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Comment by ileri62 | Hacker News Reader

Then again you are using the North American definition for left and socialist, because the North American liberals are neither of those two.

Edit: to be fair though, I wouldn't consider liberals of any definition to be left or socialist. They might have some left leaning positions on immigration or the environment, but due to their capitalist nature they can not be considered left.

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? 'North American Liberals' are definitely 'left' and 'socialist'.

In the most popular, common use of the term 'Liberal' in north America 'socialist' and 'left wing' would be the most common substitutes.

Not really, I mean Bernie Sanders is not a Socialist since he doesn't want to nationalize any industries which is really the sine qua non of socialism. He is a Social Democrat. Actual socialists usually identify as Leftists instead of Liberals.

Social Democrats are definitely Socialists. That's fair game.

And if Bernie were Emperor for a while, he'd nationalize a few industries, surely. I can barely imagine would Trump would do if he could just make up the law as well.

Disagree. Bernie doesn't advocate socializing any industries. Even Medicare for All would leave hospitals and doctors as private employees. He isn't going out there saying we should have nationalized the Big Three car companies instead of giving them a bailout, or trying to nationalize the banks, or anything else. He's a social democrat, he wants a strong public safety net tied with private ownership of capital. That's a perfectly fine political position, but it's not socialism.

There's a huge difference between what one advocates as a position as a politician trying to get/stay elected in a two-party democracy, and what they'd be willing to force through if they were all-powerful.

As an example, do you think that, given the ability to enact whatever legal changes he wanted, Bernie Sanders would nationalize our telecommunications infrastructure? Or our health care system?

I don't have any specific, citable reason to think he would, but I think there's plenty of reason to believe they're things he might want to do.

Social Democrats are essentially socialists, which is why even the Wikipedia entry has it under 'a series on Socialism'.

There's barely a hard line between Democratic Socialism and Social Democrats.

wat? If they are the same, then why do they have different names? Get a grip. Social democrats have nothing to do with socialists.

The definition of liberal in North America is different to the rest of the world. Liberal is not left wing or socialist elsewhere.

And to confuse matters further, I imagine GP is saying 'left wing' and 'socialist' in NA are somewhat diluted compared to the rest of the world.

Yes, I agree, but your bit: " because the North American liberals are neither of those two." I inferred as liberal in the sense of what people are called, whereas I guess you meant to imply classical liberal, which I guess would be 'Libertarian' but even that label doesn't apply well in the US as it's a fairly populist movement.

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