I was a high school government teacher for the majority of my thirty-five and a half year educational career.\u00a0\u00a0There was a lot of complex teaching going on:\u00a0\u00a0the nuts and bolts of the US Constitution, the legal intricacies of our Court systems, and even the basics of finance and taxation.\u00a0\u00a0And, somewhere in the middle of all that there was the \u201ccrazy-isms\u201d lesson.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0First was the \u201ccrazy-isms\u201d of governing:\u00a0\u00a0fascism, totalitarianism, anarchism, federalism and communism.\u00a0\u00a0They along came democracies, monarchies, theocracies, autocracies, kleptocracies.\u00a0\u00a0They were all ways to govern (or in anarchy\u2019s case, not govern).\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We came up with memorable examples, often based on more familiar situations. Gangs \u201cruled\u201d through theft and intimidation \u2013 a kleptocracy. Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader was the head of the ruling religion \u2013 a theocracy. Monarchs wore crowns, hereditary kingships; a monarchy. Totalitarians wanted total control (from the military to toilet paper) – totalitarianism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then we switched to economics.\u00a0\u00a0Who owned businesses, who paid wages, who put products on the market.\u00a0\u00a0More \u201cisms\u201d:\u00a0\u00a0capitalism, socialism, Marxism.\u00a0\u00a0Capitalists believed that \u201cthe means of production\u201d, business and industry; should be owned by private individuals competing with each other.\u00a0Socialists believed that the main businesses should be owned by the government, a government made up of the people, democratically elected.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And Marxists (Communists) believed that \u201cAll of the means of production\u201d, from farm lands to factories to retail stores selling goods (toilet paper \u2013 forest to mill to packaging to store) should be owned by the government, a government controlled by the Communist Party (another \u201ccrazy-ism\u201d, an oligarchy, with \u201cfake democratic\u201d elections). Marxism, at its core, was supposed to be a dictatorship of the workers; but it turned out to just be a dictatorship of the powerful, with workers hung out to dry and nowhere to turn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So when some claim that the American government is socialist or Marxist, they are conflating government with economic models.\u00a0\u00a0The American Government is a complex Federal mixture, of fifty states that are governed by elected representatives:\u00a0\u00a0Representative Democracies. And then there\u2019s a separate National government, also an elected Representative Democracy.\u00a0\u00a0None of that describes the economic model the United States follows.\u00a0\u00a0Most of the elected are definitely Capitalists, a few are Socialists, and I\u2019m not aware of any Marxists elected in the United States.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So what is the economic model of the United States? We are a \u201cmixed economy\u201d. Our \u201cbase\u201d plan is capitalism, private ownership of business, manufacturing, production, distribution and retailing. But we also have government regulations of those industries. We try to provide a \u201csafety net\u201d so that individuals and families don\u2019t fall through into abject poverty. The United States tries to provide food, housing, education and health care to every American.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are no \u201cMarxists\u201d in the American Government. And there are no \u201cCommunists\u201d either. When most of the other Nations of the world look at the United States, our economy is far less \u201ccontrolled\u201d by the government than theirs. And, of course, if you look at the United States\u2019 greatest economic rival, China; their economy is Communist, totally controlled by their government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are some socialists in American political life, but they seem \u201cextreme\u201d to most Americans. Even Bernie Sanders is a \u201cmixed economy\u201d guy, though his mix includes a whole lot more government regulation than we have today. And where is Kamala Harris? She is to the \u201cright\u201d of Sanders on economic issues, in fact, she is right down the center-line of American economic theory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And what about Trump? He certainly is more \u201cpure capitalist\u201d than Harris. But he too takes advantage of government intervention. After all, bankruptcy is a government protection. Trump declared bankruptcy six times in his career. So Trump wants the ability to run his businesses without government regulation, but he still wants the \u201cfallback position\u201d of government protection. That\u2019s not pure capitalism, there\u2019s no \u201cmercy\u201d there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So when the MAGA crowd calls Vice President Harris a \u201cMarxist\u201d, they are demonstrating one of two things.\u00a0Either they didn\u2019t listen to their Government teacher back in high school, and are ignorant of the \u201ccrazy-isms\u201d, or they are willfully lying to the public.\u00a0\u00a0Donald Trump is proud of graduating from the Wharton School of Economics at the University of Pennsylvania.\u00a0\u00a0I suspect there was at least one macro-economics class on his schedule. He should know the differences in economic theories.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I guess that makes him a liar: surprised?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"