“From each one according to his ability. To each one according to his need,” is one of the tenets of socialism. Of course, most Americans don’t know that because most Americans know nothing about socialism, and think it’s the same exact thing as Communism. You can thank Ronald Reagan and his propaganda campaigns against socialized medicine for that.
It’s amazing that so many U.S. citizens mistakenly relate socialism to Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky- if they even know those names. There’s even a socialist in the U.S. Congress, Bernie Sanders of Vermont. And Newsweek published a cover story a few years ago entitled “We are socialists now.”
And former Philadelphia Eagles defensive lineman Jason Babin sees the socialist streak in his former team.
From “Helmet to Helmet”
In reference to his “socialistic” barb, Babin pointed to the firing of defensive line coach Jim Washburn as an example of the Eagles’ system at work.
“They don’t have amicable splits with people,” he said. “You saw how dirty they did (Jim) Washburn with leaking out the false stories and the way they talked about him on the way out. It’s kind of a big socialistic system that they have.”
Despite the ven diagram leading off the post, I’m not here to judge the Eagles economic structure, or system of meritocracy. I don’t know the ins and outs of the organization. What I do know is that Washburn was treated unfairly, and Babin had 18 sacks just last year- a phenomenal number, and now he’s gone. But what I do know is that the NFL has by far the most socialistic economic structure of all the major sports. They spread the wealth around like no other. Yes, even despite the extreme right-wing nature of their fans and the league’s consistent promotions that are in bed with the military (another right leaning stronghold)
Paul M. Banks is CEO of The Sports Bank.net, a Google News site generating millions of unique visitors. He’s also a regular contributor to Chicago Now, Chicago Tribune.com, Walter Football.com, Yardbarker, and Fox Sports
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