Is Trump Embracing Socialism With His Intel Deal?
This is a huge opportunity for the left. Because the question is not now 'big government or free markets?' The question we should be asking is 'who controls the economy – the elites or the people?'
Donald Trump has just announced that the United States is taking a 10% share of chipmaking giant Intel, and the liberal establishment is up in arms – it’s “Marxism,” it’s “socialism,” they declared. Trump has repeatedly claimed to believe in free market capitalism – how can he square this with taking a public stake in a private company?
The answer is that capitalism is not a ‘free market’ system – it relies on deep cooperation between big corporations and powerful states. Trump has simply dropped the act and shown us that capital relies on big government to survive.
But this shift does create an opening for the left. Instead of engaging in never-ending, futile arguments about whether big government or free markets are preferable, we can show that the right has always been committed to big government when it suits them. The question isn’t ‘market or states?’ It’s ‘who controls the market and the state – big business and corrupt politicians, or the people?’