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So Hot Right Now: Socialists

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October 21, 2008 | 1:36 p.m
Black and White and Red All Over<br /> (Getty Images)
Black and White and Red All Over
Getty Images

The Atlantic's Ta-Nehisi Coates points us towards an article by Rex W. Huppke in yesterday's Chicago Tribune in which a member of the Communist Party USA denounces Republican presidential nominee John McCain's assertion that his opponent's economic plan is tantamount to socialism.

Mr. Huppke quotes John Bachtell as saying:

'Red baiting is really the last refuge of scoundrels... It has nothing to do with the issues that are confronting the American people right now. It's just a big diversion.'
Mr. Huppke has a little too much fun cracking jokes about Mr. Bachtell and his comrades, but he's not the only one with reds on the brain this week.

 

The New York Times' Alan Feuer visits the New York City office of the Socialist Party USA and talks Zelig Stern, the amazingly named secretary of the party (as well as a cab driver), who tells him apropos of recent government bailouts of banks and insurers, "It doesn’t make any sense... Corporate socialism can't exist — it's a contradiction in terms."

The god that failed fails again.

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