Is Obama a socialist? Just copy and paste that into your Google search, and see what you get (you will likely find articles in the Wall Street Journal, Cristian Science Monitor, CNN, and Fox). But where is the evidence? I mean, Rick Perry stands by the title “socialist” when referring to Obama, but Perry might just be confused; he may just be mixing up “progressivism” with socialism. While Perry feels this way, others see him as a classic moderate who favors the middle class and aims only to ensure that America’s future is full of both opportunity and happiness.

Back to the original question about Obama being a socialist. Both Perry, and those who claim that Obama is a moderate, are seriously mistaken. First, socialism is a name that denotes a set. Within that set there are elements that share similar properties, but those elements are also shared by other ideologies from competing sets (basically, the elements of the set we call socialism are not exclusive to that set). The common property that all elements in socialism possess is this tendency to transfer property from individuals to society, or, in it’s most simplest form, to make property subject to a type of social management. This idea of private property being limited or transferred is not a new conception among socialism, nor is it exclusive to it (see: fascism, theological democracies, monarchies, and communism). Consider one of the first proponents of socialism, Saint-Simon; Saint-Simon was fascinated by the enormous potential of science and technology and advocated a socialist society that would eliminate the disorderly aspects of capitalism, and would be based upon equal opportunities. Essentially, he advocated the creation of a society in which each person was ranked according to his or her capacities and rewarded according to his or her work (or, if you are a Marxist, we would merely say that, “a given amount of labor in one form is exchanged for an equal amount of labor in another form.”). Marx, Saint-Simon, Robert Owen and others require that private property be controlled by the state along with the ownership of all capital; the reason for this requirement is to ensure control, planning, and efficiency while mitigating the cumbersome inequalities of capitalism. Moreover, to ensure that every member of society fall under the same bracket of opulence, the state must ensure that the productive forces of capitalism and its moral hazard be restrained -or, directed in creating equal opportunity.

Clearly, Obama does not fall into the same class as Marx, Saint-Simon, or Robert Owens. He does not advocate that the government control, own, or manage all productive forces and property in the USA. Obama does try and ensure that social reforms and free market principles come together. However, in short, it is said that Obama is attempting to “map” Bill Clinton’s “centrist” position by proposing legislation that mixes both social justice ideals in with right-wing free market ideals -I mean, if he were a traditional socialist, he would have pushed the public option when passing the healthcare legislation.

Are the moderates who claim Obama as one of their own right? Well, not really. The problem with calling Obama a “centrist” or by saying that he maps Clinton’s ideals into a more social framework, requires that we assume that what people like Clinton, Tony Blair, Harold Macmillan, and even John Rawls are perfectly aligned in the center endorsing fiscal conservatism while promoting social liberalism. However, to promote social liberalism along with fiscal conservatism als places you within the set of what is called Democratic Socialism. Surprisingly, the person who wishes to push the negation of fiscal conservatism, would rightly end up in far-left socialism, and anyone who desires to take social liberalism to the chopping-block, would fall face-first in Fascist territory.

So, if Obama is a moderate -in the “clintonisque” sense then he clearly possesses the necessary elements to be considered a democratic socialist; and if he is not a moderate then he either falls into deeper socialist territory, or he is a republican. I would note that republicans (Bush, Hoover, Romney, Gingrich, and others) who spend public money viciously are also members of a subset of socialism.

The problem with holding this so-called “middle of the road” social democratic position is that it creates a contradiction. First, social democrats, following the Regan administration, sought to merge the principles of free market individualism with the tenants of social justice. In fact, in 1999 the BBC wrote:

“something different and distinct from liberal capitalism with its unswerving belief in the merits of the free market and democratic socialism with its demand management and obsession with the state. The Third Way is in favour of growth, entrepreneurship, enterprise and wealth creation but it is also in favour of greater social justice and it sees the state playing a major role in bringing this about. So in the words of… Anthony Giddens of the LSE the Third Way rejects top down socialism as it rejects traditional neo liberalism.”

— Report from the BBC, 1999

The contradiction created by trying to endorse economic freedom and social justice is that they are essentially the same thing. You cannot, as I have said, divorce the two. Both social justice and the corresponding demand for more social freedom requires that you pass laws to prevent people from infringing on certain rights. However, by doing so, you must make a blood-offering. You have to sacrifice some freedom somewhere. Consider the Equal Opportunity Act (both for employment and housing) and what it means. Basically, if I own a business, my hiring of people must be restricted to not discriminating based on preferences outside of what may be considered bona fide occupational requirements; but, who determines what requirements are bona fide? The state? If so, then I cannot, as a business owner, freely determine who and what uses my private property without violating the law.

The conflict amid both social justice and economic freedom intensifies when business become considered “social institutions.” Basically (Elizabeth Warren), proponents of this view expand the term “social” to fit anything that is in society, that is, anything that is onto (i.e. projected in or by) society. Some expand the scope of what falls under society to such an extreme that my existing (that is, coming into existence and physically acting in the world) makes me a ipso facto participant in some contractual obligation with those of my community. You should not be surprised by this, for The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act banks on this very idea -you exist, so you have to buy insurance. As we see, the attempt to balance out the conflict, is possible only if one were perfectly neutral in understanding that both social freedom and economic action are manifestations of humans acting and interacting with one-another. The only ideology that actually promotes this “middle ground” is, quite unsurprisingly, libertarianism.

So, to all those republicans, democrats, and moderates, you more likely to be socialists or fascist which both are elements of the set that we commonly call oppression.