Further on the important question posed by Chris Matthews: “What’s the difference between a Democrat and a socialist?”

In 2010, I wrote a column on this very subject, and I’d like to give you a taste:

For some years — starting long, long before Obama — I’ve played a little game. It goes like this: “If Politician X were not an American, but a politician in some other country, what party would he belong to? If his views and outlook were exactly as they are now — if it were merely a question of nationality, or venue — what party would he belong to?
Well, let’s play with Obama: . . .

And I thought this paragraph was especially relevant, today:

There’s something I admire Sen. Bernie Sanders for: He calls himself a socialist, by golly. He makes no bones about it. He ran for the Senate as an independent, and the Democrats put up no candidate against him: He stood for them, really. Is that suggestive? No?

Yes.

P.S. If you were to put the exchange between Matthews and Wasserman Schultz to music, it might be by Ives: The Unanswered Question.

P.P.S. It’s not too much to ask the chairman of the Democratic National Committee to know the difference between a Democrat and a socialist (assuming there is one). (And if there isn’t, she should say so.)