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The Faux Meme of Populism
Author: Raine    Date: 02/11/2010 13:42:52

Since the weekend of the Tea Party convention the media has been beating a slow drum, repeating the meme that this is a Populist movement. We've heard claims they are angry at the banks, angry at wall street and angry at government. That is pretty populist right? They have a small problem though -- it's not populist at all. If history does indeed repeat itself, this could be dangerous.

Last week, Peter Beinart, associate professor of politics and journalism wrote an article about this movement and populism. He writes:
A populist is someone who champions ordinary folks against the privileged few. For the original Populists—the people who created the Populist Party in the late 19th century—the ordinary folks were farmers and workers and the privileged few were bankers and railroad owners. The goal was to redistribute power from the latter to the former. The Populists wanted a currency based upon silver, not gold, which would make it cheaper for farmers to borrow and less profitable for bankers to lend. They wanted to nationalize the railroads, telegraphs and telephones so corporations couldn’t charge ordinary folks extortionate rates. They wanted a progressive income tax, an eight-hour workday, and laws making it easier to join labor unions, so workers would have greater protections and greater pay. And they wanted guaranteed pensions for sailors and soldiers, a kind of precursor to Social Security.

And what was the mechanism for this redistribution of power from the privileged few to ordinary folks? The mechanism was government. It was government that would coin silver, nationalize the railroads, and institute the income tax, pensions and the eight-hour shift. As the Populist Party declared in its first platform, in 1892, “We believe that the power of government—in other words, of the people—should be expanded…as rapidly and as far as the good sense of an intelligent people and the teachings of experience shall justify, to the end that oppression, injustice and poverty shall eventually cease in the land.”
Anger is not populism. Having a woman who was paid a $100,000 speaking fee to rile up the masses is not populist. The Tea Partiers are not only opposed to bailing out the banks, they are opposed to regulating them as well. They want less government 'interference' with regards to Wall Street. They are certainly against progressives taxes.

Populists wanted to empower people by making this a more democratic country. They wanted to use government to more equally distribute the wealth in the United States. Tea Partiers believe the opposite; they don't believe that government can do that, an instead are in favor of disempowering our government. IF they succeed, they are actually going to empower the monied interests they claim to rail against. That's quite the opposite of populism, and the opposite of what they think they are doing by being a member of the Tea Party.

So you see, once again the Media is misleading everyone into believing a false meme. It's time for the left to take back a political movement that has always been a progressive idea. It's time for people to start calling the media out on this.

If it's not populism, then what is it? Sadly, it's much closer to what happened in Italy
One view is that fascism in Italy was a response to the perceived failings of democracy, liberalism and Marxism, which were seen as either favouring individualism or internationalism at the expense of the nation. Fascism presented itself as a radical nationalist alternative to Bolshevism. It nevertheless incorporated aspects of Bolshevism, such as the single-party state, elite rule over the masses, and appeals to the proletariat. At a time when war veterans were facing unemployment and other economic problems, fascists promoted a form of collectivism, calling for the end of bourgeois individualism, as well as opposing Marxism for its anti-nationalism and perceived anti-patriotism. [...]

Disillusionment with liberalism deepened with the 1929 stock market crash and the Great Depression. Alfredo Rocco, Benito Mussolini and Giovanni Gentile justified fascism as answering a need for purpose in an absurd world.
I try not to use the word fascism, as it's very inflammatory during these political times, but I think in this case, it is warranted from a historical point of view. What is happening with the Tea Party movement may or may not be exactly the same as what happened in Italy, but there certainly are comparisons to be drawn. People are genuinely angry, and monied interests have seized upon that for their own personal gain.

It's easy to go after Sarah Palin, but the real problem isn't her, it's what people think she represents.

The problem is that whether they know it or not, people are being led down a path that is against their own self interests. The media is more than happy to help them along. That can become a very dangerous thing. History has shown us that time and time again.

It's simply not populism. Don't get fooled again.

and
Raine

 

24 comments (Latest Comment: 02/12/2010 01:07:04 by livingonli)
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