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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
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Look, I'd really prefer it if you didn't immediately respond to someone upset with wealth inequality in America with a veiled "what about Venezuela?" defense. I recognize that Maduro is bad - it does not mean every single Left-Winger in every single country arguing against inequality is exactly the same way.
Also, not entirely sure what Chapo has to do with this?
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Essentially that. "Populism" gets banded around so much its almost as useless as "establishment". Its largely an arbitrary distinction used in common discourse as "someone I don't like".
Edited by AzurePaladin on Apr 10th 2019 at 9:47:03 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -FighteerWe're talking about Populism, this isn't even about Left or Right (thought my actual example is Evo Morales). Populism, as a rule, leads to a tons of idiocy becoming normalized among not just the elite, but the average persons.
Exactly. As you can imagine, it leads to bad things.
Edited by KazuyaProta on Apr 10th 2019 at 8:53:04 AM
Watch me destroying my countryI mean, like socialism it gets thrown around a lot but it is still a specific concept. Lincoln didn’t promote zero-sum class warfare, or lash out at the intellectual or media establishments of the day. He supported big business and open immigration. He had nothing but contempt for Jacksonian popular policy.
If you can define Lincoln as a populist, then the word populism has no meaning for you.
Also, I’ll point out democracy is in no way a rejection of “elites”. Elites are voters too, and representative democracy is a thing.
Edited by archonspeaks on Apr 10th 2019 at 6:53:49 AM
They should have sent a poet.That's what I'm trying to say. In political discourse, it has all but ceased to have one.
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Apologies, I thought you were referring to Venezuela with the "destabilizing the region" comment. Having said that, the point stands.
Edited by AzurePaladin on Apr 10th 2019 at 9:57:07 AM
The awful things he says and does are burned into our cultural consciousness like a CRT display left on the same picture too long. -FighteerI'm not sure why you'd brand Lincoln a populist. Lincoln was pretty radical for his place and era, sure, but being radical isn't the same thing as being a populist. Lincoln had actual outlined policy ideas, and his opposition to the expansion of slavery was hardly some pie-in-the-sky idea considering that most other western countries had already banned it.
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I mean, Evo and Maduro ties are pretty well known. The Venezuelan Crisis had many actors.
But TLDR. Populism is really dumb idea. Not all populists are the same and some can even be good, but those are the exceptions.
Edited by KazuyaProta on Apr 10th 2019 at 9:00:35 AM
Watch me destroying my countryLincoln actually ran as a moderate Republican. Heck, during the convention he siphoned votes from both the radicals and the conservatives by essentially portraying himself as being the "electable" candidate who was everyone's second choice since there was no way their preferred option could get the nomination.
It's actually pretty hilarious the extent of the scheming by Lincoln's people to ensure he got the nomination.
Edited by Parable on Apr 10th 2019 at 7:09:43 AM
Doublepost, but Jay Inslee is having a townhall on CNN,
in case he's a candidate anyone wants to check up on.
"It's actually pretty hilarious the extent of the scheming by Lincoln's people to ensure he got the nomination."
Wow, my comparison between Lincoln and Hillary Clinton really does hold up.
More seriously, I do want to clarify. I'm not trying to argue that populism is always bad, but that populism is about a rhetorical framing that is about protecting the interests of "the people" against "the elite". And who "the people" are can very, as can "the elite", and "the elite" doesn't always mean (just) "rich people".
What I am arguing though, is that even though Southern Plantatian Aristocracy really were corrupt elites, there wasn't much in Lincoln's ideological framing that was about opposing them for that reason. Whereas conversely, while not necessarily Confederates themselves, contemporary Democrats who really, really loathed Lincoln, did have a lot of that rhetoric. Which is not surprising, because the sort of founder of the party, Jackson, was a really big anti-elite guy (who was a really wealthy slave owner).
And like when you have two sides of the equation, one of which includes bankers (Lincoln's Republicans) and the other which was founded by a guy who considered bankers his worst enemies (Jacksonian Democrats), the populists are mostly going to be on the latter side, even if they are "the bad guys" in other respects.
Which is not to say that there weren't populist or at least pro-liberty/equality/will-of-the-people aspects to the ideology and rhetoric of Lincoln and his supporters. For instance, part of the reasoning behind opposition to slavery was out of a belief that everyone should be able to enjoy/benefit from the fruits of their labors.
And something I learned of pretty recently and need to read more is how there were was this whole group of people known as the "Forty-Eighters
", including the Jewish Spiegel brothers (the survivng one founded the department store) that fled Germany to America after taking part in the Revolution of 1848, and then became super-committed Union soldiers, particularly because of hatred of slavery.
But I'm not sure if being a revolutionary is exactly the same thing as populist either, because populism is again more "how" you believe than "what" you believe.
Edited by Hodor2 on Apr 10th 2019 at 10:02:48 AM
Political scientist Francis Fukuyama defines populism with three characteristics:
1. The first is a regime that pursues policies that are popular in the short run but unsustainable in the long run, usually in the realm of social policies.
2. A second has to do with the definition of the “people” that are the basis for legitimacy: many populist regimes do not include the whole population, but rather a certain ethnic or racial group that are said to be the “true” people.
3. A third definition of populism has to do with the style of leadership. Populist leaders tend to develop a cult of personality around themselves, claiming the mantle of charismatic authority that exists independently of institutions like political parties.
This comes from his analysis "What is Populism?". Link here (warning, it's a pdf and a long one)
Edited by M84 on Apr 10th 2019 at 11:11:48 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedI think that sounds broadly right, but although I'm falling into it myself, I don't think populism should necessarily be defined such that being bad is an inherent part. And I wouldn't consider Fukukyama to be an unbiased source, since as I understand it, he's a neoliberal guy- in the real sense of neoliberal, not in the sense of as a term of abuse for Democrats.
Definitely, think he's right on with #2 though. It's not always true, but it tends to come up a lot (and I think somewhat explains why even benevolent populists like Sanders tend to have some degree of conscious political incorrectness).
Edited by Hodor2 on Apr 10th 2019 at 10:17:02 AM
Oh yeah, he's biased. But his definitions of what populism is still hold weight.
Here's a more recent thing from December 2018:
The Great Recession has influenced populist movements today, say Stanford scholars
In which Francis Fukuyama, Anna Grzymala-Busse and Neil Malhotra discuss why populist messages have emerged in contemporary politics and how they have evolved into larger, political movements.
Fukuyama: Populism often involves a politician who claims to have direct charismatic connection to the people, which gives him/her special legitimacy in pursuing the “people’s” interest. This presents a challenge to democracy, since such leaders tend to be anti-institutional: They oppose courts, the media, bureaucracies and any check-and-balance institution that stands in their way.
Grzymala-Busse: Populism is an ideology that consists of two main claims: first, that the political and economic elites act in their own corrupt self-interest, and neither care about or respond to popular concerns. The second claim is that as a result, the “people” need to be represented by the populist party or movement, so that their interests can finally be served. In the U.S. today, these claims take the form of calls to “drain the swamp” and of attacks on “disloyal” opposition, media or citizens.
Malhotra: Broadly, one way to think of populism is a political movement that represents the masses against the elites. As manifested in America, populism has features of liberal economic policies – e.g., protectionism, support for mass entitlement programs – conservative social policies and isolationist foreign policies. It also stands against trends such as globalization and “small-l liberalism,” in which I mean the embrace of global markets and cosmopolitan integration.
Edited by M84 on Apr 10th 2019 at 11:18:15 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedYeah. I do think that sounds about right. Thanks for sharing those links.
I think the one where I'm iffier is about the cult of personality part, because it feels like a bit of a tautology that politicians who are popular and who rail against "the system" (and are popular because they rail against "the system") would be more popular to their supporters than "the system" they rail against.
I find this part to be more a hallmark of Fascism than of Populism, and I think there's a Venn Diagram, wherein there are Populists who aren't Fascists (i.e. Bernie and AOC), Fascists who aren't Populists (i.e. Franco), and people who are both (i.e. Orban and Trump).
Edited by Hodor2 on Apr 10th 2019 at 10:27:56 AM
Oh, it is. The underdog narrative is very popular. And we all like to think of ourselves as the underdog.
The key trait of populism is that it's not really a political ideology. It's a style. This is why it shows up all over the political spectrum.
One reason I find populism of any flavor dangerous is that it almost always carries with it anti-intellectualism. Probably because it all too often ties into the anti-elitism rhetoric of a lot of populist leaders and movements. There's a reason that anti-vaxxers are on the rise wherever populism spreads.
Vaccine scepticism grows in line with rise of populism - study
And of course, we can't forget the most extreme cases such as Pol Pot or Mao Zedong, who went so far as to kill the "elite intellectuals".
...Fuck populism.
Edited by M84 on Apr 10th 2019 at 11:41:06 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedI find that fucking populism is a sentiment we don't have the luxury of it. When the working class and poor are dying in the streets because of the GOP trying to kill them—yes, you can say the Elites are untrustworthy.
It's just the irony the Democrats can't convey this and the GOP claims to be for the working class—so perhaps, yes, the public is stupid.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Populism is an ill defined term, something Fukuyama points out in his report at the beginning of it. The entire report is an attempt to define it based on the common characteristics of many movements and leaders who have been called populist.
As for fascism being ill defined...that's also intentional. It was brought up in other OTC threads that when Mussolini created Fascism he was more or less just flinging shit at a wall and seeing what stuck.
Edited by M84 on Apr 10th 2019 at 11:57:03 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedI would rather have a shitty kingdom ruled by people who are being ruled than a paradise ruled by geniuses without their consent.
Kentucky may be deeply deeply wrong in its voting habits but I believe the populace can be educated. Because i believe in democracy....and I hate the elites of my state. People who hate the poor, the tired, and the brown.
They appeal to the worst instincts of the voters but I believe they can have their best appealed to as well. We need to appeal to the people—I just don't know how.
But I'm peacing out on this subject.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
You're seriously suggesting that the people who are critical of populism want a technocracy or something?
We're critical of populism in large part because we don't want despots who trample over democratic institutions!
The cult-like behavior, the anti-establishment anti-elite anti-intellectual rhetoric, the appeals to emotion over reason, the encouragement of "us vs. them" mentality...this is a recipe that has led to tragedy so many times throughout history.
Besides, a technocracy wouldn't lead to a paradise anyway. It'd be a cyber corporatist hellhole ala Shadowrun.
Edited by M84 on Apr 11th 2019 at 4:54:36 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedExcept without the joy of Trolls... well, non metaphorical ones at any rate.
Honestly, i think a tonne of Yama Kings would actually improve DC overall. Or the First Nations actually able to pull off the Great Rain Dance that buggers up things.
W Ith the whole shebang going on with Barr, what's the current outlook like for actually restoring some semblance of normalcy? As it seems the Administration is running fairly roughshod over all the attempts at checks and balances.
Any attempt can only begin once Trump is out of office. That's what it will take. It's not the only thing that needs to happen — far from it. But it definitely has to happen for anything else to be considered.
And no on Shadowrun being an improvement. With our luck we'd end up with President Lofwyr or something.
Edited by M84 on Apr 11th 2019 at 5:03:24 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedSo it looks like Democrats just lost an important election in Wisconsin: [1]
.

Yep. See above, re: Trump feels emboldened like never before now that the Mueller Investigation isn't hanging over his head.
Step one is retaliation against everyone who dared stand against him.
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