Thought for the Day

[broncofan]

http://www.jpost.com/Breaking-News/B...-Israel-475622
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United...esolution_3379

As an add-on to that last post, I agree with Ban Ki-Moon's point here in the first article. I think evidence of this is in the second link of a UN resolution, whereby the UN declared Zionism a form of racism, which Kofi Annan said was a low point in the UN's history. Israel is a UN member state, and was created to fulfill the aims of Zionism. It was never an aim of Zionism to have a two tiered society, or to deny rights to non-Jewish citizens. The resolution by the UN suggests that the very existence of Israel (within any borders) is an act of racism, despite the fact that they created Israel!

Edit: Just to clarify, the resolution 3379 was not a statement against the occupation, but against Zionism without qualifications, which was to say that the state they created was not legitimate.

But I personally agree that the settlements are an obstacle in the way of peace, and even if we ignore their immediate effects, it leads to a coercive negotiation. So, I understand Obama's position on that...he expected the Israelis to freeze settlement activity.

[holzz]

New Year's Resolutions are stupid.

[Stavros]

What is Populism? I have been puzzled by this word for years because it never seems to have a single definition that everyone can accept. Google it and you find it defined as support for the concerns of ordinary people; or Populism is a political style of action that mobilizes a large alienated element of a population against a government which is seen as controlled by an out-of-touch closed elite that acts on behalf of its own interests.

Neither works for me. How does anyone know what the concerns of ordinary people are, other than an obvious response -their family, work and friends, their health and happiness, and so on? As for mobilizing 'a large alienated element of the population' -what about those people who do not see the problem as 'out-of-touch' elites?

Populism does not exist, nationalism does.
And what nationalism does is divide people into categories that suit the creators of that national identity. The so-called Populism has given us Brexit -17 million making a decision for a country of 64 million; and that it has put Trump in the White House is surely a contradiction -most Americans who voted chose Hillary Clinton- unless you redefine who 'the people' are to include White Americans and exclude most of the rest, or you could even fine tune it to be 'White Christian Americans'. The 'National Prayer Breakfast' that was held in Washington DC last week makes one wonder if Jews can be American, let alone atheists.

One wonders what it means to be part of the population yet be ignored, until one realises that is the whole point of nationalism.
Nationalism, not populism is at the root of Brexit, Trump, and the extremists in Poland and Hungary. But are you 'one of us'? And crucially, 'Do you belong here?'.

[filghy2]

Populism is a bit of a nebulous concept, but I think it does exist. From my reading it seems to involve four main elements:

1. An appeal to the support of the common people, in opposition to an allegedly corrupt elite. Sometimes this involves implicit or explicit appeal to the idea that only certain groups comprise the 'real' people.

2. Rejection of pluralism: the idea that society comprises a range of different groups whose interests should be accommodated and balanced. Instead politics is seen in 'us' and 'them' terms.

3. Rejection of constraints on implementing the will of the people, such as legal checks and balances and minority rights. A good example is the Brexiteers reaction to the court ruling that parliament must approve the triggering of EU exit.

4. An emphasis on claimed simple solutions to identified problems, and rejection of expert opinion to the contrary. This often involves appealing to popular prejudices by identifying 'others' (eg foreigners/immigrants, ethnic/religious minorities, elites) as the source of problems.

Seen in this way, populism is more an approach to gaining power and governing, rather than a distinct ideology (populists can be left or right on the political spectrum). Hence, populism and nationalism are not alternatives - populists quite often appeal to nationalism.

[Stavros]

Although I agree with a lot of the above, it does not clarify Populism, and thus I resort to my claim that nationalism is the core idea, and the separation of people into 'we and they'. In addition, there is a intriguing question and answer lurking in the 'appeal to the support of the common people', the rejection of pluralism and the rejection of experts: who is organising this? To which the answer is: not the common people!

Look at it this way -who led the campaigns against the EU which its victors claimed are the results of a 'populist backlash' against corruption, globalization etc etc -none other than the elites in the same system which alienated 'the people' and who stand to benefit most from 'populism' if it re-structures the global economy to give them commercial advantages: step forward Rupert Murdoch via The Sun and SKY; step forward Paul Dacre and the Daily Mail-and in the US Fox News, the Koch Brothers, etc. The same people who control a substantial slice of the media, and manipulate the news to depict the EU as useless, corrupt, expensive and the cause of 'our' loss sovereignty and 'uncontrolled immigration' -all lies- are not populists, but elitists with their own agenda who pump out fake news on a regular basis to create a different agenda from one that relates to economic reality and who recruit politicians to their cause even though, supposedly the same politicians entrusted with Brexit are distant from the real interests of the British people.

When you look more closely at what Populism is, the people disappear, to be replaced by competing interests whose agenda is clear: an end to international co-operation through integrated markets, such as NAFTA and the EU, and a revival of the confrontation between competing interests in a survival of the fittest. The national interest, ultimately, is not decided by 'the people', it is presented to them as an either/or dichotomy, which, if you begin from a morally compromised position, leads to a morally unsatisfactory conclusion, and does not solve the real problem of work, wages and a happy life.

[filghy2]

I think you are making the mistake of thinking that populists are genuinely trying to represent the interests of the common people. Claims to be supporting 'the people' against 'the elites' are really just a rhetorical device for manipulating public opinion so that populists can get into power. In doing so they will try to tap into veins of thinking that already have support among the general public, but the primary purpose of 'the people' is to be manipulated for the populists ends. Populists will commonly claim that their ideas have mass support (whether or not this is true) but are being suppressed by elites, particularly the liberal media.

As you note, many of the key supporters of the populist/nationalist agenda are wealthy businessman whose primary agenda is to pay less tax and have less regulation of what they can do. They know that this agenda in itself is unlikely to attract majority support, but promoting nationalism serves as an effective device for shifting public support to the right, particularly among the working class who formerly supported mainstream left parties. I presume these people are in businesses that are unlikely to be affected by increased protectionism (eg media).

In the case of Trump, he was able to win by tapping into concerns about unequal distribution of economic gains and economic decline in the rust-belt states. The massive contradiction at the heart of his campaign is that he was proposing massive tax cuts for the rich, abolishing Obamacare, deregulation of finance etc but he was able to paper over this by emphasising illegal immigration and unfair foreign competition and promising tough measures to address these.

Interestingly, Charles Koch has recently made some very critical comments about Trump's immigration ban. It may be starting to dawn on some of these people that they've unleashed an unpredictable monster who they can't control.

[filghy2]

A couple of articles that may be useful
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...m-inauguration
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.7a967319db6a

[blackchubby38]

Before Trump, here is a list of the Presidential candidates that were considered "Populists":

Andrew Jackson
William Jennings Bryan
George Wallace
Pat Buchanan
John Edwards

If you look at their respective campaigns, they pretty much all had a running theme. They were advocates for the "common man" or "the working class". They were going to take on the establishment, be it big business, special interest groups or Washington D.C., who they saw as being responsible for the problems that those individuals faced. It wasn't until Wallace and Buchanan where you started seeing the word "white" inserted before "working class". Of course, this was due to backlash against the civil rights movement and later immigration.

I think Andrew Jackson was able to win because like Trump he was famous for his day and his message resonated with voters. Jennings is probably the most well known and somewhat likable of the candidates. But lost his best shot at winning the presidency (the election of 1896) when big business threw all their support behind his Republican opponent, William Mckinley.

When it comes to populism is seems the winning formula would be the man+the right message. John Edwards talked about a "rigged system". But his "rigged system" included oil, insurance, and drug companies. As we later found out, he was a bit of phony as he was getting expensive haircuts and cheating on his cancer stricken wife. If you want to try to take on those groups, you better make sure you are beyond reproach.

Its still early and since the only comparison we have is a guy who was president 180 years ago, we have to wait and see if one can run the country as a Populist.

[Stavros]

Before Trump, here is a list of the Presidential candidates that were considered "Populists":

Andrew Jackson
William Jennings Bryan
George Wallace
Pat Buchanan
John Edwards

If you look at their respective campaigns, they pretty much all had a running theme. They were advocates for the "common man" or "the working class". They were going to take on the establishment, be it big business, special interest groups or Washington D.C., who they saw as being responsible for the problems that those individuals faced. It wasn't until Wallace and Buchanan where you started seeing the word "white" inserted before "working class". Of course, this was due to backlash against the civil rights movement and later immigration.
.

Thank you for the historical comparisons to remind us of the pedigree of this nonsense concept. If it is the case that 'white' was not inserted into the definition of populist in the past, I assume it is because non-white Americans were not really thought of as citizens. The rest of your post does rather illustrate my point that populism is a vacuous concept that is given 'shape and form' by the people who wish to manipulate public opinion for their own purposes rather than reflect it. Just as most Americans, other than the Government of the USA can spell words like 'attack', 'attacker', 'Denmark' and 'San Bernardino' so I believe most of them can tell the difference between a five year old boy and a terrorist, and don't need to be warned by their President or his press that the two are the same threat.

Another transient fact is that what 'interests' the people in one year might not be so interesting a year later. For example, Prohibition can be interpreted as a 'Populist' policy because it emerged from the agitation of religious groups who could summon the statistics to prove that alcohol was destroying the American family. It lasted from 1920 to 1933 and I will let you decide if and in what way it was effective or not -but by 1933 it was not a popular policy and the question remains -was this Populism in action if, on the one hand Prohibition emerged from 'the People' but not all of the people?

[broncofan]

I am not sure to what extent this additional idea is covered by the word populism, but Trump is also a confidence man and a demagogue. The average informed viewer might watch a debate and be able to distinguish a few policy proposals between candidates, but the mass of uninformed viewers will listen to less tangible things like tone, confidence, and buzzwords. This allows someone with very little real knowledge about how the economy works, about our country's history, and about the constitutional scope of executive power to present himself as an attractive candidate.

Most confidence men who look to rip off the average Joe are trying to sell their mark on their trustworthiness or integrity. Trump sells people on his competence and acumen as a businessman by making outlandish claims about what he'll do or what he's capable of. Even his promises lack the remotest specificity. He's gonna make things "great", he's gonna prevent someone "bad" from getting into the country, or such and such is "yuge".

He appeals to people because he demonizes the entire educated class, whether they're journalists or scientists or artists. But this tactic would not work if a core of mindless resentment did not already exist among the public. Beyond these observations, any other criticisms I have are specific and cannot be summarized, beginning with who he has appointed to heads of agencies, his lack of respect for an independent judiciary, his lack of respect for freedom of the press, his lack of understanding about why he should not even appear to use his office to enrich himself or his family, and his general vindictiveness towards anyone who challenges the many stupid things he proposes and says. It's a cold day when I wish our president were an ideological conservative who believed in everything I find simple-minded but who respected our traditions and the rule of law.