Are you a Socialist?

People often debate whether we are a capitalist society, or something else. When the issue of national health care comes up, people cry "socialist!" America is generally capitalistic, but why do we fear socialism? We have a number of socialistic aspects to our society, for example the DMV, which is a state-owned system. The FCC supposedly regulates private broadcast corporations, and the utility companies are also regulated by the Fed. So why do we fear national health? Sometimes, a nation should nationalize part of its infrastructure for the betterment of its citizenry, and health care may be one such industry.

A Capitalist believes in an economic system controlled by individuals, and a Socialist believes in a government-controlled economic system. The words “capitalist” or “socialist” are nothing more than symbols that represent certain values - and values one embraces must be lived, and occasionally fought for, (and that fight is not in Iraq, it's here at home). The fight is inside all of us.

America is an inclusive nation that in its ideal represents personal freedom, but those freedoms are being necessarily challenged. We don't deserve the freedom to kill one another, nor do we deserve the freedom to steal. But do we deserve the right to make the world in our image? Before we tackle that mission, shouldn't we get it right here first? In order to do that, we need a separation of business and state, and we need to look at ourselves in the mirror and seek self-improvement. A Global economy without compassion will create a planet without purpose, a species without a conscience.

Plato believed that power and wealth should be separate. He thought if you wanted wealth, you could chase money, and if you wanted power, you could be a Senator, but you couldn't be both because he believed that these two aspects of a society when combined led to too much corruption and immorality. We've seen this play out again and again throughout our history, from the decadence of Rome to our current social ills. The apathy of a wealthy state is predictable, as we let someone else try to solve (or hide) our social problems, but the fact is, folks - it’s up to US.

We need a new vision for ourselves, for our nation, for our species and our planet. Perhaps a new word can be created to describe an American economic system that is worth promoting globally. We don’t need to be capitalist, socialist, nor communist, fascist, or any other “ist”. If we live the values of the meanings of the words, we could become a “globally compassionate socio-capitalistic inclusivity,” or ‘Glocom-socapinclusist.’ How about if we just become decent Human Beings?