Words have meaning... until they don't.

Mongo turned us on to an article that opined on a recent poll that revealed that “only” 53% of Americans favored capitalism over socialism. Actually, the article itself didn’t opine much but provided a clearinghouse for reasoning from both the left and right, why it is that the free market held such narrow sway over a variant under the big tent of collectivism which has proven itself to be the greatest man-made disaster in modern history.
(italicized inference, ours)

Please do read the article. There is an element of truth in nearly all the opinions.

In the same article, Mark Thompson reasoned that because right-wing conservatives have a knee-jerk reaction to almost everything the Democrats/the Left does by labeling it as “socialism”, the word has simply lost its meaning, dulled through repetitive use. Spot on. Not that right-wing critics are necessarily wrong to label as such, it’s just that you can only go to the well so many times and expect to illicit a positive response.

When we started this blog, we vowed to do our darndest to stay away from the standard orthodoxy, verbage and lingo of socio-politically themed blogs. To the extent that we have succeeded is, we suppose, subject to opinion – but we continue to persevere. When Bailout Nation first started cranking up last year, this is what we had to say regarding selection of words:

Finally, a few words regarding terminology. We’ve seen the term “socialism” thrown around quite a bit with respect to this bailout, particularly by those opposed to the bailout. We’ve steered clear of the term, not because we do or don’t believe this bailout will put us on the “slippery slope” to the same, its because its irrelevant as far as we’re concerned. If an idea sucks, then the idea sucks. One does not have to dress-up this bailout in any finery and throw it out there as red meat to us ravenous capitalist pigs for us to hate the idea. We understand the horribleness of the bailout - don't waste any ammo. Like “family values” which we’re all for and “socialism” which we’re all against, we still cringe whenever we here pols use these terms. They’ve lost their meaning and have become hackneyed and tired words for people who can’t articulate their positions.

And speaking of the nuances of what is or isn’t socialism, we liked this explanation the best:

To socialize the American economy, it is not necessary to nationalize every business in the United States. All it requires is to put the corporations that control the finances of all of the companies in the economy under government control. And that is what is happening now.

Yep. Just follow the money. Oh, and the whole idea still sucks.