Dear Editor:
There has been a lot of fearmongering about “radical socialism” after the Republican National Convention. Worried that voters will hold him accountable for his dismal performance in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Donald Trump has tried to smear Joe Biden as a Trojan horse who would introduce “radical socialism.”
Is Mr. Biden a socialist because he protects Social Security and Medicare against Mr. Trump’s threatened $538 billion in budget cuts?
Is he a radical monster because he implemented the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 that rescued capitalist icons like GM and Chrysler while Republican ideologues argued that these companies should be allowed to go bankrupt, even if it meant millions of job losses?
Is he a monster for providing 20 million Americans with health insurance under the Affordable Care Act? Yes, expansion of Medicare might help the U.S. achieve better health outcomes like “socialist” Canada or socialist Sweden. Yet these countries are not cursed with gulags or tyrannical regimes. Healthy democracy and innovative entrepreneurship continue to thrive in Canada along with a robust social safety net.
Meanwhile, Mr. Trump openly fawns over the worst breed of socialists – unrepentant Stalinists like North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Russia’s Vladimir Putin. He admires Mr. Putin’s authoritarianism even as Mr. Putin invests millions of dollars in funding right-wing extremists in the United States and Western Europe while trying to crush democratic forces in Ukraine and Belarus.
As long as Mr. Putin’s malignant disinformation campaign favors him, Mr. Trump could care less.
Christina Kowinko
Stratford, Conn.