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Via Salon:

More than a century ago, German scholar Werner Sombart published a book entitled ”Warum gibt es in den Vereinigten Staaten keinen Sozialismus?” or, “Why Is There No Socialism in the United States?” Today, many scholars and political thinkers ask the same question, and the answers vary broadly. While many of the answers – racism, the malapportionment of the Senate, federalism, a pro-business Supreme Court, low levels of civic participation – all have some truth and explanatory power, it remains difficult nonetheless to square democracy and inequality. Democracy was supposed to be “the road to socialism,” after all.