Bernie Sanders promises to give Medicare to all, and rightly so. This government healthcare program vies Social Security in popularity with
'Mericans. Western democracies, except for the United States, have
found that socialized medicine is a keystone of actual national
security. But before Medicare in the US, there was a Canadian example to
follow. The Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) grew out of the
experience of the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919. The strike was violently ended by mounted troops [photo] who swept through the streets following orders of Winnipeg's elite; a labor newspaper said the charge, “demonstrated the nature of the class struggle, the ruthlessness and brutality of imperialist capital,” and “the real purpose of military and semi-military bodies.” Two strike leaders founded the CCF party after arriving in Ottawa. When the party, led by Tommy Douglas, gained power in Saskatchewan in 1944, it created the first Medicare program with universal coverage in North America in 1947. The program is now nationwide and wildly popular, so much so that even die-hard conservatives have given up attacking it*. Contrast that to the sustained attacks on Medicare in the United States. The CCF is the left precursor of today's New Democratic Party (NDF), which continues to offer a political alternative for Canadians to the liberal-conservative bifurcation that paralyses US politics. When an historically unpopular plutocrat, seen by some as a reality-TV clown, beat a dynastic candidate of the liberal elite establishment, the perennial question of US politics was asked again, perhaps more urgently: is it time for a third party here? As history shows that undertaking is fraught with peril. The Populist Movement at the turn of the 19th century is the closest the capitalist United States has ever gotten to a successful left third party; but even a powerful grass-roots movement ably led was co-opted by an opportunistic Democrat with a gift for bombastic oratory, William Jennings Bryant. He was funded primarily by free-silver elites. After the momentous loss of 1896, populism as a mass movement of the dispossessed fizzled. Its remnants degenerated into the racist nativism we know today, epitomized by Donald 'Duck' Trump.
Because there is functioning three party system that includes a left of center party, socialism is not a dirty word in Canada. If a Canadian tells another Canadian he or she is a socialist, that is interpreted to mean they vote NDP, not that they are a seething seditionist aching to overturn the capitalist order. Having a third party opens up possibilities on the political landscape and empowers progressive activism. The NDP historically has been aligned with the Canadian labor movement, so labor has had an official voice in parliament. In the US, the Democratic Party since the New Deal has claimed the labor movement mantle, but that claim has become specious. A conspicuous break was made from representing labor with the candidacy of Bill Clinton. What remains of America's labor movement are business unions whose interests closely identify with the established plutocracy. The Democratic Party, in the words of the late political scientist Sheldon Wolin, has become the "inauthentic opposition". (Nancy Pelosi alone is worth $74 million!)
The 'F-35' Sanders, who claims to be a "democratic socialist", is running as a Democrat for an obvious reason: the two party system militates against an electable third party candidate in the US. Two party machinery controls access to the ballot and a great deal of funding. More importantly the duopoly, which essentially represent business to different degrees, controls how the population thinks about politics. Medicare for All is deemed 'too radical' or just labeled with the dirty word, 'socialism'. A legitimate third party of the left, opens people up to thoughts of what alternatives are possible to profit controlling all goods in the economy, including social goods like medicine. Then the arguments against are no longer ideological but practical, as in "socialized medicine is too expensive". How can that be when private mega banks whose greed nearly collapsed the entire national economy a decade ago were bailed out with trillions in public funds?
If a new left party is to finally succeed in America, it must not be solely a party of the ballot box. That field is not level right now. A new party must learn the lesson of the old Populists, and organize at the base of its natural constituency, an entire generation of young workers who have only known exploitation at the hands of the economic elites of the world. Before the Populist Movement became co-opted at the national level, it created hundreds of speaker bureaus, cooperatives, newspapers, mass meetings, and clubs who purpose was to educate and organize farmers, provide access to markets and financing, and equally important, to provide a culture of shared ideas and values. After this building, it found electoral success in holding local and state offices. A warning: genuine political activism is arduous, expensive, sometimes dangerous work.
A fundamental theme of a new left national party should be subordinating capitalism to the needs of a more equitable society. As that chart below eloquently shows, a new left party has a lot of explaining to do. It needs to harness the disaffection of a large segment of voters who currently misplace their allegiance with a deceitful plutocrat adept at manipulating mass media. These people are driving for Über, or working temporary, no-benefit "gigs" in the "gig economy" and wondering why their "American Dream" has vanished. If a left political party undertook the unglamorous task of educating workers in the struggle of the socialist movement, perhaps they would look upon the strikers of Winnipeg with admiration, not as red radicals attempting to take away their civil liberties.
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| only 13% answered with the academically correct definition |
*Noted in Canadian Dimension, 2012: "The North American medical establishment and the entire insurance industry were determined to stop [Saskatchewan's] Medicare in its tracks. They feared it would become popular and spread, and they were right. Within 10 years all of Canada was covered by a medical insurance system based on the Saskatchewan plan, and no serious politician would openly oppose it." Canadian doctors, supported by the AMA, went on a twenty-three day strike against the program. Douglas was burnt in effigy after being labeled a Nazi, a Stalinist, or both. You would not think it in mild-mannered Canada, but the Mounties maintained an 1100 page dossier on Douglas! Despite his bona fide radicalism, the prairie socialist is hailed today as the "Greatest Canadian".