Why Socialism?

By Eugene E Ruyle

I urge voters to think outside the capitalist box and consider socialism.

Socialism will come to America when the American people want it; socialism cannot and should not be imposed on Americans against their will. By the same logic, however, the United States does not have the right to prevent other nations from adopting socialism or any other economic system they chose. Yet this has been the dominant aim of U.S. foreign policy since WWII. This has not benefited the freedom and well being of the American people. Americans are less free and less secure because of U.S. meddling in the internal affairs of other nations to make the world safe for U.S. corporations.

Socialism is a complex science requiring careful study. Briefly, we can highlight three pillars of socialism: Peace and Disarmament, Guaranteed Employment, and Environmental Sustainability.

PEACE AND DISARMAMENT: Immediate withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Iraq and Afghanistan is of course a must. The U.S. must also honor the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, in which non-nuclear nations agreed to give up the right to build nuclear weapons and the United States and other nuclear nations agreed "to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a Treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control." (Article VI) Disarmament would free tremendous resources to address social and environmental concerns.

GUARANTEED EMPLOYMENT: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations sixty years ago, guarantees everyone, in America and around the world, "the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favorable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment" and "to just and favorable remuneration ensuring for themselves and their family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection." The right to quality free heath care and free education must also be established and all forms of racism and sexism abolished.

ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY: Americans must learn to share our planet with six billion other people so that we can meet our needs while preserving the earth for future generations. We must address the issue of global warming and end the ecological destruction caused by capitalism and build a new society that is in harmony with nature as well as our own people. Important steps include ending dependence of fossil fuels and nuclear power, development of solar technology and other renewable, non-polluting energy sources, massive development of free public transportation, and rigorous environmental protection.

In order to build a socialist world of peace, social justice, and ecological sanity, the workers and oppressed people of America and the world must organize as a class, take possession of the Earth and the machinery of production, and create a world in which, as Marx put it, "the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all."

THINK OUTSIDE THE CAPITALIST BOX --
-- CONSIDER SOCIALISM