Chomsky is expressing that the core of socialism is workers' control of workplaces, not "public" control. That would be Chomsky's view. Most socialists today think there should be some mix of public control with direct worker control.
My point is that there is no single definitive definition of socialism, and there are many different socialist ideas out there. Chomsky has one angle, Bernie has his own. Some socialists won't admit Bernie to the "club" but I will.
He clearly knows what socialism is. If you read some of his older writings it at least demonstrates he has a clear grasp of the ideas. He simply expresses it differently these days. He repackaged it.
His policies are not socialism necessarily. They are in the center of the mainstream progressive movement. But they are motivated by Bernie's socialism. The people supporting Bernie sense that he's different from any other major politician today. That democratic socialist impulse is what gives him that clarity. He has an underlying socialist worldview that lets him express the issues with moral clarity. He knows the purpose of the economy should be to serve the people. We should have the right to basic economic security, like the right to a job at a living wage, to health care, education, and housing. Bernie knows the only way we can achieve these things is we have to fight against the super wealthy class of people whose wealth and privilege depends on keeping us poor. That's the billionaire class, and the corporations, the institutions of the system. But unfortunately they also dominate the government, so we have to organize a big majority of people to take control of the government, through the democracy. That's socialism in nutshell, repackaged for this American time and culture. It's not everything about socialism, but that's Bernie's best effort at explaining it and he seems to be having some success with it.
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