Democrats are Socialists: They Support Social Security and Medicare

Photograph Source: Molly Adams – CC BY 2.0

The new in-thing for Donald Trump and Republicans is to call their Democratic opponents socialists and communists. Their focus groups apparently show that voters can be scared by these words.

There is a small grain of truth to the Trumpian allegation. According to polls, most Democrats now have a positive view of socialism. In fact, in at least one poll, Democrats had a more positive view of socialism than of capitalism.

While these results are striking, it is worth asking what “socialism” means to people these days. It doesn’t seem likely that tens of millions of people have suddenly been grabbing up copies of Karl Marx’s works and become convinced by the insights of his writings.

A more plausible story is that for two decades, people have seen Democrats who stand up for programs like Social Security and Medicare being denounced as “socialists” by Republican politicians who want to cut back or eliminate these programs. These programs are overwhelmingly popular with the American people, but especially among Democrats. If voters believe the Republicans’ charge, that people who support these programs are socialists, it is understandable that they would say they have a positive view of socialism.

By contrast, Republicans seem to have a qualitatively different view of the role of government. As Donald Trump eloquently put it, “We can’t afford daycare, Medicare, and Medicaid because we’re fighting wars.” To Trump, government is about fighting wars and paying out bloated fees to well-connected military contractors. And we know that Donald Trump speaks for all Republicans, since they constantly tell us they stand behind whatever Trump says and does.

Given the context of the current political situation, “socialism” has come to mean a government that provides services like healthcare, childcare, education, and Social Security to the population. It is the Republican Party that has defined it that way for people.

By contrast, the capitalism espoused by Donald Trump and the Republican Party is about fighting wars halfway around the world and giving bloated contracts and big tax breaks to make the rich richer. Socialism seems a pretty obvious choice if it means a government that actually provides services to the people.

We’ll have to see how the Republican scare words play out this fall. We can assume that they will mix them up with the old claims about pet-eating migrants and public schools that perform sex change operations at recess. The reality is that fighting needless wars and handing trillions of taxpayer dollars to the rich are not popular policies. The Republicans badly need to change the topic, and calling their opponents “socialists” and “communists” might just do the trick.

This first appeared on Dean Baker’s Beat the Press blog.