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Democrats Overwhelmingly Prefer Bernie’s Democratic Socialism To Unfettered Capitalism
Last edited Fri Mar 25, 2016, 11:37 AM - Edit history (1)
Despite all the right-wing demonizing of Bernie Sanders as a “socialist” and countless crude allusions to the horrors of the Soviet Union (which had very little to do with “socialism” and everything to do with totalitarianism), it appears that the ideology that brought us vital institutions like Social Security and Medicaid is making a resurgence in its popularity – at least among Democrats who are capable of kicking the Cold War era knee-jerk rejection and understanding its potential value in rectifying the alarming income inequality that is crippling the American middle class and empowering the oligarchs.
A new poll by Republican firm OnMessage Inc has found that nearly six-in-ten Democratic primary voters view socialism as a preferable system of socioeconomic governance over unfettered free-market capitalism – a view that was shared among every age group, gender, and race of queried voters. These results confirm similar numbers from a January poll conducted by Bloomberg and the Des Moines Register, which found that 43% of voters self-identified as “socialist.” The poll does not couch the questions in terms of preference of self-declared democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders or of centrist Hillary Clinton, but instead asks questions about the role of government and how much power corporations and the wealthy should have over our society.
...
Even a cursory analysis of the American economy and the state of the American middle class reveals that unfettered free-market capitalism has resulted in massive income inequality that funnels wealth to the richest Americans, where it remains. Scientific American reports that “the top 20% of US households own more than 84% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% combine for a paltry 0.3%.” There is very little “trickling down,” and most of the American population is entirely ignorant of this fact: “The median American estimated that the CEO-to-worker pay-ratio was 30-to-1, and that ideally, it’d be 7-to-1. The reality? 354-to-1. Fifty years ago, it was 20-to-1.”
What is even clearer is that the lies that the staunchly hypercapitalist Republican Party pushes on the American people are working to tease us with false hopes of the “rags-to-riches” dream that is an important part of the mythology of the American Dream, but in reality is just that – a myth. The Pew Charitable Trusts found that “more than 40 percent of Americans raised in the bottom quintile of the family income ladder remain stuck there as adults, and 70 percent remain below the middle” – but still Americans cling to that myth, with as many as 60% still believing that hard work, no matter your circumstance of origin can help you get ahead in this nation, refusing to acknowledge that the system is rigged in favor of the wealthy.
http://occupydemocrats.com/2016/02/22/new-poll-democrats-overwhelmingly-prefer-bernies-democratic-socialism-to-unfettered-capitalism/A new poll by Republican firm OnMessage Inc has found that nearly six-in-ten Democratic primary voters view socialism as a preferable system of socioeconomic governance over unfettered free-market capitalism – a view that was shared among every age group, gender, and race of queried voters. These results confirm similar numbers from a January poll conducted by Bloomberg and the Des Moines Register, which found that 43% of voters self-identified as “socialist.” The poll does not couch the questions in terms of preference of self-declared democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders or of centrist Hillary Clinton, but instead asks questions about the role of government and how much power corporations and the wealthy should have over our society.
...
Even a cursory analysis of the American economy and the state of the American middle class reveals that unfettered free-market capitalism has resulted in massive income inequality that funnels wealth to the richest Americans, where it remains. Scientific American reports that “the top 20% of US households own more than 84% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% combine for a paltry 0.3%.” There is very little “trickling down,” and most of the American population is entirely ignorant of this fact: “The median American estimated that the CEO-to-worker pay-ratio was 30-to-1, and that ideally, it’d be 7-to-1. The reality? 354-to-1. Fifty years ago, it was 20-to-1.”
What is even clearer is that the lies that the staunchly hypercapitalist Republican Party pushes on the American people are working to tease us with false hopes of the “rags-to-riches” dream that is an important part of the mythology of the American Dream, but in reality is just that – a myth. The Pew Charitable Trusts found that “more than 40 percent of Americans raised in the bottom quintile of the family income ladder remain stuck there as adults, and 70 percent remain below the middle” – but still Americans cling to that myth, with as many as 60% still believing that hard work, no matter your circumstance of origin can help you get ahead in this nation, refusing to acknowledge that the system is rigged in favor of the wealthy.
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Thanks for the heads up.
