IT'S THE PRETTY PIG PROBLEM.

Paul McDonnold of The Daily Economy dips into the world of socialist social media to discover that the interest in socialism ... has nothing to do with Robert Owen or Karl Marx or Frank Zeidler.

An older video offered a slideshow on basic socialism narrated by the DSA’s national co-chair, Megan Romer. It was candid, enlightening, and reasonably upbeat. My first light-bulb moment came when Romer explained how becoming a socialist is not typically an involved intellectual process.

“Most people become socialist because of one issue,” Romer said. “They usually become socialists because of something they specifically got mad about in the news. That is the primary thing that makes people become a socialist.”

What's that wisecrack about if you're still socialist at forty you have no brain?  But if you're angered by something in the news, it's easier to take the good things for granted and attribute all the ills to The System.  "Since the status quo seemed to be performing poorly, especially for the young, why not try socialism?"

Of late, particularly among the young, the pig-sty in which they live appears particularly messy, and Old Major's imagined pig-sty wins by default.  Venture capitalist Peter Thiel, who might have billions of reasons to keep the existing order pretty much as it is, suggests it's not so much "socialism" as "not-capitalism" or "not-neoliberalism" that is looking better, if only by default.

The first step is to talk about the problems, even if you don’t know what to do about them. There’s been a failure of, let’s say, the center left-center right establishment to even talk about them.

I don’t know if I would say that young people are pro-socialist. I would say they are less pro-capitalist than they used to be. If capitalism is seen as an unfair racket of one sort or another, you’ll be much less pro capitalism. So in some relative sense, they’re more socialist, even though I think it’s more just: Capitalism doesn’t work for me. Or, this thing called capitalism is just an excuse for people ripping you off.

The interview explores a lot of territory, including the potential challenge for genuine socialists that most of the leadership comes from the remnant of the Silents and the older cohort of the Baby Boomers, the ones that never dabbled with being yuppies, and some sobering thoughts about whether it is better that some voters stay home.  Material for another day.

Rather, it is the unseen pig winning the contest by default that we consider.  Cornell historian Glenn Altschuler sees "not-capitalism" as the real winner of the contest.  "At the same time, many Americans have soured on capitalism because it fosters inequality and doesn’t meet the needs of working people."  That's the sort of argument to resonate with college sophomores as well as academicians who envision themselves as social planners, that is, until they hear the sheep bleating "Four legs good, two legs better," as they step into Napoleon's Farm.  College sophomores, though, have not yet developed their brains and they go for the argumentum ad misericordiam.  Northern Star columnist Byrdie Seda is paradigmatic.  "It’s impossible to have an equitable democracy under capitalism."  For reasons that align with what Professor Althschuler offered.

Capitalism provides everyone with an equal opportunity to create a successful business and gain power, which lines up with the essence of democracy. However, in practice and without strict guidelines, capitalism will ultimately lead to the downfall of an equitable democracy.

One of the biggest problems capitalism brings that contradicts an equitable democracy is the creation of a class system. In this class system, the highest class, or the richest people in the first percentile for socioeconomic status, have the most power when it comes to influencing government changes. While the people who are not as wealthy or successful, the other 99%, may have some influence, it’s not nearly enough to match the power of the top 1%.

This inequality in the class system leads to people not having equal opportunities when it comes to influencing the government and being financially successful, which blatantly contradicts the meaning of democracy. And, with the wage gap in America increasing, the ability for Americans to be democratic is diminishing.

Additionally, a government ruled under capitalism sets the precedent that human needs such as food, water and shelter should only be reserved for those earning money.

Those are predictable lapses for a student columnist, conflating equality before the law with equality of opportunity, and treating the emergence of classes, which are fluid, with castes, which are not (and shouldn't a student at Northern Illinois concentrate on overturning the caste system of the Ivies?) and failing to recognize how a stronger government involves enhanced opportunities for rent-seeking.

Thus, rather than take ownership of the means of production, expand the administrative state, particularly its taxing powers.

Many Americans are fed up with the economic polarity of the country but don’t seem to want to do anything about it. By taxing corporations more, setting a limit for the amount of money someone can own and providing more universal resources, many of these issues can be solved.

We can have a more equitable and democratic government if capitalism is taken off the pedestal it has been put on for the past few centuries and replaced with more socialist ideals such as these.

Again, completely understandable in a collegian.  Robert Reich, peddling the same sort of thing, is another matter.  "Democrats need to show America that they can be better trusted to bring prices down and real wages up."  Burn your macroeconomics text if it mentions "wage-push inflation."  Then raise the minimum wage, have Medicare do for medicine what Wal-Mart did for Vlasic pickles, break up monopolies, tax the rich, and prevent private equity firms from buying houses to lease out.  But Mr Reich has been a figure of fun here for years.

Noah "Noahopinion" Smith, on the other hand, suggests that today's socialism is no different from Dickens-era socialism.  "William Gibson famously declared that 'The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed.'"  So it has long been: strawberries in December or music on demand or a trip into space or a large jar of pickles, there is money to be made in expanding consumption opportunities more broadly.  Thus Henry Ford's "history is bunk."  His museum is a collection of stuff that improved the lives of commoners, while the academic historians debated whether it was ideologies or influencers that shaped their lives.

That's not to say all is well.  Rick Moran of Pajamas Media quotes Peter Thiel, "We may be approaching a moment when America’s youth will need to resist socialism’s siren song of false hope and delusion—or risk the collapse of the 250-year-old American experiment."  Strong stuff, that, and yet pinning your hopes on ideas that appeal to college sophomores is unlikely to end well.

If Mamdani's victory teaches anything, it is that our peril now comes from the overeducated elites who cannot distinguish intelligence from wisdom. Their degrees may hang in mahogany frames, but the ideas they carry are recycled failures.

A nation led by such minds risks learning the old lesson all over again—that socialism, whether taught in seminar rooms or shouted from campaign podiums, always ends the same way: in equal misery.

It is time to retire the illusion that schooling equals education, or that credentials confer virtue. America's future depends on rediscovering what our elites have forgotten: that freedom, not dogma, drives genuine progress.

I could get into trouble asking whether "freedom" is itself a dogma, and there will be other opportunities to slag on higher education for its more evident failures.  We're still focusing on the pretty pig problem, and Reason's Robby Soave might be suggesting that advocates of free minds and free markets (is betting on emergence also a dogma???)  might better make the positive case for those.

Most people probably think their political views lend toward a dignified society that generally works for all. Certainly, opponents of socialism believe that the opposite slate of policies—free markets, low regulation and taxation, reducing government control of the economy—creates greater prosperity at all income levels. Democratic socialists should be more honest about what they support: having a powerful, central government micromanage the economy.

Didn't Robert Reich display precisely that honesty for us?  People who disagree with Mr Reich or with the socialist program more generally have an opportunity to show the way toward that greater prosperity.  "Those who aren’t poor should help those who are poor learn how to, well, stop being poor."  And yes, I have read and understood Blaming the Victim so don't scold me for the preceding sentence.

I fear, dear reader, we are exactly where we were six years ago.  "[T]here are fewer voters who remember the triumphs of technocracy we refer to today as the Great Society, and whatever came after through the Carter presidency. Some things, people might just have to experience."

The past four years of the Jarrett regency might not have been sufficient instruction for some.