JONATHAN TURLEY: Socialism is back in style and Democrats are buying the pitch

Karl Marx believed that "Democracy is the road to socialism." Socialists seem to have found a generation of dupes to buy their ahistorical, fanciful pitch.A new poll shows 43% now have a positive view of socialism.

An astonishing 65% of Democrats have a positive view.Socialism is now the rage on the left.Like clothing styles, if you wait long enough, socialism tends to come back into style with generations with no memory of past failures.

However, it is an astonishing trend in one of the most prosperous nations on Earth that outlasted a history cluttered with the broken failures of socialist and communist systems.A new slick packaging of socialism has emerged with leaders such as Zohran Mamdani offering to teach people of the "warmth of collectivism." The Democratic Socialists of America are enticing voters with narratives like "Imagine the end of capitalism." Those words promise voters that there is a brave new world without landlords, debt, mandatory work hours, and "food, education, energy, medicine, and transportation… are common goods and utilities."MORE AMERICANS THAN EVER NOW HAVE A POSITIVE VIEW OF SOCIALISM, NEW POLL SAYSWhat is incredible is that many are buying this pitch.It is also ironic that this is happening not just on the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence but also on the 250th anniversary of the publication of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations.MODERN CAPITALISM IS TURNING 250, TOO.WE NEED TO REMIND AMERICANS WHY IT’S IMPORTANTAs I write in Rage and the Republic:"While he never visited the United States, his theories seemed quintessentially American to many of his generation.

For a revolution that was triggered by tariffs and fueled by events like the Boston Tea Party, Smith’s general principles read like an economic version of Common Sense.It was a type of declaration of independence not just from the British policy of mercantilism (emphasizing British exports over imports) but from economic controls over individual produ...