{"id":2240,"date":"2010-02-08T16:32:43","date_gmt":"2010-02-08T16:32:43","guid":{"rendered":"0"},"modified":"2010-02-08T16:51:18","modified_gmt":"2010-02-08T16:51:18","slug":"those_words","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/?p=2240","title":{"rendered":"You Keep Using Those Words…"},"content":{"rendered":"

…but I do not think they means what you think they mean…<\/p>\n

So the blogs were all a-twitter over the Gallup Poll<\/a> last week that showed that 53% of Democrats\/leaners have a positive view of socialism (I was going to do this post Friday but was busy buying a car…).<\/p>\n

But you know, when you look at the poll, what it shows (I think) is just an American public that’s somewhat confused about labels…and actually a liberal American public that’s a bit more confused about what it believes.<\/p>\n

Here’s the breakdown by party:<\/p>\n

\"Gallup2.jpg\"<\/form>\n

…what jumps out at me?<\/p>\n

53% of the Democrats (and leaners) say they have a positive reaction to socialism. But 95% are positive on small business, 85% on free enterprise, 82% on entrepeneurs, and 53% on capitalism. Notice a contradiction??<\/p>\n

Let’s look at the breakdown by ideology:<\/p>\n\"Gallup3.jpg\"<\/form>\n

Socialism is positively viewed by 20% \/ 39% \/ 61% (conservatives\/moderates\/liberals). But…<\/p>\n

Free enterprise is liked by 89% \/ 82% \/ 87%.<\/p>\n

Capitalism 68% \/ 52% \/ 60% – more liberals like capitalism than moderates!!<\/p>\n

Interestingly, conservatives\/Republicans were more consistent in their answers – 20% liked socialism, and 90% liked free enterprise.<\/p>\n

I think that what this says is that the broad base of American voters aren’t really all that comfortable with the fine meaning of broad political economy labels; I think the scare factor of labels like ‘socialist’ and ‘capitalist’ has been pretty thoroughly devalued and that the American public – correctly – doesn’t know where the government’s role in the economy ends and business’ begins. They are correct because our national leaders don’t know either.<\/p>\n

And that’s not a terrible thing. Governments have been meddling in markets to some extent here since the Founding.<\/p>\n

But while it’s not terrible that they are confused, I think it’s problematic; problematic because I think we need a clear vision of our society, economy, and politics that resonates with the people and helps clarify the turbulent times we’re in.<\/p>\n

If only we had leaders who were visionaries and great imagemakers…oh, wait…
\n–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The American public is confused.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2240"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2240\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}