American, socialist and proud: Meet Bernie Sanders’s supporters
JASON WILSON, THE GUARDIAN
05 AUG 2015 AT 08:58 ET
What does socialism mean in America? Some recent events suggest we haven’t a clue.
Last Thursday, political commentator Chris Matthews asked Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Democratic National Committee chair, what distinguished “a Democrat like Hillary Clinton from a socialist like Bernie Sanders”. She stumbled and obfuscated, eventually blurting out that the really important differences were between Democrats and Republicans. The S-word was not something she wanted to discuss.
Predictably, the right wing’s all-caps brigade jumped on the occasion: the incident proved there was no difference between Democrats and socialists, and dammit, they were right all along to warn us about Obama’s socialist ways.
On the other side, Matthews – a centrist Democrat – later opined that Schultz was being cannily evasive. She was, he said, trying her hardest not to offend Sanders supporters, whom she will later ask to vote for the nominee.
But should we consider the possibility that Schultz genuinely didn’t know how to answer the question, and the further likelihood that she is not alone in her confusion?
What makes Sanders’s socialist candidacy so remarkable is that it’s been decades since the term has functioned as anything other than abuse. Perhaps bravely, Sanders still takes pride in that political label, and repeated in interviews last week that he is a “democratic socialist”.
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http://www.rawstory.com/2015/08/american-socialist-and-proud-meet-bernie-sanderss-supporters/
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... who's empire was built on money from communist dictator Joseph Stalin with the Koch brothers' father Fred Koch after WWII.
http://investmentwatchblog.com/the-kochstalin-connection-where-their-wealth-started/
Does the right really think they can be prouder that their campaign is funded by the inherited empire money received from a Soviet Union 1%er communist? Is that better somehow than someone who feels that DEMOCRATIC socialism is better for America?
Even most polled Americans feel the wealth distribution of northern European countries like Sweden is more what America should be too.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20140922122811-90103575-wealth-inequality-differs-from-income-inequality
This widely-distributed and accepted chart from Harvard Business School professor, Michael Norton and Duke University economics professor, Dan Ariely illustrates this contrast in perception versus reality.
"They asked more than 5,000 Americans how they thought wealth is distributed in the United States. Most thought that it's more balanced than it actually is. Asked to choose their ideal distribution of wealth, 92% picked one that was even more equitable."
As the chart indicates, most households believe they have a larger share of the nation’s wealth, but that share is not yet ideal. However, not only does that perception not match up with reality, an even greater divide exists between reality and perceptions of equality versus inequality, for instance, either greatest in the U.S. or moderate in Sweden, as the comparative chart below reveals.
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your tirade will. Seems to me it would be far better to pull sections of the Guardian article out and expand directly on them, not to worry about the Kochs. When the time comes to support/defend/and define Bernie's positions (and Bernie's brand of "socialism"
on issues against the inevitable GOP assaults, folks are going to be far more concerned about his brand of socialism than they will be as to why old man Koch sat down with Joseph Stalin, created the John Birch Society or even what Joe McCarthy had to say.
Phope you ignore me too 
