#1058 
by Stein » Feb 25, 2020 6:19 pm
As a useful exercise, I'm trying to look at all this from right outside either bubble.
Standing right outside one bubble, the fact is some Republicans I've met who are hardly enamored of Trump do not view him as a downright skinhead -- meaning a downright white nationalist, antisemite, neo-Nazi, etc., etc..... Yes, he enables much of that, seems to empower that, even seems intimidated by that demographic, etc., but seems too unideological to explicitly embrace the skinhead agenda himself. For one thing, his comfort zone with his Jewish son-in-law seems perfectly genuine to otherwise disaffected Republicans. Trump seems to really respect him.
But these partially disaffected Republicans, who do appreciate his apparent lack of antisemitism, still see Trump as a kid playing with matches in one respect: his obstinate refusal to explicitly disown the skinhead demographic and the goon-like antics of, say, those skinhead marchers in Charlottesville with slogans like "Jews will not replace us", or running one woman over with a car, etc., etc......
O.K., let's skip over to the other bubble now. Standing right outside the other bubble, anyone who's closely followed 20th-century Scandinavian politics will get that there is a clearly democratic strain of social programs in Scandinavia, which still remains a completely democratic region and has even produced a stable prosperity. As another example, America's President Franklin Roosevelt largely appeared to subscribe to this type of program, and certain programs that today's flourishing democracies take for granted, like Roosevelt's social security, are of this form of social program.
In the wake of Franklin Roosevelt and the similarly democratic social safety net in Sweden and Norway, Denmark's own Prime Minister Larsen was the next generation to take up this same apparently prosperous and free tradition and may have been the first head of state to actually call this tradition "Democratic Socialism".
That this tradition has always been genuinely democratic is certainly true. It has also produced stability and prosperity. But whether or not it is really socialism is open to debate -- in some circles. Some just term it a mixed economy instead of real socialism.
While there are competing definitions of socialism, Denmark's Larsen's use of the term for the Scandinavian tradition did catch on. His practice of using the term here has stuck. It's a way of distinguishing what are genuinely democratic and prosperous systems in Scandinavia from the totalitarian strictly statist authoritarian goon-like dead-end Stalinist Communism of Soviet Russia, Mao's China, Castro's Cuba, North Korea, Pol Pot's Cambodia, etc., etc.
Again and again, Bernie Sanders has made it clear he is using the Larsen lexicon. It is thanks to Larsen (and not so much the earlier Sweden/Norway) that the term Democratic Socialism gained circulation in the first place
Now Sanders, going back decades, has always subscribed to the Democratic Socialist model in Denmark. If you study Denmark today, that probably gives you about the closest picture of what Sanders is on about.
However, there is a reason why a Sanders Administration cannot be all gas and gaiters: To whit, What of Sanders' supporters? His followers? Does every single one of them really get the crucial distinction between Larsen versus Castro, Franklin Roosevelt versus Stalin? Really?
Yes, I have a feeling most of them do get that distinction. But does every single last one? That concerns me.
From time to time, Sanders has made a halfhearted attempt to distance himself from the goon-like antics of a fringe element on line who also profess support for Sanders? Is it possible that this small portion of supporters on line happen to act like goons because they're really goons who happen to subscribe to the dead-end totalitarian Communist model, not to the Democratic model of Denmark's Larsen? They maybe latch on to Sanders in much the same way that dyed-in-the-wool antisemitic skinheads latch on to Trump.
Yes, I admit I'm still appalled, after half a decade, that Trump won't unequivocally disown and repudiate the racist skinheads by name and repudiate their goonish behavior.
How about Sanders? Today, in 2020, it is past time for Sanders to explicitly disown and repudiate by name those goons who profess support of Sanders while acting up in ways that strongly suggest a totalitarian bias. Sanders cannot risk -- by either commission or omission -- enabling or empowering any goons who appear to act up in his name. The time to discredit them completely is right now.
To be frank, I admit that Trump strikes me as someone with far less regard for our democratic institutions and our laws than any respectable President.
What about Sanders?
The pros: By contrast, Sanders is at least a long-time Senator with a long-time record of functioning in a democratic institution where Democrats and Republicans must break bread together. In addition, Sanders has occasionally worked on legislation with members of both parties. That's all good. So since Sanders seems to understand democratic institutions better than Trump, I do trust him more with our freedoms than I do Trump, and I would probably vote for Sanders for that reason.
The cons: However, if Sanders does not want to duplicate our unhappy experience with today's apparently rising hate crimes under Trump -- a chief reason why I can never bring myself to vote for Trump -- Sanders has to be as direct and as stern and as explicit as possible in denouncing any goons who threaten our freedoms of thought and speech in Sanders' name. Personally, I view Trump's continued passivity and neglect, in the face of similar goons, to be a moral disaster. Candidly, a long-time Senator like Sanders ought to be respectful enough of our freedoms not to make the same colossal error in judgement that Trump has made. But will he?
