McCain and Palin call Obama's ideas "socialist"

The intellectual progenitor of most modern socialist parties was Karl Marx, whose philosophy was broad, ramshackle but ruthless. You could plow through thousands of pages of his writings without finding a single idea for government that would work in 21st century America or be happily embraced by many Democrats. But you don't have to do that research, to prove that Barack Obama isn't a socialist. Strip away all the ornate antechambers and upper stories of Marx's ideological palace -- which when imposed on modern nations always leads to their decline -- and you find one elemental, insistent idea: The state should own the means of production, all of them. Meaning that except for Korean laundries and unlicensed plumbers, the state should own every damn productive unit in the economy. No American presidential candidate has ever subscribed to that idea, least of all the unexcitable, distinctly unradical Barack Obama. So the McCain-Palin flaming steak of rhetoric about Obama being a socialist is just another piece of Flying Wallendas exaggeration. It's a lie if they know what socialism actually is, and if they don't, then it's clear they're at the stage of the campaign where they will say anything that might generate a headline which two or three voters will actually believe, while simultaneously driving their "base" absolutely hysterical with fear and hatred. That won't only create a long hang-over for the conservative faithful. In an age of political polarization and partisan animosities, it's irresponsible.