In the editorial “Centrist Dems must not let ‘democratic socialists’ take over their party without a fight” (July 5), the Tribune Editorial Board criticizes the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), which recently became the largest socialist organization in American history with 120,000 dues-paying members. The board, in its response to DSA’s recent electoral victories in New York and Colorado, derides DSA candidates for being too radical.
The board does not focus its critique on democratic socialist politics, nor of the record of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani or any other DSA members in public office. Instead, the board argues that a “leftward lurch will make it far harder to defeat Trumpism in the intermediate and long term” and implies that DSA’s growing power will alienate “Americans in the middle,” who “crave stability and commonsense, nonideological problem-solving.”
The type of “nonideological problem-solving” the board describes is in fact very ideological: It is neoliberalism, a political theory rooted in the belief that “the freer the market, the freer the people” and that whatever is good for big business is good for everyone. Over the past half century, neoliberal politicians from both the Republican and Democratic parties have signed trade deals such as NAFTA that decimated our industrial working class, defunded social welfare programs, loosened regulation on corporations and led our country into imperialist wars resulting in incalculable human carnage.
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It is this failed ideology — that of the ruling class and of the board — that resulted in Trump’s two victories and the catastrophic widening of wealth disparity that has followed.
While Republicans turn ever further to the right and establishment Democrats cling to an imagined center, DSA offers an alternative: a turn toward the working class. Workers — the vast majority in this country who have to work or starve — deserve more. That’s our program. DSA’s program is gaining support all across the country precisely because workers are being exploited in every state and every county.
DSA’s working class-oriented politics are not “baggage” weighing us down. They are the central feature that makes us more popular than anything the center has to offer. A better world is possible, and we’re building it together.
— Deana Corbitt and Sean Duffy, co-chairs, Chicago Democratic Socialists of America
Fending off extremists
Democracy is frequently messy. The path to a more perfect union has never been a straight line and has been filled with obstacles. For the past 250 years, the country has, sometimes grudgingly, overcome those obstacles. Because we have done so, as difficult as the current political climate is, I remain optimistic that our republic will endure.
The Tribune Editorial Board issued a warning for Democrats in a July 5 editorial. I am in complete agreement.
If the democratic socialists win control of the party, the radical right policies of President Donald Trump’s administration will be followed by radical left policies that will further divide the country. Wild swings in opposite directions is counterproductive and not what the majority of people want. There are already calls for impeachment proceedings against Trump, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Pete Hegseth and others. This kind of tit-for-tat is also not what the people want. Impeachments are doomed to fail anyway, because unless the Democrats win 67 Senate seats, there will be no convictions. Instead, Trump will just claim total vindication, and the MAGA crowd and congressional Republicans will echo the sentiment.
Some of what the democratic socialists favor makes sense, but much of it does not. Social Security and Medicare — and at age 77, I receive both — are in fiscal peril. So, “Medicare for all” might sound good, but I have not read or heard how it will be paid for. I am not willing to sacrifice the national security by gutting the Department of Defense.
The extreme left politicians want to cut Israel adrift, and they give the genocide in Gaza as the reason. I defended Israel in a Tribune letter in October 2023, wondering about which part of “never again” people don’t understand. I will agree that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has visited more than enough retribution for the vicious attack on Oct. 7, 2023. What Zohran Mamdani, Darializa Avila Chevalier, Melat Kiros, Kat Abughazaleh and others fail to mention is that Hamas started the hostilities, and it is the Arab world writ large, and Iran and its proxies in particular, that calls for the destruction of Israel and the genocide of Jews.
I stand with the 45% of independent voters who generally hew toward the center. Together with centrist Democrats and mainstream Republicans, we can fend off the extremists in both parties and restore stability in our government and the world’s faith in the promise of America.
— Len Levy, Glenview
Appeal smells like a setup
Let me begin with a response to the Tribune Editorial Board’s appeal to centrist Democrats (voters in particular) to not let the party be taken over by democratic socialists: Why not? Voters have already handed a good chunk of democracy itself over to nationalist, religious and ideological fascism.
Not to diminish legitimate concerns over the pocketbook issues that ostensibly drove the 2024 presidential election, but a what-the-hell-let’s-burn-it-all-down attitude in the voting booth is unfit for anything but a country weened on grievance culture with a “freedom” based on negativity. Anybody who cared to think critically could foresee all those kitchen table issues would become far worse under the administration of an insecure narcissist.
As for the editorial, it seems to rely on time-honored red-baiting to make its case as it names all the usual suspects. That’s fair. But isn’t it also fair to mention that Denmark, Norway and Sweden, for example, all consistently report a higher satisfaction with life than the U.S., which now doesn’t rank among the 20 happiest countries?
In addition, when “Trump remade the Republican Party in his own image,” he did it by promising retribution and removal (that negative freedom again) while the Democratic Socialists of America, notwithstanding its younger greenhorns making all-too-often unfortunate statements, at least offers a vision based on building things rather than tearing them down.
Would I vote for a DSA candidate? Don’t know. But I do know that the A or B choice that we’re all currently locked in (and that this paper seems to want to perpetuate) is nowhere near the representation we all deserve. Coalitions — everything from MAGA to Karl Marx — would serve a service-starved electorate more honestly, if not more perfectly.
And it’s that expectation of perfection, unfortunately, that keeps us forever throwing out the baby with the bathwater. In a national election, a “leftward lurch” most likely would be met with an equal and opposite reaction (this paper helping to write those GOP attack ads, to be sure) because, you know, the price of eggs.
Hey, I’ll take centrism any day over what we’ve got now. But these days, an appeal to centrism smells more like a setup. With the center sliding ever rightward, is the board’s plea for moderation a ploy to keep the Democrats compliant and accepting in their/our being dragged along through the corridors of power? The corridors of schools and public buildings where the Ten Commandments can be read for the edification of all? As if that will be an effective distraction from the fact that there is no more middle class, healthcare or a secure retirement?
How’s that for red, white and blue-baiting?
— Jim Koppensteiner, Niles
An unhinged epithet
There’s a lot of pearl clutching in the major dailies about the success of the democratic socialists, so I’m not surprised to see this editorial in the Tribune. But calling Kat Abughazaleh a “bomb-throwing influencer”? That’s hyperbole verging on libel.
That epithet is more unhinged than any of the examples the Tribune Editorial Board gives in the editorial.
— Eric Scholl, Chicago
Board undermines itself
The editorial about democratic socialists raises important questions.
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But Kat Abughazaleh is not a “bomb-throwing” influencer. That assertion undermines the seriousness of the piece and puts into question the validity of the Tribune Editorial Board’s other assertions.
Kat deserves an apology.
— Leonard Grossman, River Forest
Defamation of Abughazaleh
While the Tribune Editorial Board is entitled to its opinion, labeling Kat Abughazaleh a “bomb-throwing influencer” is untrue, crass and petulant. The board may not agree with someone’s political stance, but such defamation and name-calling are a reflection on it.
— Alejandro Suarez, Melrose, Massachusetts
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