The High Bar for Socialism

Check out Scott Galupo over at U.S. News and World Report where he details how DeMint, Reagan, and other conservative lodestars are “socialists” by supporting Social Security:

I make these patently silly assertions to illustrate why we need my “high bar,” as Jonah described it, for socialism. If, as Jonah says, “European socialists believe in a mixed economy,” and, as I argue above, Jim DeMint obviously believes in a mixed economy, then we need new terminology–because it has the potential to ensnare all of us. [See a roundup of editorial cartoons about the economy.]

Stanley  argues there’s a lot of headroom in American conservatives’ brand of a mixed economy. But is there really so much headroom? If you had told Barry Goldwater in 1964 that, decades later, some of the most steadfastly conservative members of his party would defend the status quo of Social Security and Medicare, what would he have thought? Would he have seen his fellow Republicans as having repudiated the European social welfare model?

Let’s sort this one out right now.  Any system that redistributes wealth as an end is socialism.  Education, transportation, public safety, and other roles is not socialism — that’s communitarianism (and distinct from socialism or communism).  Taking money and investing in things for the common good?  That is intricately bound to the power of the state.

So for a republic to work effectively, one must have at the bare minimum an educated citizenry, open lanes of communication, and the ability to defend against those who would do the polis harm — whether internally or externally.

…but is it all socialism?  Of course not, though socialism is the inevitable consequence of a citizenry grown to construe their liberty as either tyranny or license.

Certainly there are some things that appear as socialistic.  For instance, could you imagine a law requiring every able-bodied man to appear at the courthouse to participate in a paramilitary organization?!?!   Our 18th century progenitors certainly did — once a month or they paid a heavy fine.  One can hear the squeals from partisans of every stripe in 21st century America should those ordinances ever be revived.  Perhaps they would call it “socialism” or “fascism” or whatever -ism you’d prefer.

There’s another warning in this: words mean things.  The more their definitions incorporate every activity under the sun, the less those words mean.  So tread lightly, Chicken Little.  Not everything that falls from the sky is a socialist plot.

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About the author

Shaun Kenney

Shaun Kenney is the Chairman of the Fluvanna County Board of Supervisors, former Communications Director for the Republican Party of Virginia, and an active blogger since 2002. Shaun lives in Thomas Jefferson's backyard with his wife, six children, and a modest attempt at a farm in Kents Store, Virginia.