I think that contradictions, unless they're understood, unless they're analyzed, unless they're thoughtfully probed, unless people have a sense of what those contradictions mean - there's just as much of a chance that they'll move into embracing fascism as there is that they'll move into a more radical conception of democracy itself.

You have a situation in which the U.S. is fighting three unjust wars and wasting trillions of dollars in public funds, all the while draining money from important social services and public and higher education.

Of course, the new domestic paramilitary forces will also undermine free speech and dissent with the threat of force while simultaneously threatening core civil liberties, rights and civic responsibilities.

What social safety net does is provide a glimmer of hope for what a democratic socialist society might look like. It makes the claim that without social provisions, without a welfare state, without a social contract, society can't survive. We need a foundation for people - economically, politically, and socially - where what the Right considers "entitlements" are really rights.

Ruling elite have think tanks, they have research institutes, they've invaded universities, they've monopolized the cultural apparatuses.

We need to figure how to defend higher education as a public good. If we can't do that, we're in trouble.

You can't wait neoliberalism out, because the class war will become more consolidated; the punishing state will increase. They'll increasingly solve problems by putting more people in jail and by criminalizing all kinds of behaviors and by appealing to racist attitudes about immigrants, blacks, minorities. They'll just intensify class warfare, that's all. It'll get to the point where the true nature of the authoritarian state will be obvious.