in part because he did not use his own machinery as carefully as we now can, and in part because some of the machinery itself needs to be refined and even redesigned. . . . Neither the truth nor the falsity of Marxs theories confirm the adequacy of his model.

Marxs model looked at the structure of society as a whole, as well as that structure in historical motion, and the German philosopher and economist employed this model to examine and reveal the dynamics of capitalism. This largely explains why there has been a renewed interest in Marxs work in recent years, especially among millennials who have lived their entire lives under a global capitalist order. Marxs model of looking at the world, along with his exhaustive analysis of capitalism, helps us to understand our own contemporary reality and where we are headed.

While Marxs modelis essential to understanding modern society, another fundamental aspect of Marxism is, of course, the merging oftheory and practice. As Marx famously declared, Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it.

This remains the ultimate goal for millennial Marxists and socialists. Although capitalism has never been more globally dominant than it is today, this has also engendered social and economic conditions that are ripe for left-wing political movements.As the Marxist economist Richard Wolff recentlysaidduring an interview on Fox Business:

Socialism is in a way the shadow of capitalism. Nothing guarantees the future of socialism so much as capitalism, because socialism is capitalisms self-criticism.

Original post:
Bernie Sanders, and the Unexpected Socialist Revival - AlterNet

Bernie Sanders stands at the podium on stage during a walk through before the start of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on July 25, 2016. (Photo: SS)

Back in June, Iwrote about the bizarre allure of socialismand said that advocates (who generally dont even know what socialism really means) were some of the most anti-empirical people in the world.

even though the real-world evidence against big government is so strong, its rather baffling thatmany young peopleare drawn to thatcoercive ideologyand disturbing thata non-trivial number of votersfavor this failed form of statism.Socialism hasa technical definitioninvolving government ownership of the means of production and central planning of the economy. But most people today think socialism is big government, with business still privately owned but with lots of redistribution and intervention (Ive argued, for instance, that evenBernie Sanders isnt a real socialist, and that there arebig differencesbetween countries like Sweden, China, and North Korea). For what its worth, thats actually closer to thetechnical definition of fascism.

Now lets update that column.

It seems that the cancer of socialism is spreading, at least ifthis storyinThe Weekis any indication.

Things are looking up for the Democratic Socialists of America. With a membership of 25,000, it is now the largest socialist group in America since the Second World War. And last weekend in Chicago, it held its largest convention, by a considerable margin, in its history. Membership has more than tripled in a year, gaining a large boost from the candidacy of Bernie Sanders That sharp surge in new recruits most of whom are fairly young has created a fairly stark age bifurcation among members. Somewhat akin to Sanders campaign, there is an old guard of people who have been carrying the left-wing torch for years, and a recent surge of new membersmost of the major proposals were adopted with large majorities. Among other things, delegates voted toendorse the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (directed at ending the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza), and to endorse Medicare for all as a major priority.

Im guessing that the bifurcated conference meant a handful of old people who are genuine socialists and a bunch of young people who think socialism is just a bunch of government-coerced redistribution and intervention.

Both groups, however, deserve scorn for favoring a system that elevates the state over individuals. That approach is grossly immoral.

Not to mention that its never worked. Nobody has ever provided a good answer tomy two-part challenge.

There is no example of a successful socialist nation anywhere in the world. Cuba?No. North Korea?No. The Soviet Empire?Dont make me laugh. Venezuela?You must be joking.

Denmark or Sweden? Umm, theyrenot socialist, though their economies have beenhurt by excessive redistribution. Greece?Give me a break.

I could continue, but no sense beating a dead horse.

See the original post:
The Bizarre Allure of Socialism, Part II | People's Pundit Daily - People's Pundit Daily

Venezuelas self-destruction has embarrassed more celebrities than hasNational Enquirer. Our glitteratis favorite socialist paradise has, like so many similar experiments, become a murderous den of oppression and privation, and none will speak on its behalf. However, Venezuelas collapse has dashed fantasies far older and more sincere than Sean Penns.

Hugo Chvezs election in Venezuela realized a dream that festered in left-wing hearts for decades: a revolutionary socialist regime, with the sovereignty and resources to fulfill decades worth of pledges from left-wing populist leaders in Latin America. During the Cold War, dictators who gained and maintained power through coup dtat and state terror, often abetted by the U.S. government, frequently thwarted such movements. The depth of evil these dictators reached and the misery they created are not to be understated. They undermined the case for capitalism and American power as positive forces in the world, giving defenders of socialism the world over something to point at and say, But what about?

Men like Chvez were cast as the antidote. His triumph was a rebuke not only of Venezuelas own ancien rgime, but also of Pinochet, Rios Montt, and the rest of the Latin American tinpot rogues gallery. He was to avenge the sufferings of Oscar Romero and Rigoberta Mench, fulfill the stolen potential of Jacobo rbenz and Salvador Allende, and improve on the flawed, illiberal experiments of Fidel Castro and the Sandinistas. The constraints on civil liberties that undergirded his power were necessary evils to ward off the authoritarian specter.

We were told Central and South American nations would never choose to adopt free markets to the same extent as their individualistic northern counterpart. With communitarian traditions rooted in its Catholicism and indigenous heritage, Latin America would embrace democratic socialism. I remember sitting in college classes and learning about how Chvez and similar, though less violent populists such as Ecuadors Rafael Correa, Bolivias Evo Morales, and Brazils Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff were forging hope by harnessing popular energy into governments that would direct economies toward social justice.

Fissures are forming for each of these regimes. Morales, in defiance of the constitution and a popular referendum, is moving to abrogate term limits for his office; Correas successors are locked in a battle over corruption that has left the government in chaos; da Silva is entering his sixth corruption trial; and Rousseff has been impeached. But it is Venezuela, the nation Chvez and his successor Nicols Maduro have led into fire and ruin, which fully captures just how fatal are the conceits of democratic socialism in Latin America.

The terror and repression Chavismo swore to deposit in the dustbin of history have reemerged in its defense, with hit squads intimidating and massacring dissidents while Maduro swats down checks on his power. The equality it promised exists only in the cruelest of terms: equality of want, equality of desperation, equality of misery. A country endowed with bountiful resources has spent and collectivized its way into such abject poverty that it cannot provide its people with food and toilet paper.

Chvezs personal legacy retains some of its man-of-the-people sheen in some circles, since his Bolivarian regime reached its tipping point under his less inspiring successor and his erstwhile defenders are still ready to make idiots of themselves for him. Nevertheless, his countrys collapse is the fruit of the state-led development path he set out on.

Endowed with massive oil reserves, Venezuela had periodically suffered from Dutch disease since it nationalized petroleum production in the 1970s, with its state-run enterprises engaging in corruption on a massive scale and becoming symbols of injustice as other sectors crumbled around them. Chvez promised to direct these companies profits toward social and political revolution, funding public works and alleviating poverty. He would be the anti-Pinochet, ending Venezuelas existence as a fount of resources for the West and directing its economy toward the common good.

Hugo Chvez, however, proved himself far less interested in the collective than in Hugo Chvez. His management of the oil industry quickly became geared toward preserving his power, as he dismissed vital and experienced workers for political reasons and diverted resources away from innovation to fund image-burnishing social programs. At the height of oil price spikes in the mid-to-late 2000s, this worked for Chvez, and even as his governing style became more and more oppressive his sympathizers saw him as a hero. The curtain started pulling back when oil prices fell, and now bureaucratic mismanagement has run the Venezuelan oil industry into the ground, and the dependence they fostered has brought the entire economy down with it.

Today, the government that swore to empower its people tortures artists and activists. Quality of life evaporates as mortality rates rise, jobs disappear, and basic utilities like power and water become unavailable. Initiatives to provide everyday necessities for poor neighbors get people jailed for hoarding. Basic governance becomes impossible as a carousel of suspected rivalsmost recently attorney general Luisa Ortega, who was removed last weekendare purged, leaving Maduro a gaggle of sycophants for him to fiddle with as the country burns.

For advocates of freer markets and smaller governments, this failure was predictable: even an economic culture with communitarian impulses is more likely to flourish within a framework of liberty, and there is no man or group of men smart enough to build a healthy economy on the management of a single resource. Despite this, Venezuelas death spiral has blindsided the Left and, tragically, its own people, who were sold one of the oldest lies in history: hand awesome power to one man and he will in turn empower all.

A funny thing about that man Pinochet: while his terroristic rule earned him a much-deserved reputation as a monster, the free-market policies he implemented became the undoing of his tyranny. Chile became wealthy enough for its people to organize a political opposition that ousted him, and it has since become a stable, functioning democracy.

Capitalism helped Chile go from a poor dictatorship to a prosperous democracy; socialism has turned Venezuela from a prosperous democracy to a poor dictatorship. Democratic socialism in Venezuela, and throughout Latin America, promised to bring an end to oppression and poverty, but now the falseness of that promise has been laid bare for the world to see.

Matt Boomer is a technology and business analytics consultant living in Dallas, Texas. He studied political science, history, and business economics at the University of Notre Dame.

Read more:
Venezuela's Descent Into Chaos Buries The Left's Hopes Of 'Good Socialism' - The Federalist