a dirty word in American politics.Â
It smacked of a rejection of the capitalistic system that had fueled the country’s rise to superpower status, too reminiscent of a dreamy, share-the-wealth philosophy that goes against the grain of fierce corporate competition.Â
Looked at another way, the U.S. has a mixed system, with a government-run retirement program, government-run health care systems for the elderly and the poor, and a spate of programs to help farmers, small businesses, schools, veterans, the unemployed and so on. It isnt exactly a European-style welfare state, but perhaps a close cousin.Â
Right now, socialists are on a roll in
Following the lead of its most visible champion, , they are shoving the party dramatically to the left â and with some deep, dark elements, especially on foreign policy.Â
This amounts to a gift-wrapped Fourth of July present to the Republicans, who are happy to spend the next few years running against these new-wave socialists.Â
Maybe that word no longer carries sinister overtones, because President Trump says the three far-left candidates that the New York mayor successfully pushed for Congress are “Communists.” That sounds like a throwback to the 1950s witch hunts known as McCarthyism.Â
But this goes beyond Washington and Seattle also electing socialists as mayors, and the obvious point is that most of the country is far to the right compared with the liberal cauldron that is
The new socialists may have excitement on their side, but some of their views are downright dangerous. And they wage their warfare quite openly under the banner of the Democratic Socialists of America.
“The Democratic Party lets DSA candidates run as Democrats, even though the DSA is ideologically committed to a hostile takeover of the party,” says Jonah Goldberg, editor-in-chief of the Dispatch, a conservative, anti-Trump news site. “The DSA isnt a formal party; it calls itself a political and activist organization, not a party. What it is is a fifth column within the Democratic Party. There is no sensible, informed Democrat who thinks these people are good for their party.”Â
What about the left? On the liberal show “The View,” Joy Behar announced that “Im not scared of the term. Social Security is democratic socialism. Partly unemployment insurance is. The people who pick up your garbage, the people who take the fire out of your house. All of these are democratic socialism.”Â
But it gets worse.
The new socialists are fervently anti-Israel, which clearly deserves criticism for Bibi Netanyahus endless wars, but cements the view that the Democratic Party, even in New York, has turned its back on our longtime Middle East ally. That reflects the partys shift as well.
Based on their own words, many of them hate America as well as Israel.
Trump wasted no time escalating his rhetoric: “Assassination is a big deal for them. They are animals⦠They will kill your people. And thats what theyre about.”
The three congressional candidates successfully pushed by Mamdani are openly pro-Palestine. And the mayor, who has used the phrase “from the river to the sea” â meaning wipe Israel off the map â takes the same stance, even in a city with the largest Jewish population .Â
That seems to be their overriding issue. Theres nothing wrong with the Democratic incumbents who were knocked off â they just werent sufficiently anti-Israel.
The most outrageous of the Mamdani-backed winners is Darializa Avila Chevalier, a community organizer and doctoral student who has supported defunding police and prisons, abolishing borders, eliminating ICE, seizing private property and nationalizing major industries.
The day after the savage Oct. 7 attacks by Hamas that butchered 1,200 Israelis and took hostages, Chevalier attended a pro-Palestinian rally in Times Square. She was celebrating a horrifying terrorist assault.
Chevalier has also called a
