My conversation with a socialist
Let me preface my remarks by saying I consider myself a soft socialist or garden variety liberal though though I don't subscribe to any rigid ideology for the same reason I don't subscribe to religious orthodoxy. Certain religious and ideological precepts inform my world view but no single one controls them. John Lennon was asked if he was a socialist. He said if socialism means that the government should see to it that granny gets her teeth fixed then I'm a socialist. Well, that's my definition. If I was God there would still be rich people but there wouldn't be any poor ones. I have no problem in saying there are folks who are just smarter than me and work harder than me and should be rewarded. The challenge is how large the rewards should be and what is their moral, legal, and ethical obligation to share their rewards with the rest of us. But taking away their wealth is not my raison d'etre, seeing to it that everybody gets to live a decent life is.
You might ask why if I eschew rigid ideologies I consider myself a DemocratSinceBirth. That's easy, because most Republicans suck.
Now that we got that out of way...
The socialist I spoke to was selling a socialist newspaper called the Spark at the North Hollywood station in L A. We struck up a conversation and I told him I did post grad work in Government and he told me he was a professor who has to work three jobs to make ends meet. Those conditions will push one to socialism but I digress... I asked him if he considered himself a Marxist and he said he was. I told him I had one professor during my entire education who considered himself a Marxist while the lion's share of them were garden variety liberals and a few were conservatives.
My conversation confirmed to me what I already knew and that's that third parties always hurt the party ideologically closest to them. If he convinced me to vote for the Socialist Worker's party or the Green candidate that's just one less vote for the Democrat. Get enough converts and you will elect the Republican. I pointed to marriage equality, gays being allowed to openly serve in the military as events we would never see in our lifetimes if Republicans controlled the levers of power.
We did agree about false consciousness...There are a lot of working class folks who should be receptive to a socialist message but aren't.
It was hot out there...I give him and his three associates credit for standing out in that baking sun but not quite as much as the two Jehovah's Witnesses who were still handing out pamphlets when I went past that spot some three hours later.
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