Washington • That the Democrats’ two evenings of dueling oratory snippets this week are called “debates” validates Finley Peter Dunne’s prediction that “when we Americans are through with the English language, it will look as if it had been run over by a musical comedy.” Already a linguistic casualty of the campaign is the noun “socialism.” So, quickly, before Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ campaign sinks, like darling Clementine, beneath the foaming brine, consider his struggle to convince Americans that socialism deserves to be the wave of their future.
One European explanation of America's puzzling (to many European intellectuals) resistance to socialism was given in 1906 by the German economist Werner Sombart: "All the socialist utopias came to nothing on roast beef and apple pie.