Right?

I basically identify as a socialist these days. But like, Scandinavian flavored, if that makes sense? So, strong socialized public services on a lot of fronts where it’s logical to do so, strong unions engaging in robust and productive dialog with the government and corporations, and - yeah - corporations. Capitalism can be, and is, a good system if it’s a component of the system instead of the entire system. The problem with most western economies is that neoliberal “captains of industry” have decided it’s time to take the governors off of that steam engine, and they’ve lobbied their respective governments to do so… and now the engine is running away (For those unfamiliar with the rough operating principles of steam engines, this is one of the possible outcomes of a runaway engine).

I agree that a disturbingly large proportion of our economy is straight up not working for humanity. But I also think a lot more good can be achieved much more quickly if we actually try to fix things instead of just tearing everything down (which I think would harm a LOT more people in ways that most people don’t fully understand). We just need to be more humanist about it (about a lot of things, really, but this topic in particular would be a great start).

From the reactions I get from some circles, you’d think I was calling for a fully libertarian hypercapitalist society. Which incidentally, is one of the things that frustrates me about the ML crowd: they’re frustratingly dogmatic in areas where it just doesn’t make sense to be, and they often refuse to admit when their theory doesn’t match with reality.

Hahah- i started calling myself a San Francisco conservative: absolutely left leaning but compared to the folks in SF I’m not blue enough.