Meghan McCain's Rant About Socialism on The View Is a Great Argument for Taxing the Rich
Since Donald Trump became president, "socialism" has stopped being a scary word to a lot of people in the U.S. In large and small races across the country, candidates running on openly anti-capitalist platforms have been scoring one victory after another. The highest-profile win yet is of course Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who appears poised to be the first socialist elected to the House of Representatives in decades. Shortly after her victory over Joe Crowley, Ocasio-Cortez appeared on The View, where she made such an impression that weeks later the hosts are still discussing "democratic socialism."
And Meghan McCain, in particular, is furious that that conversation is still happening.
Sunny Hostin: We had her on the show and I asked her this question, "What do you mean by being a 'democratic socialist?'" And she went over her platform. She said Medicare for all, fully-funded public schools and universities, paid family and sick leave, justice system reform, immigration justice, infrastructural overhaul, clean campaign finance, an economy of peace, housing as a human right.
Joy Behar: That sounds like a successful country.
Meghan McCain: Can I please push back on that because this makes my head explode.
McCain's arguments are familiar, if very tired at this point. Many of the policies supported by Ocasio-Cortez, like universal health care, are commonplace in every developed country in the world except for America. And while conservatives delight in pointing to the unfolding crisis in Venezuela as evidence that any politics left of Susan Collins is bound to fail, they conveniently omit that many democratically elected socialist governments around the world failed because they were violently overthrown with help from the U.S.
McCain claims that she would love the Democratic Party to run a socialist platform because they would certainly lose (forgetting that a right-wing extremist candidate beat a seasoned centrist in the last presidential election), but she certainly doesn't sound like she's excited about it. And that makes sense. Republicans like McCain, even if they don't have parents with a combined net worth of over $200 million and benefit directly from Republican tax cuts to the super rich, are nervous and angry. Because all those sensible things that make her head explode? They're very, very popular.
