Another Take On Socialism In America
By Timothy V. Gatto
13 July,
2008
Countercurrents.org
Capitalism has been good to the United States…for the most part. What passes for capitalism in this nation today is far from what it used to be. The challenges of starting your own business and competing with the “big box” retailers, unless you live in the country where you have the only business in town, you’re probably out of luck.
It’d not only the retailers that set the price of things. The oil cartels and the power companies as well as the pharmaceutical industries are all involved in price fixing. The average worker is totally at the mercy of these moneyed interests. The simple fact of the matter is that 10% of the wealthiest families own 71% of this nation’s wealth. This leaves the middle and lower class to split the remaining 29%. This is quite a difference from the banner years of free enterprise.
The choice today is to have the government regulate these industries to prevent price gouging. This won’t happen because the corporations own the government as well as the mainstream media. The idea of getting a fair shake from either one of these entities is a dream that won’t come true.
Our government of today can’t even uphold our constitutional rights! Look at the FISA bill and retroactive immunity that they gave the telecommunications companies. Expecting the Federal government to monitor the corporations that pay for their campaigns and their public exposure is ridiculous. The corporations and especially the military industrial complex have been in control for decades. This is something that has caused the federal government to ignore our infrastructure and embolden them to start wars for resources.
The nation needs a good influx of socialism. This would give the power back to the people, and more than that, scare the corporate structure out of its wits. Having a strong socialist party in the United States would work towards worker’s rights, toward better worker conditions, and more equitable pay. It would also champion healthcare and better and more effective unions. The socialist party would be a champion for cutting our defense budget and reducing the amount of military bases throughout the world. The savings that we would see from cutting our overgrown defense budget would bring the nation back to fiscal responsibility.
There is nothing wrong with socialism. This country had a strong socialist party in the first part of the last century and was responsible for helping to build strong unions, enact women’s suffrage and to prevent child labor. The time for socialism is here once more. It is said that true socialism needs to rise out of a democratic, capitalist society. This they didn’t have in Russia or China. This is the next wave, where the people that do the work, reap the benefits. It is ridiculous to have CEO’s that make hundreds of millions of dollars while their companies run in the red. This just can’t stand while they cut the workers benefits and pay. Nobody is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. They don’t even put this money back into the economy.
Think about these things. Some socialists of note have been; Helen Keller, Albert Einstein, H.G. Wells, Eugene Debs, Victor L. Berger, Sam Dewitt, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Jack London, A. Philip Randolph, John Reed, Victor Reuther, Walter Reuther, Bayard Rustin, Carl Sandburg, Upton Sinclair, Seymour Stedman, Rose Pastor Stokes, Norman Thomas, Louis Waldman, Frank P. Zeidler, Nelson Mandela.
These people were not “anarchists” or “rabble-rousers’”. They were principled and the Americans among them were loyal to a fault. The socialist party has a proud heritage and I believe that it’s time has come again.
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