I can see clearly now. For many years, the left worked an elaborate shell game, pushing socialist ideas while denying any affection for socialism or its prophet, Karl Marx. The American public had rightfully been suspicious of socialism, having seen thug socialist regimes in the Soviet Union, Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, Eastern Europe, China, North Korea, Cuba, and other places take power, then turn to regimentation, oppression, and, ultimately, mass murder. They are the grisly legacy of the 20th Century, the Century of Socialist Warfare.