To The Editor:

With all due respect to my fellow Americans, most of us simply don’t seem to know that a “Liberal/Progressive” is not the same thing as a “Socialist.” This includes the Democratic Party presidential candidates — such as Bernie Sanders — as well as the members of “The Squad,” such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar.

A true “Socialist” is someone who wants all of the businesses and workplaces to be owned and controlled by “the state,” “the government,” “the workers” or “the people,” and not by individuals and groups of people who run them for profit, as we have here in the U.S.A.

Democrats who want our federal government to spend more on social programs, in order to help the lower and middle classes as they struggle to survive and pay their bills, are not “Socialists.” They are “Liberals/Progressives” who want our market-based capitalist economic system to become more humane (and not replaced) by having our federal government spend more to help the lower and middle classes.

Let’s use a little common sense here. How can someone, including Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar, be a true “Socialist” when they do not advocate for/fight for replacing our market-based capitalist economic system with a socialist economic system?

Sincerely,

Stewart B. Epstein

P.S. By way of background, I am a retired college professor of Sociology, Social Work, and Psychology. I taught at West Virginia University and Slippery Rock University.

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