all political labels are meaningless outside the classroom.

This is the real truth. None of the world’s governments are what they claim to be. All of them have taken a basic foundation, and then added various things from various systems until every government in the world is some Frankenstein’s Monster of bureaucracy.

We’re supposed to be a Democracy, or a Republic, or a Democratic Republic, or something, who knows, but a lot of the best stuff in America is straight up Socialist, like parks, schools, libraries, museums, roads, bridges, etc.

Fire Departments are one of the best examples of American Socialism. In the olden days, if you owned a building, you’d buy fire insurance from a local fire brigade, and they’d give you a “fire mark,” a cast iron medallion, that you would attach to your building. That proved that you were paid up, and if your building caught fire, they’d show up to put it out. If you weren’t paid up, they’d show up to watch your building burn, unless you paid.

Eventually, they replaced the profit-making fire fighting system with a municipal fire fighting system, paid for by ALL the citizens, to benefit ALL the citizens, and not just those with enough money to pay. Same with public schools, roads, bridges, etc. Much of the best of America is already Socialist.

NONE of the world’s governments adhere to the political philosophy they claim to follow, except in the most basic ways. Whatever labels they apply to their own systems, or the systems of others, is meaningless propaganda. There are no Socialist, Communist, or Democratic nations. They are all mixed systems, that exist more by evolution than design.