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PugJesus

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Simple guide to socialism (lemmy.dbzer0.com)

submitted 2 days ago by [email protected] to c/tankiejerk

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[–] PugJesus 7 points 20 hours ago

I don’t really think its functionally different in the USA (or other liberal states). Democrats and Republicans are quite literally “Party Approved Candidates”.

Independents run in the US all the time. Democrats and Republicans both have party primaries, in which the 'party-approved' candidates are voted for and ran. I don't even remember the last time there was an uncontested national election.

The presence of independents is incidental,

Why? Because it's inconvenient to the point?

and the USSR had independents in its parliament as well.

The 'independents' were party-approved, and almost always elected uncontested as well. Contested elections, to my memory, were not even allowed between independents and Communist candidates until 8 fucking 9.

This is why I view both the USA and USSR as “democratic”, but I would view neither as socialist.

Neither the US nor the USSR are socialist, but the USA is much more democratic than the USSR. Fuck's sake, 19th century Britain was more democratic than the USSR, and 19th century Britain was not very fucking democratic.