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Is Populism a threat to Democracy?

R

RVonse

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that people in the US are living in the matrx
Nancy Pelosi offers the compelling 10 minute argument that modern populism has become a threat to democracy here:



But Winston counters her argument here:


While I do believe Pelosi has the correct stance regarding the negative uses of populism especially by a con artists, it is the corruption of Congress and Washington that has allowed populism to show up in the first place. If ruling elites in Washington were doing their job, the majority of the populace would be representative in the first place and there would be no reason for a populism movement either liberal or conservative.

I think it is very fitting that one of the most corrupt politicians I can think of (Pelosi and her insider trading) is the one arguing against the populist movement. And it is also very interesting that the liberals (lead by Pelosi) have shifted over time (since Obama was president) whether a populist is a good person or not. According to liberals a populist is now a deplorable person.
 
Three observations.
First, however corrupt Ms Pelosi is, Mr Trump is magnitudes more corrupt.

Second, Ms Pelosi does not soeak for most liberals.

Third, charismatic, ruthless, clueless sociopaths of any ideology are the threat to democracy.
 
Populism can be a dangerous thing, and you seem to agree with Nancy Pelosi on that. William Jennings Bryan was a populist though and the dude didn't really have a bad bone in his body. Daft as all fuck though.

Right-wing populism can get pretty ugly. Can there be such a thing as good right-wing populism? Right-wing populism doesn't have favorable roots and is founded on "traditional" stuff which usually means "Let's turn the calendar back 80 years back when life was better".

I'm uncertain the definition proper for populism, but to me populism represents a generalized and overly simplified popular movement. Populism tends to exist in a bubble and while populism can have empathetical roots (people who saw their livelihoods more overseas, civil rights, not enough to retire) but is generally too broad to address things in a focused manner. Problems that require a myriad of solutions, but often the people who support populism are in fact standing in the way. People angry about industry moving overseas often blame the Democrats, when the GOP has done fuck all to help them. Far left wing want environmental changes but can't manage the need to get business involvement.

And this is the decent populism. One can trend into right-wing populism (see cable news) or left-wing populism where people want more equity in the system and support those who actually just want to plunder it (see "socialists" such as Venezuela). Right now, the US has a strong right-wing populist movement and weak left-wing populist movement. Build the wall and America becomes great again. Puhlease!
 
Jimmy Higgins said:
Right now, the US has a strong right-wing populist movement and weak left-wing populist movement. Build the wall and America becomes great again. Puhlease!
Click to expand...
If our government represented the people properly there would be no left or right wing populism...because the people...would be happy. I blame corruption, ineffective leadership, and too centralized government causing the populism to manifest itself in the first place. Perhaps the goal of government (although not stated) should be to address the needs and wants of the populace so that populism never shows its face.

In a way populism movement reminds me of unions. They shouldn't be needed but they are because management is so bad in the first place.

And to me the fix is obvious although admittedly impossible to accomplish. Just get rid of the corruption.
 
RVonse said:
Jimmy Higgins said:
Right now, the US has a strong right-wing populist movement and weak left-wing populist movement. Build the wall and America becomes great again. Puhlease!
Click to expand...
If our government represented the people properly there would be no left or right wing populism...because the people...would be happy.
Click to expand...
People are never happy. It is part of our nature. The Clinton and Obama administrations were effectively successful, yet people wanted "a change". When things go well for too long, people get dumb as well.
RVonse said:
I blame corruption, ineffective leadership, and too centralized government causing the populism to manifest itself in the first place.
Click to expand...
You misspelled "life isn't easy". Government can't make life easy. Though one party wants to at least help out a little.
RVonse said:
Perhaps the goal of government (although not stated) should be to address the needs and wants of the populace so that populism never shows its face.
Click to expand...
The people with the money have first dibs. Always have. It isn't particularly fair, but this is the best we've got.
RVonse said:
In a way populism reminds me of unions. They shouldn't be needed but they are because management is so bad in the first place.
Click to expand...
Except "populism" is generally oversimplified reflection of the economy and country. Trump's campaign was a populist effort that was great at pointing out problems, but never providing a path to addressing them.
 
laughing dog said:
First, however corrupt Ms Pelosi is, Mr Trump is magnitudes more corrupt.
Click to expand...
Is it so much to ask that the people should expect our government not to be corrupt at all? And that our elite should follow the same laws they make for us? For example, if Martha Stewart can not do insider trading, should we not expect Nancy Pelosi not to do insider trading?

Its not just the degree of the corruption but the hypocrisy that leaves many with such a bad taste.
 
RVonse said:
Is it so much to ask that the people should expect our government not to be corrupt at all? And that our elite should follow the same laws they make for us? For example, if Martha Stewart can not do insider trading, should we not expect Nancy Pelosi not to do insider trading?
Click to expand...
As I understand it, insider trading is doing trades based upon information unavailable to the public gained from the position of being in office. Try as might, I could not find an example of Pelosi doing so. Do you have an example of her doing so?
 
Oh goody. More videos with no synopsis on them for me to ignore. What exactly is the point of this thread? Is it to say whilst populism is bad, we should ignore the rhetoric of populists? Because that's a fucking stupid take.

RVonse said:
In my lifetime, they have never been more unhappy. Especially since the 2008 occupy Wall Street movement.
Click to expand...

Sounds like a you problem my good sir. And a very populist argument if I may, considering it is subjective as fuck.
 
It's more *&$)@(^&#^@ bullshit.

Oh crap... I censored the wrong part.
 
They seem to be engaging in an academically half-assed debate and Pelosi is chosen for show since she has celebrity status. Listening to each of them for about a minute, I don't think that either is really worthy of the debate in question. That said, at least Pelosi makes an attempt to tie populism to other features of society and I believe that is really the crux of the issue. That is, it isn't really populism per se that is an issue, but the things that get tied into it, and mostly what that appears to mean to me is we do not need to define populism as a problem at all, only to speak to the root causes of how populism may be perverted into something else. We could also discuss what to do to fix those issues, but it appears that in doing so, it's our representative form of government that has to mostly ensure those things, meanwhile, it is called a political elite class. I believe firmly that is the source of the problem as that messaging, as most messaging, originates with an OTHER elite class, i.e. from corporations, oligarchs, and religious institutions of power.

So, when we talk about populism, there's often another adjective applied left-wing or right-wing populism.

Right-wing populism is a large contingent of the masses usually under a propagandized message from the elites to participate in govt through voting, political funding, and sometimes coups and corruption. The conservative institutions of power will sometimes even throw bones into legislation to make it more appealing to the right-wingers, such as "you want tax cuts" while things like social security and needed services are undermined, the bigger portion of tax cuts going to the wealthy, and including more messages like "you want job creators to have cuts."

It's quite ludicrous when you think about it. We've seen a group of people, right-wing populists dressed up in colonial Tea Party outfits, saying, 'hey we're the Tea Party' after being told that idea by the Koch brothers or you have masses of people being led by the Heritage Foundation and other right-wing funded think-tanks being told they are so-called "grassroots activists" against the latest issue du jour, such as Critical Race Theory. "Hey you need to be against this, click here to download the brainwashing packet about it." "Okay, good. Now you are a minion."

As I've stated before in the Critical Race theory threads, I've gone inside the beast by signing up for info on CRT with the Heritage Foundation. I was quickly harassed through email for other issues and donations and I was constantly lied to whilst I was called the grassroots activism (i.e. right-wing populism). The latest email I received...just today...uses the latest campus protests against the war in Gaza to defame college students calling them Hamas supporters and then it uses this ad hominem attack to call to action the so-called right-wing populists (who are being told what to do) to then write their congress critters about student loan forgiveness. Who benefits from being the most anti-student loan forigivng, but the BIG BANKS and INVESTORS, the oligarchs?
 
RVonse said:
If our government represented the people properly there would be no left or right wing populism...because the people...would be happy.
Click to expand...
That's both hilarious and sad.

Happiness has nothing whatsoever to do with government, and vice-versa.

Government can determine prosperity, but there's a major kicker that most people are utterly oblivious to, and which (once you truly understand it) can change your entire life: While poverty can certainly make you unhappy, wealth cannot make you happy, and the pursuit of wealth is often a disastrous strategy in the pursuit of happiness.
 
RVonse said:
I think it is very fitting that one of the most corrupt politicians I can think of (Pelosi and her insider trading) is the one arguing against the populist movement. And it is also very interesting that the liberals (lead by Pelosi) have shifted over time (since Obama was president) whether a populist is a good person or not. According to liberals a populist is now a deplorable person.
Click to expand...
Democrats embraced populism under Obama? Do you just mean that he was popular? I don't remember any endorsements of populism as a social phenomenon at the time, nor would I see his customary si se puede hetoric as hinging on populist ideas for the most part, at least no more so than any other American politician.
 

Is Populism a threat to Democracy?​

In this post I summarize the important part of the answer to this question.
To summarize the summary, a strong populism is likely to be subverted into fascism and thus is very bad. This problem was exacerbated, first by radio broadcasting, then by social media. Pro-Green populism is often relatively benign, but otherwise can anyone cite any examples of "good" populism since the turn of the century?

The word "Fascism" is ambiguous. (Is there a thread discussing the definition?) A look at Madeleine A's book gave me insight. I say with confidence that populism is the prerequisite precursor for fascism. A country might be taken over by populist politics without becoming also fascist, but never vice-versa. And a strong populist political movement is easy to warp into a fascist model. Briefly, a fascist takeover begins with popular ideas and policies, ideas with general appeal, to rich, poor, political left and right. Intellectuals and altruistic leaders will often oppose ill-advised populist agenda, but some leaders will be corrupted.

In today's U.S. clime, most of the GOP leaders have been corrupted into supporting Trump's fascism. The threat is much more dire than many understand.

There are "legitimate" issues where sincere Populists think they speak for liberal values. I show gasoline pricing as an example.
Thinkers mostly agree that higher gasoline prices would be beneficial* for society in several ways (and should have been imposed decades ago). In a "smart populism" model where the people are smart, they'd say greenishly, "Dear Congressman, Stop listening to the Oil Industry lobbyists. Hike up the price of gas please."

In practice the unwashed or uninformed masses would probably oppose higher gasoline prices. All else equal the opinions of altruistic experts is preferred over the ignorati. *-Putin and MBS are already colluding to throttle oil production for Trump's political advantage in the late summer. Higher prices in the short term would be very bad.
Click to expand...

So what turns populism derived directly from ordinary human ignorance into the malevolent governing model called fascism? Populism, by its very nature, can be easily enhanced and exploited by con-men. As a trivial example, 40% of Brits wanted, stupidly, to exit from EU. Con-men pushed that up to 51% and got the reward of deregulation. But that is NOT fascism. The con-men sought and achieved one specific change. In fascism the con-man doesn't just want a single new law -- he takes over the entire government!

No sense laying out a blueprint for fascist takeover. An obvious ploy is . . .
Is there someone to blame? Desire for increased income is common. Voters who blame their poor financial situation on immigrants or politicians will be prey to a con-man pandering fears and hatreds. In extreme cases (Hitler's lies, contrails, vaccines and space lasers) new fears and hatreds are created and stirred up.

The playbooks of Mussolini, Hitler and Trump are all similar in this model. I've read a claim that Trump read Mein Kampf or otherwise regarded Hitler as a mentor. Is this true?
 
laughing dog said:
Third, charismatic, ruthless, clueless sociopaths of any ideology are the threat to democracy.
Click to expand...
No. The people who somehow find it in themselves to vote for Hitler and Orange and their ilk are the problem. So chalk it up to human ignorance. Populists are nothing more than bogeyman salesmen peddling fear and lies. Unfortunately there are lots of people ready to buy.
 
Don2 (Don1 Revised) said:
They seem to be engaging in an academically half-assed debate and Pelosi is chosen for show since she has celebrity status. Listening to each of them for about a minute, I don't think that either is really worthy of the debate in question. That said, at least Pelosi makes an attempt to tie populism to other features of society and I believe that is really the crux of the issue. That is, it isn't really populism per se that is an issue, but the things that get tied into it, and mostly what that appears to mean to me is we do not need to define populism as a problem at all, only to speak to the root causes of how populism may be perverted into something else. We could also discuss what to do to fix those issues, but it appears that in doing so, it's our representative form of government that has to mostly ensure those things, meanwhile, it is called a political elite class. I believe firmly that is the source of the problem as that messaging, as most messaging, originates with an OTHER elite class, i.e. from corporations, oligarchs, and religious institutions of power.

So, when we talk about populism, there's often another adjective applied left-wing or right-wing populism.

Right-wing populism is a large contingent of the masses usually under a propagandized message from the elites to participate in govt through voting, political funding, and sometimes coups and corruption. The conservative institutions of power will sometimes even throw bones into legislation to make it more appealing to the right-wingers, such as "you want tax cuts" while things like social security and needed services are undermined, the bigger portion of tax cuts going to the wealthy, and including more messages like "you want job creators to have cuts."

It's quite ludicrous when you think about it. We've seen a group of people, right-wing populists dressed up in colonial Tea Party outfits, saying, 'hey we're the Tea Party' after being told that idea by the Koch brothers or you have masses of people being led by the Heritage Foundation and other right-wing funded think-tanks being told they are so-called "grassroots activists" against the latest issue du jour, such as Critical Race Theory. "Hey you need to be against this, click here to download the brainwashing packet about it." "Okay, good. Now you are a minion."

As I've stated before in the Critical Race theory threads, I've gone inside the beast by signing up for info on CRT with the Heritage Foundation. I was quickly harassed through email for other issues and donations and I was constantly lied to whilst I was called the grassroots activism (i.e. right-wing populism). The latest email I received...just today...uses the latest campus protests against the war in Gaza to defame college students calling them Hamas supporters and then it uses this ad hominem attack to call to action the so-called right-wing populists (who are being told what to do) to then write their congress critters about student loan forgiveness. Who benefits from being the most anti-student loan forigivng, but the BIG BANKS and INVESTORS, the oligarchs?
Click to expand...
Do you have some comments on left wing populism?
 
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