The DSA’s War on Wealth

Communism is on the rise in the United States and has now entered otherwise mainstream Democratic Party politics.

The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is on track to increase the number of its members in Congress from two to at least six in January, possibly more. That’s not including Sen. Bernie Sanders, who calls himself a democratic socialist.

A DSA member named Francesca Hong just came within striking distance of becoming the Democratic nominee for governor of Wisconsin, one of our largest and most important states. Hong was narrowly defeated in the Aug. 11 primary by Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley.

Don’t be confused by those calling themselves socialists. A few may be well-meaning middle-of-the-road Democrats who favor the Scandinavian socialist model. But others are wolves in sheep’s clothing — communists who use the socialist label to hide their real intentions.

What’s interesting is that many of the new socialists don’t even try to hide their radical leanings. They publicly call themselves socialists and are proud of it.

After the fight against communism in the U.S. in the 1950s and the U.S. victory in the Cold War by the early 1990s, most Americans might assume that communism is no longer a threat to the American way of life and the U.S. political system.

That’s a mistake.

Communist and Marxist ideas are alive and well in the U.S. and are thriving in universities, think tanks, foundations, the media and other institutions that Americans typically think of as having better motives.

The Evolution of Revolution

This ideological infiltration may follow Marxian economics, but the method used by the new communists was anticipated by the Italian communist Antonio Gramsci, who wrote in the 1920s and 1930s.

Gramsci agreed with Marx’s goal — the abolition of private property — but he thought the way to achieve it was not through violent revolution but through a long-term struggle for control of society’s cultural and political institutions.

Decades later, this strategy came to be described as “the long march through the institutions.”

In other words, communism would not necessarily win by direct confrontation but by a gradual infiltration of education, culture and governance and the decline of critical thinking.

U.S. institutions would become ideological boot camps and propaganda outlets that would gradually convince Americans that communism, dressed up as “socialism,” was the better path.

From there, it would be a simple task to tear down traditional constitutional structures by getting rid of the Senate, the Electoral College and an independent judiciary.

Top-down communist control would be the final step. No revolution required. Just long-term rot like the proliferation of mold or termites.

For a powerful example of this process, consider the recent controversy surrounding the Smithsonian Institution and testimony before Congress by Anthea Hartig, director of the National Museum of American History.

The dispute centered on whether America’s national museums have increasingly emphasized slavery, race and inequality at the expense of the country’s founders and achievements. Hartig defended the museum’s approach and told lawmakers that it does not take sides in America’s political debates.

The Smithsonian’s treatment of Benjamin Franklin, for example, emphasizes his history as a slaveholder. Yet Franklin was also one of the great scientists and founders of the 18th century and, later in life, became a leading abolitionist.

He served as president of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery and, in 1790, petitioned Congress to work toward ending slavery.

Franklin also became the nation’s first postmaster general, helped establish an early fire insurance company and helped found the institution that became the University of Pennsylvania, where I attended law school.

The real issue is one of emphasis: whether America’s national museums should primarily celebrate the country’s achievements or increasingly focus on slavery, race, inequality and other failures in the American story.

That debate is worth having because institutions shape the way Americans understand their own country.

A Very American History of Communism

Communist ideology never entirely disappeared from America. It took root in organized political movements following the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917 and expanded during the Great Depression.

The New York Times’ Moscow correspondent Walter Duranty notoriously minimized Stalin’s man-made famine in Ukraine in the early 1930s, reporting that helped obscure the brutality of the Soviet system.

American communism suffered a setback after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939, which was a nonaggression treaty between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. American communists and fellow travelers were disillusioned that Stalin would make a deal with Hitler, who was universally viewed as the avatar of fascism.

Anti-communism reached a frenzy stage during the Cold War with the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg in 1953 after their conviction for conspiracy to commit espionage, the Alger Hiss case, accusations of communist infiltration leveled at government officials by Sen. Joseph McCarthy and hearings by the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Despite these setbacks, the radical left had a revival during the 1960s and 1970s and is prominent today in the success of the Democratic Socialists of America, now the largest socialist organization in the United States.

Castro’s American Alumni

Cuba also played an important role in the American radical left during the Cold War. Many American radicals traveled to Cuba or absorbed the influence of Castro’s revolution, including Stokely Carmichael and Angela Davis.

Karen Bass, now the mayor of Los Angeles, traveled repeatedly to Castro’s Cuba in the 1970s as part of the Venceremos (“We Will Conquer”) Brigade, where young American left-wing activists worked alongside Cubans and were immersed in the communist revolution.

Cuba was not the only source of communist influence. Barack Obama, as a teenager in Hawaii, had a relationship with Frank Marshall Davis, a writer and activist with documented ties to the Communist Party. Obama later wrote about Davis in Dreams from My Father and the influence Davis had on his thinking about race and identity.

If you wonder why race relations in the U.S. remain strained after enormous progress beginning in the 1960s and why socialism is on the rise today in urban centers like New York and Los Angeles, the history of the American radical left and its ties to international socialist movements are worth understanding.

The labels and tactics have changed, but the underlying struggle over property, markets and political power has not disappeared.

Politics Comes for Your Portfolio

The rise of socialism inside the Democratic Party is an enormously important political story on its own. But it also has huge investment implications that could affect your portfolio.

Many democratic socialists favor higher taxes on wealthy households, expanded government healthcare and tuition programs and sweeping changes to policing, immigration and other institutions. Some prominent figures on the left have also supported “wealth taxes” — which would tax certain holdings of property, shares, bonds and other assets rather than merely income.

Depending on how such a tax were structured, investors could find themselves selling retirement assets just to pay the new wealth tax.

Apart from causing social and economic disruption, these policies could hurt your retirement because you’ll have to pay the taxes needed to finance them. Later, you may pay even more taxes to clean up the mess.

Gold and silver may be among the best assets to own in these circumstances because they’re non-digital, can be held outside the banking system and are difficult to freeze electronically.