It's Official: Obama is a Socialist

Obama's a socialist. That's the view of 55% of American voters, according to a new poll. And this isn't coming from a Republican pollster.

It comes from Democracy Corps, a polling group started by life-long Democratic operative James Carville and his partner Stan Greenberg. When the group asked 1,000 voters in mid-June how well the term "socialist" fits President Obama, 55% said "well" or "very well."

This must scare the hell of the elites in the media and academe, who think such talk is just the province of Glenn Beck, not the majority of voters. But, yes, and yes again. It is Glenn Beck and it is the American people who think that. And when you look at the evidence, it's hard to dispute.

Nationalizing companies and whole industries

and big-footing time-honored laws regarding property rights are socialist policies. It's fair to assume that the man directing socialist policies is a socialist.

And Americans have always been fair.

They were fair to give Obama the benefit of the doubt and elect him...And after seeing him in action, they're fair to think of him as a socialist.

His recess appointment of the new health czar, Donald Berwick, helps confirm that impression. Remember, he's the guy who says that the only way to improve health care in America is to force the redistribution of wealth in this country. That's the kind of socialist nonsense that you hear in academic circles all the time.

And in academic circles, this talk usually goes unchallenged. These people believe that folks are poor because other people are rich. They even extend that belief to the whole world, believing that the only reason poor countries are poor is because they're exploited by rich countries. That's called "dependency theory," but it's really just warmed over socialism. And it's got the same emotional core as socialism, drawing its energy from guilt, envy and jealousy. When these ideas are isolated in academic circles, they're just another theory to argue about late at night, over coffee and cigarettes.

But when they're played out in reality, they can cause devastation.

The world has buried in it far more corpses resulting from the envy of socialism than it does from the greed of capitalism. And the affluence of America’s middle class has nothing to do with socialism or redistribution of wealth - it has to do with the creation of wealth.

Now, thankfully most Americans, even inside the Beltway, understand that income

redistribution is not the key to our social problems. They understand that the ultimate outcome of that belief is to make everyone poorer. Americans don't want a society that pushes people down, but one that brings everyone up - or at least provides the opportunity for everyone to succeed as high as they can go.