Socialist

Who said Obama is a socialist? Certainly not Billy Wharton, the editor of the Socialist magazine. Even though suddenly he has become somewhat of a media celebrity himself because of this buzz, Wharton says Obama is not a socialist, and in fact he may not even be a liberal. “Socialists understand him more as a hedge-fund Democrat,” Wharton continues in today’s Washington Post, “one of a generation of neoliberal politicians firmly committed to free-market policies.”

So how did all this talk get started? “Oddly enough, Republican politicians such as Mike Huckabee and John McCain had become our most effective promoters,” says Wharton. “During his campaign, the ever-desperate McCain, his hard-charging running mate Sarah Palin and even a plumber named Joe lined up to call Barack Obama a socialist.”

In fact, what Wharton wants to know from Obama is: “Can you lend legitimacy to a society in which 5 percent of the population controls 85 percent of the wealth? Can you sell a health-care reform package that will only end up enriching a private health insurance industry? Will you continue to favor military spending over infrastructure development and social services?”

Unless Americans wake up from their nationalist nap of denial, Obama will have his hands full just trying to keep from collapsing under this impoverished balancing act.