Markk wrote:In your opinion, what are the goals, besides getting Trump out of office, that the Democratic party is moving towards?"
I can't speak for Schmo, nor would he want me to, but I think there is a good underlying question to ask first of one's self, and then of the parties and candidates. What is the fundamental goal society should be moving towards?
in my opinion, many people who grew up during the cold war came to equate America with capitalism and the USSR with socialism. To some, the entire conversation is, "What makes the USA great? Capitalism. What motivated people to leave Europe from the 1600's to today to start a new life? Capitalism. Why did the USSR collapse while the USA continued and prospered into the 1990's? Capitalism. What is the biggest threat to the USA from within and without? People who would replace capitalism with socialism."
But that isn't true. Capitalism is a system of economics, and not an inherent characteristic of the United States. The cold war propaganda has caused a warping of many people's understanding of how our system of government works with a variety of economic policies that include capitalistic ones as well as socialistic ones to accomplish the goal of giving people a chance to achieve more than their birth-class might otherwise limit them to as their destiny.
Democracy and capitalism aren't synonyms. They are in different categories, not just two different things. Capitalism isn't a form of government, it's an economic system. Democracy isn't an economic system, it's a political system. It doesn't make sense to conflate the two.
What made the USA such a special place at it's founding in contrast to aristocratic Europe? Democracy. What motivated people to take the risks to themselves and their families to come here? The democratization of opportunity. The United States has never been a purely capitalistic society, and many times in our past the government has taken ownership of resources to then make them widely available so that a wide range of people and institutions could innovate and come up with successful new ways of doing things. That democratization of opportunity is what has been the tip of the spear of innovation in the US. Yes, it takes capital. Sometimes that capital has come from so-called capitalists. And sometimes it's owned and made available by the government. Often it included a combination of both.
In many ways, what made the American experiment successful is the ability to leave behind one's position at birth and find opportunities that wouldn't be available in a traditional hierarchical society like was the case in Europe. For example, my Mormon ancestors who came over from Britain were often 2nd or 3rd sons whose older brothers inherited the family land according to tradition. In England, Ireland and Scotland their options were limited. The promise of making a new life in the western United States where opportunities made the risks worth taking influenced their decision making, and their success in establishing businesses and farms throughout what is now Utah was made possible by there being land available they could cultivate, new business opportunities they could develop, and it didn't matter that their father wasn't of a certain class or their family had the wealth and connections to put up to support their business ventures. Coming to the United States was a way of shedding the restrictions of the old world that had become calcified into aristocratic hierarchical societies where a person's place at birth largely determined their destiny.
To my mind, the current split in politics in the US is one along lines of asking how important the democratization of opportunity is compared to protecting the interests of what to me has all the characteristics of a 21st Century aristocracy.
- Do we seek to ensure kids entering our school system, regardless of class and background, have opportunities to meet their potential? Or should kids whose parents have wealth and connections have more opportunities regardless of their own inherent intelligence, talent and ability?
- Do we seek to ensure innovators who have good ideas can find capital and pursue those innovations to keep propelling the US into the 21st Century? Or should access to wealth and the means of production be limited to those with connections and the right backgrounds?
- Do we seek to ensure a health problem or injury is something a person or family can recover from and get back on their feet again? Or should only those with wealth be able to weather misfortune without going bankrupt and destroying their family's futures?
- Do we believe individual liberty is best understood as applying the law equally to everyone? Or is individual liberty best understood as everyone should think like me and if they don't, they are morally degenerate?
- Do we believe that every one of us benefits from a healthy society, so we should contribute to social services that benefit society overall even if we don't directly see the connection to our own benefit? Or is it right to believe I should only have to contribute directly to aspects of society that I believe are directly benefiting me?
I favor democratization of opportunity. I believe a society that does so has the best chance of prospering because it best capitalizes on it's human resources. Smart kids born into all income levels including low income families become our next generation of geniuses rather than only having the pool of rich kids to draw from to form our next generation of great thinkers and innovators. I favor individual liberty in the form of equal application of the law. And I favor viewing the benefits of a healthy society being indirect rather than directly tied to only those programs and aspects of society where I directly withdraw. If I didn't have a child, I'd still be better off contributing to an education system where every kid is getting a top-tier education. Even if I don't use public transportation, I'm better off in a society where a good public transportation system is available. Even if I don't use public healthcare, I'm better off in a society where everyone can have access to basic healthcare-related needs. I don't need to take directly from a program to benefit from having contributed to that program. That applies to infrastructure, to parks and the preservation of opens spaces, to art and the sciences - I'm better of in a society where we all contribute to having public goods and services rather than only those who can afford them having access to such things.
Right now, the Democratic party is the most aligned with my values and beliefs regarding what makes for a good society. There are elements within the Democratic party that don't align with my view regarding the importance of democratization of opportunities that I don't support. I think there are elements in the left-wing of the party that are as happy to exert their own brand of authoritarian oppression as there are among right-wing elements in the US. But I don't think the extreme left has control of the Democrat party.
The Republican party is a mess, in my opinion. It lost any claim to be a conservative party with the election of Donald Trump. It has embraced non-conservative economic policies such as trade protections and tariffs, and shows no interest in managing the national debt load. But it seems very interested in entrenching a class system that has arisen as wealth inequality has become more and more exasperated over the last few decades. It's strange to watch the right claim to be honoring the founding fathers while erasing the very system of social order they were establishing in favor of the one they fought against. The tax code put in place by Trump and the Republicans is one that establishes an American aristocracy, make no mistake about that.