By Michael Mottern

On Saturday, October 17th, in the middle of Halloween season, I dressed up like the GI Joe character Shipwreck for the No Kings protest in Niagara Square, Buffalo yet again. This time as a selective or workers Naval work uniform, Shipwreck is equipped with bell bottom jeans, a chambray shirt, a Dixie cup, (Navy hat) and utility belt with rope, binoculars and an ammunition bag! No knives were included because of my cautionary attempt to be more comedic than realistic. As a World War II U.S. Navy reenactor working as a ghoul in the evening and a protester by day, this was a character worth using. 

Like the American flag at the Bonus Rally in 1932, Shipwreck is both an anti-terrorist fighter and a United States Navy sailor. As the theme of the protest in Buffalo like many other cities across the land, coming out of Idaho, Massachusetts, Illinois, and even Detroit and the Buffalo suburb of the town of Hamburg, significant crowds were there as well as Niagara Falls Boulevard in the north towns of the city. We took back democracy!

It got so cliche, that my County Executive even got on the microphone screaming alternative rock music at the top of his lungs, and a Haitian immigrant head of the No Kings organizers put his vocal cords to good use, stirring the crowd lyrically and with passion!  As I arrived in the taxicab where my Uber dropped me off behind City Hall, the downtown, Niagara Square immediately started to fill in with people, many of them in costumes not only for the Halloween season, but for the satirical side of the protest. Blow-up suits and even a woman dressed as a suffragette, to proclaim women’s rights reborn, with the elimination of Roe v Wade giving abortion back to the States and places like the state of Kansas stepping up to the plate in favor of women’s reproductive Rights, we see in Buffalo WNY historic lows for Trump’s approval rating at 32%, 33% which is the lowest for any president in the midterms before the general election in modern history. 

My uniform said it all but my sign reinforced the satire we can only find in places that are also protesting, like Paris, France. Protesting because of dilapidated schools and lack of societal reward for high taxes and the high cost of services. The ruination of neoliberalism…! Or the erosion of modern-day corporatism… Let us hope! 

The protest was fun and rewarding considering I had to work till midnight that night but it worked out perfectly because it took place from 3:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. and my job was only up the street! Cool! May the Democrats sweep in the midterms, history says that the sitting President always does poorly in this situation; let’s hope it is true for Donald Trump as well! As a fascist thug himself, he can raise a militia of “Ice Agents” that are nothing more than a paramilitary organ, hell bent on kidnapping and lawlessness! Let’s fight back for the real American heroes, the 99% of Americans that don’t have a hedge fund or a Swiss bank account or who are close with the corporators banks!

The Real American Hero is the guy or gal that’s just trying to get by in an economy that doesn’t work for them but the top 1% only, the working class Hero and the internationalist fighter not only poised against global terrorism but paramilitarism on the right and fascism! GI Joe might be a ghost brand but I was proud to play the part of Shipwreck and the Halloween season, the dawn of a new election. Let us remember what they teach us at these No Kings protests, democracy at work and fair play. “And knowing is half the battle LOL.” GI Joe was there at the No Kings rally, Halloween season 2026! 

Michael Mottern is the SDUSA first vice-chair

By Jason Sibert

Note: This is a follow-up to Few Holes in This Swiss Cheese.

My favorite mountain country, Switzerland, has a housing policy worth examining: it combines a mostly rental market with tenant protections and a significant cooperative sector, offering the United States useful lessons about housing security beyond homeownership. Its housing system rests on a simple reality: most residents rent. Roughly 55 percent of the population are tenants, giving the country one of the world’s lowest homeownership rates. For many Swiss residents, renting is a long-term way of life rather than a temporary stage before buying a home. Housing remains expensive in cities such as Geneva and Zurich, as it does in New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Chicago, but Switzerland’s policies are designed around a renter-majority society.

The key feature of Swiss housing policy is that it tries to strike a reasonable balance between renters and landlords. In other words, there are strong tenant protections. Leases are relatively stable, and tenants have legal protections against arbitrary rent increases and evictions. For this blog, and in other places, I’ve written a lot on housing cooperatives where residents collectively own shares in the cooperative, and they are a key feature of Switzerland’s housing market. These cooperatives operate on a non-profit basis and often charge rent based on costs rather than market prices. They receive support through favorable financing, land policies, and other public measures. In Zurich, cooperative housing represents a much larger share of the housing stock than in most cities and is often cited internationally as a model for affordable urban housing.

Unlike countries such as Austria or the Netherlands, Switzerland never developed a very large state-owned social housing sector. Public or municipal rental housing makes up only a small share of the country’s housing stock. Switzerland’s housing model is market-based, with strong tenant protections, extensive renting, and an important nonprofit cooperative sector. When it comes to mortgages, the country has very strict rules. One might call Switzerland’s housing policy a third way between public-housing-heavy European countries and the more free-market United States.

But how free-market is the U.S. system? The federal government has long intervened to promote homeownership. President Herbert Hoover created the Federal Home Loan Bank system, and Franklin Roosevelt, a president with social democratic tendencies, expanded federal involvement through long-term mortgage support. When Roosevelt took office in 1933, the housing market was in crisis: foreclosures were widespread, mortgage credit had dried up, and typical loans were difficult to obtain. Homebuyers often needed down payments of 30 to 50 percent, mortgages lasted only three to five years, and many ended with balloon payments that borrowers could not easily afford—imagine a final car payment twice the usual amount.

The National Housing Act of 1934 created the FHA to stabilize housing and revive construction employment. The FHA did not lend money directly. Instead, it insured mortgages made by private lenders. If a borrower defaulted, the FHA would compensate the lender for certain losses. This reduced risk and encouraged banks to make more home loans. In addition, FDR created Fannie Mae, a government corporation that buys loans from banks, giving them more money to lend.

The Home Owners’ Loan Corporation, created in 1933, was one of the New Deal’s most important housing reforms. It helped homeowners avoid foreclosure by refinancing troubled mortgages. Before the New Deal housing programs, about 40 percent of Americans owned their homes; today, 60 percent do. Roosevelt’s social-democratic-oriented administration helped expand access to homeownership, although the long-term rise also reflected later policies and economic changes. Its reforms nevertheless show how government intervention can reshape the housing market and improve prospects for average-income households.

However, there is another side to the story. Not everyone will be—or needs to be—a homeowner. The housing crisis that preceded the Great Recession showed the danger of expanding mortgage credit without adequate underwriting, oversight, and consumer protection. Deregulation during President Bill Clinton’s administration also deserves scrutiny. Social democrats should support responsible paths to homeownership while recognizing that the housing market includes both owners and renters. Renters need protection from unjustified rent increases and other abuses of landlord power.

What’s to be done? A tenants’ movement, led by tenants’ unions, should push for Swiss-style regulations to protect tenants and other positive legislation. In addition, why not a tax deduction just for renters? There’s already one for mortgages, which benefits homeowners. Would landlords raise the rent by the amount of the deduction? Yes, and that’s why our government should regulate rent increases to prevent that. Maybe regional boards representing tenants and landlords could address rent increases that might be tied to tax deductions.

The US can also learn something from the Swiss support of housing cooperatives. Why not a government agency like the FHA to support housing cooperatives? Maybe a direct grant program to help municipalities start housing cooperatives. Perhaps tenants and the municipality could own housing cooperatives, maybe until tenants are financially ready to own the apartment themselves. The policy tools for a better housing system already exist. The United States can continue supporting responsible homeownership while also protecting renters and helping housing cooperatives grow. The challenge is not inventing solutions; it is building the political will to use them.

Jason Sibert is the Lead Writer of the Peace Economy Project.

By Michael Mottern

Maria Love (neè Mary Moltby) was a prominent Buffalo native in the late 1800s and was originally from the town of Clarence in the South towns of Western New York in what is now the Buffalo NY metropolitan area, still one of the poorest cities in America. Unlike Mary’s time, there’s no commuter train that can go from Clarence to Delaware avenue in the City of Buffalo, which affects working class commuters that are disproportionately people of color. However, she had a lasting effect in the City of Buffalo, creating the first childcare facility in the city, The Fitch Crèche, modeled after the French system of childcare which means, “To cradle your baby.”

In the late 19^th century, there was no real social safety net in the US; Grover Cleveland was ignoring it as a presidential contender, candidate, and prominent Buffalonian. Cleveland had a tendency to ignore the plight of the poor and the many dilapidated tenements where mostly  Italian immigrants were living. As a result, his presidency was seen as historically lackluster when it came to dealing with the blight that befell human beings and the amount of poverty that was coming out of the industrial era, but in the City of Buffalo, Cleveland’s hometown, we see a different pattern in a so-called old biddy, a woman, who cared about the plight of the poor and did not believe that children should be, “just collecting driftwood” (a piece of coal that fell off the coal car train to fuel homes).

She believed that children, instead of scrounging for fuel for their homes, should be learning or playing or enjoying themselves because no matter what was going on with systemic racism, lynchings, and Cleveland’s rather anti-American, xenophobic and anti-Italian immigrant policies, it still didn’t stop the fact that many of the nation’s immigrant population, hard workers as they were could not get out of poverty during the industrial era, and the situation was dire for everybody, immigrant and working class alike. We are reminded of the many smells that come out of the term poverty but nothing is more powerful of a stench than 12 people occupying one room no bigger than my small living room and my one room apartment in Tonawanda. I can only imagine what it was like in the lower West side for early Italian immigrants.

However, this is where it gets complicated: Love was also an anti-suffragette during the Progressive Era when women were fighting for the right to vote as well as equal treatment under the law. She felt that voting might break up the family as opposed to help it and that women needed to be closer to their children, an argument made then by Christian conservatives. Her childcare facility, “The Fitch Crèche” a home smaller than the early maternity ward on Delaware and Edward in Buffalo, was not too far from Millionaires Row and was located on Swan Street in the downtown area. It was equipped with both a nursery, a sizable backyard, and a playroom.

This form of direct help led to the Maria Love Convalescent Fund, a charity that helps the less fortunate get back on their feet with stipends for bills, clothes, food and medicine. Being in therapy and in a private counseling center once started by the Episcopalians, I’ve learned about “The Fund,” offering charitable help to those in need, those who come out of prison or have fallen on rough times.

Maria was a pioneer. Progressive Buffalonians look back at her as being an alternative, a breath of fresh air regardless of where any of us come from. As a scholar of Buffalo history, thank God for Maria Love. She showed what hard work and dedication can do in the field of social services.  I’m actually proud that someone like that, even if a bit flawed, comes from Buffalo, with the stiff upper lip and committed to human and social services. Like Teddy Roosevelt, she had a social democratic spirit! 

Michael Mottern is the First Vice-President of SDUSA.

By Jason Sibert

Note: This is a follow-up to Ole Miss – Just Like The Swiss.

Switzerland offers a useful lesson for American social democrats: broad collective-bargaining coverage can strengthen workers’ wages and conditions even when union membership is relatively low. Switzerland is a wealthy country, and that fact helps support its citizens’ living standards.

Why is its economy so vibrant? It combines high‑value industries, world‑class human capital, and extreme political stability into one of the most efficient economic models on earth. Its high-end industries include pharmaceuticals, chemicals, medical devices, luxury watches, life sciences, advanced technology, and precision machinery. Strong intellectual property protection and deep R&D ecosystems keep these sectors competitive. Financial services also power the economy. Private banking, wealth management, and insurance attract global capital. The Swiss franc’s safe‑haven status reinforces financial stability. In addition, Switzerland’s dual education system is one of the most effective in the world – apprenticeships and vocational training produce highly skilled technicians and managers.

Wages for workers are always an issue for any social democrat. In the Swiss economy, high productivity per worker powers the country’s high living standards, but what about the labor movement? Union density is low, though not as low as in the United States, at 15 percent of the workforce. At the other end of the spectrum, Scandinavian countries have a union density of 50 to 70 percent of the workforce. However, the Swiss labor movement still wields power. The main union federation is the Swiss Trade Union Federation, and key unions include Unia (construction, retail, hospitality), Syna (services, healthcare), VPOD (public sector), and KV Schweiz (commercial/administrative). Swiss Collective Labor Agreements are the core mechanism Switzerland uses to regulate work conditions while avoiding a big welfare state, stronger unions, or heavy national labor laws. The agreements are sector‑wide contracts negotiated between unions and employer associations, and they quietly shape the Swiss labor market, meaning union power stretches far and wide.

Despite a lower density, 47 to 48 percent of Swiss workers are covered by collective labor agreements. How is this? Collective bargaining agreements in a particular industry – bargained on by unions and employer associations – are extended to all workers in that industry, regardless of whether they’re in a union or not. The employer must follow the agreement on minimum wages, working hours, overtime rules, vacation rules, training requirements, and safety standards. Of course, not all sectors are covered because not all sectors have collective bargaining agreements, but it’s easy to see how these agreements use unions to empower all workers.

Strike activity is very low in Switzerland. As a social democrat, I believe strikes should be used as leverage. However, strikes have downsides because they interrupt the flow of goods and services to the market. Laws prohibit striking while collective bargaining agreement is in force, which helps maintain order between employers and employees. I can’t help but think extending union-bargained wages and benefits to whole sectors plays a role in this as well. Employees without unions don’t have the option of strikes but can still benefit from collective bargaining agreements.

Switzerland is a social market economy (a free market combined with union power, social insurance, regulation of private industry, and social welfare), in a sense like Germany, although it’s not as much of a social market economy. One could call it a liberal coordinated market economy. It mixes market liberalism (flexible labor markets, competition, low regulation, and low taxes – but good public services) with high‑skill coordination (strong vocational training, export‑oriented industries, stable institutions).

A Swiss-style system for extending collective bargaining agreements could raise wages and improve working conditions for more American workers. The U.S. economy already resembles Switzerland’s in some respects, particularly its market liberalism, but adopting sector-wide extensions would require major legal and institutional changes.

The federal government needs a representative body to ensure agreements apply across an industry and to enforce wage and benefit standards. Some union leaders might object to covering employees who do not pay dues, yet the broader principle is compelling: collective bargaining can benefit entire groups of workers, including people who otherwise lack union representation.

Jason Sibert is the Lead Writer of the Peace Economy Project.

By Kevin McGuire

Is there a certain logic to achieving social democracy in America? In respect to differing viewpoints and our democratic tradition, most definitely. Who buys the products and uses their disposable incomes to fuel our economy? Who provides the needed labor to produce goods and services? Should capitalism remain unchallenged, in this age of high prices  and scarcity? Does everything require commodification? Can democracy be fully achieved?

All the talk from both the far left and far right about “how we have no democracy here in America“ is so self-serving. On the right, we have seen the total replacement of the GOP by something worse and more dangerous, a dominant MAGA. And on the left, we have cancel culture and the opinion of the DSA via their Marxist cadre groups and caucuses, who falsely argue “we are the real existing socialism for America.” This is no different than what the Communist Party USA pushed onto their minions in the ‘60’s, ‘70’s and ‘80’s, and is a total deviation from democratic socialism.

The idea of a “liberal democracy” is being fully discredited by both camps. The idea that  has preserved our societies for centuries is under attack. From “liberal democracy”, we have a court system, with law enforcement and prisons, and an immigration system, both with rights which we can all agree on. The direction of this argument is some kind of civil war so that one side gets subjugated. And the argument that sometimes deaths are necessary during revolutions is totally unacceptable. Means and ends get warped and twisted, and do not serve societies’ long-term interests, particularly in our nuclear age. Is this appropriate?

Can we agree on an economic system? The “right” retains a “rugged individualist” model, which leads to the obvious slogan “we either hang together or we hang separately.” It looks like the latter hanging is prevailing. The far “left” pines for a collectivist form, which has its own pitfalls. We saw what happened to the USSR’s “real existing socialism.” There were no workers’ rights, no freedom-like speech and artistic liberty.

Why can’t we create a system which ultimately establishes the dignity and self-worth of every individual member of our society, independent of one’s age, race, creed, gender identity and economic class through an agreed economic system that can achieve these ends? Our view of capitalism should never stand still; it needs constant critique. Some argue that Marx was no “Nostradamus, “yet this statement is so disingenuous; he tried to tell his German comrades where capitalism was going, until Eduard Berstein made the “astonishing” claim, through Marx’s own procedures, science and data, that Marx’s theories were going nowhere. The middle class never collapsed, and capitalism never fell under its own weight.

Can Socialism be fully achieved here in America?

The real answer here is unknown. Democracy serves as a safeguard for better ideas to be put into action, but when those reforms fail or stop, then democracy is no longer perceived as a pathway and then folks wander into the right-wing domain. Eduard Bernstein failed to answer the question of socialism and responded, “the movement is everything.” This response is in favor of a political party which safeguards the middle and working classes against tyranny and speaks for further reforms. The reform work should continue always and address the needs of the working and middle classes. And whether those further reforms are “socialism” is for historians and others to argue. Along the way, we need to evaluate the reforms and argue whether they are acceptable for the middle and working class. This seems logical.

One thing is for certain: this business of billionaires and a run-away Pentagon has to end. We KNOW what is wrong, and we can make our world much better!

Kevin McGuire is a SDUSA member from Houston.