Who You Calling a Socialist?

Harold Meyerson is a Washington Post opinion editor.  In today's article (click on the title), he discusses all of this socialism talk.  He says the only "democratic socialists" he's encountered in DC are Bernie Sanders, the senator from Vermont and himself.  He says socialists don't want to nationalize industries anymore and Obama certainly isn't a socialist, but, like FDR, trying to save capitalism.  And that the capitalist system is failing on its own.

The new, uncrowned head of the opposition, Rush Limbaugh, likes to call everyone a socialist.  I wish Obama were a socialist, but it is clear to me he's not.  I have a socialist bookkeeper and and a socialist barber, but I'm not sure they're out of the closet on the issue.  So I think I can recognize a secret socialist and I just don't see it with Obama.  Rush is welcome to call and discuss this with me if he likes.

If I had to choose between Bernie Sanders to run things and Rush, I'd take Bernie.   But I don't want the government to take over the banks.  I'd like to go back to the days when branch banking was illegal and you knew your banker.  That way if he stole from you, he had to live next door or down the street and face you at the grocery store.  And if he was real bad, people could get together and tar and feather him.  But now banks are multi-headed hydra (with far more than the nine heads of the beast in Revelations) and much harder to kill.   Maybe it would be best if banks were turned into 24 hour libraries and coffee shops.  I don't want the government to take over the brokerage houses, but perhaps they could be converted into homeless shelters and public cafeterias.  I don't want the government to take over insurance companies.  I'm thinking ice cream parlors.  Anyway, you get the idea. 

 

I think if the government is to do anything, it should help poor people and not rich people, but I also think there are only rare periods in history when things work this way.  Maybe we are entering one now.  I hope so.  But in general, I think the rich will in the long run always corrupt government.

I have tried to read the doctrinal battles of various flavors of socialists and I find them as complex and impenetrable as the Sicilian defense.  

I like Big Bill Haywood, but I don't think he was really a socialist.  He was an anarchosyndicalist rather than a socialist.  He was in he Socialist Party of America for a while and campaigned for Eugene V. Debs, but Big Bill was too radical for the socialists and they tossed him out.

He was a bundle of other contradictions as well.  He was strongly anti-war, but when a Pinkerton man came to arrest Big Bill, Big Bill shot him.

I also like Big Bill's view of contracts, especially labor contracts.  He believed in industrial unions (that is, the whole industry rather than just trades, hence the Industrial Workers of the World) and not trade unions.  Trade unions tended to be racist and snotty about workers further down the pecking order from them.  Big Bill viewed most any contract for labor as a trap rather than a benefit for workers.  As soon as it becomes unfair, the workers should all be able to walk off the job.

I am not sure what Big Bill would make of today's world and Obama.  I am pretty sure he would not favor sending all of these soldiers to Afghanistan.  I doubt he would have bailed out IAG, more likely shut it down.  

Anyway, all you socialist-baiters, please be aware that socialists tend be calm, moderate people with whom you can negotiate and make contracts.  Before this particular collapse of capitalism is all over, and before the remains of the middle class is completely beat into submission, you may be wishing for more socialists.  

Saint Peter Don't You Call Me, 'Cause I Can't Go....I Owe My Soul to the Company Store

Big Bill Haywood, in his Autobiography, rejects labor contracts. He tells the United Mine Workers in Cripple Creek, "why enter into an agreement with the mining companies at all--that is a time agreement? Why not be in a position to strike at any time?"

I labored through six hours of contract law in law school and never really thought about the underlying premise of the morality of entering into contracts. In essence, most types of contracts involve a promise to do something in the future. Even putting aside for the moment the problems with adhesion contracts, what about the mere idea of making a promise that binds future actions. Isn't there a problem with this?

Jesus said to to the young man, "If you want to be perfect, sell what you own. Give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then follow me!"

If he is bound by contracts, the young man must say, "Sorry, Jesus, I can't go. I've got a mortgage to pay, credit card bills to meet, and a six month employment contract to fulfill."

And this may have been what happened because when the young man heard this, he went away sad because he owned a lot of property.

If we enter a contract or promise to behave in a certain way in the future, does this break Jesus' rules of life laid out in the Sermon on the Mount? Jesus says (in one translation), "But I tell you don't swear an oath at all. " Other translations talk about "forswearing" oneself.

What is the difference between an oath that forswears a promise for the future and a contract? Maybe the first has some greater implied seriousness, because it is witnessed by God, but the concept of, in the present, committing your future self to a certain type of action, seems to be the same.

Isn't Jesus giving added support to this position when He says, "So don't ever worry about tomorrow. After all, tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own?"

Contracts always require a worry about tomorrow. That is the whole idea.

And of course, beyond a calling from Jesus, in a more secular context, there may also be a call to the conscience.

For instance we might say,

"I woke up this morning with a clear belief that the rest of my life should be committed to designing and building low cost housing. Anything else would be a waste of my full potential and doing so would be my best chance to reduce human suffering."

Or,

"The muse has moved me and see in my minds eye the Great American Novel that will bring joy to millions and guidance to a nation lost in the wilderness."

Or,

"My young daughter has informed me she is growing up without me and I must stop all I am doing and spend time with her."

But then we remember all of the contracts we have signed and must say,

"No wait. I've forgotten. I need to pay off my Sears charge card first. And the consumer contract on the house siding. And the five year loan on the car. Oh, well. I will stuff away for now this call to conscience thing and this foolishness about living life to my highest potential. Maybe another inspiration will be along in another ten years."