There are many ways to interpret Marx. Many of them legitimate. But many others seek to dismiss Marx by invoking anticommunist echo chamber rhetoric. They deride him as a sterile economic determinist or lambast his analysis and predictions as horribly wrongheaded.

Marx was not always correct (who is?). But he was either correct or made defensible claims more often than many people realize. And he remains worth heeding.

So with an eye toward rebutting some of the more wild-eyed portrayals of the great socialist thinker, here are eight claims that any credible interpretation of Marx or Marxism should include.