"ObamaCare Not Socialism, it's Fascism," Whole Foods CEO

In the second part of a two-day interview on NPR’s Morning Edition, Whole Foods CEO John Mackey backed down from his previous assessment of the Affordable Care Act as being socialism. Instead, Mackey claims the law is fascist.

In the debate over potential provisions in the healthcare reform law, Mackey wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal calling the unpassed, unamended, and incomplete law “socialism.” Now that he has a book to sell, he sat down with government-run radio outlet National Public Radio to discuss his views on capitalism, mostly (since his book is titled Conscious Capitalism).

But when asked by host Steve Inskeep whether Mackey still considers the law to be socialism, he said he did not. Instead, he used another term.

“Technically speaking, it’s more like fascism,” Mackey said. “Socialism is where the government owns the means of production. In fascism, the government doesn’t own the means of production, but they do control it, and that’s what’s happening with our healthcare programs and these reforms.”

Mackey reiterated his characterization of the law, and many other regulations, as fascism later in the interview.

Listen to the interview on the NPR site.