What's In A Name?
    Bernie Sanders calls himself a socialist on the Nordic and Canadian model. Elizabeth Warren calls herself a capitalist on the FDR model whose 'socialistic' policies saved capitalism. Their politics are virtually identical. I love them both. But Elizabeth is the more practical one.
   The Nords and Canadians are capitalist not socialist. Big business thrives in them. What Bernie describes as their socialism is that they provide their people with a range of social and civic benefits that are either absent or minimal here in the U.S.
   If we decided tomorrow to adopt those same policies we would not become socialist. Instead, we’d be catching up with the rest of the modern capitalist world.
   I understand Bernie. He trying to take the fear mongering out of the word socialism and get Americans to accept it as just another reasonable political option, a la the New Democrats in Canada or the social democrats in Sweden.
   I think Elizabeth has the better notion. Catching up with capitalist Australia or Japan or Quebec is more appealing a political call than invoking a word that carries so much negative baggage thanks to the relentless conservative assault on any politics that do not bow down to Wall Street and the prerogative of the rich to run this country for their private benefit.
.