What the heck is a Populist?

I've never thought about this word much until it started coming up in Edwards and Huckabees campaigns.

Then this morning there is this diary making reference that a populist is the new conservative:

Run For Your Lives, Conservatives – the Populists Are Coming To Get You!

Then this statement popped out at me:

"..populism is a useful and healthy passion when aimed at the liberal elite.

That made me curious so I looked up some definitions:

Populism is the use of discourses, ideas or policies which aim to appeal to "the people" by setting up a dichotomy between "the people" and "the elite". This populist appeal to "the people" has often been associated with an emotional appeal to identities, including national, class, ethnic and regional ones. Populism may involve either a political philosophy urging social and political system changes and/or a rhetorical style, deployed by members of the political class competing for advantage within the existing regime.
What is a Populist?

I always thought about celebrities when I heard the word populist, as in popular, in the past.

But in my way of thinking I think the Populist term in this election cycle has more to do with getting the 'christian mantra' out of the political conversation because that word has become so divisive. Haven't heard much about Christian Conservatives this time around and think that silence is notable, almost Rove-able.

It especially makes sense when I think about Republican Huckabee using the Populist label. But is that also why Democratic Edwards is being labelled with it?

Just curious and wondering out loud.

•  tips

  "Time is for careful people, not passionate ones"

  by roseeriter on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:10:03 AM PDT

  •  people can be passionate and careful

    it is because I am passionate about certain issues, such as the Bill of Rights, that I am careful about how I express things and how I act in certain situations, because I don't wish to undercut the Bill of Rights.  I don't see the two as a dichotomy.

    by teacherken on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:24:14 AM PDT

    •  I love passion but honesty more- I don't like

      cloaks and that's how I see the label Populist being used. But then I think a bit different than most.

      "Time is for careful people, not passionate ones"

      by roseeriter on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:30:01 AM PDT

      •  Yes, but it's a label that the media is using

        in order to sour people on Edwards. Here's a candidate who wants to put an end to the monied interests in D.C. controlling the debate and writing the legislation and so the media (bought and paid for by those same corporate interests) wishes to marginalize him and slap him with a negative label.

        by Newzie on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:53:47 AM PDT

        •  The MSM label- is what I'm thinking also

          which is why I think its Rovian in nature for getting the 'christian' word out of the conversation.

          When Bush was running that's all we heard was christian this christian that and it pitted the real christians from the phonier ones.

          So its not necessarily a bad thing, but I think populism=christians in this election cycle.

          "Time is for careful people, not passionate ones"

          by roseeriter on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 07:06:51 AM PDT

•  Populism

  ...hasn't been a part of Democratic politics for over 100 years (back to Wm. J. Bryant). It is almost always a bad thing, associated with scapegoating of immigrants and other groups, isolationism and nativism. It's a much better fit in the modern Republican Party. Some in the anti-globalist left (never really a pert of Democratic politics) adopted these positions in the 1990s. Thus we see throwbacks like the John Birch Society alongside far left groups protesting the "North American Union" etc.

  I think that candidates attempting to ride a populist wave are basically going for the "angry white man" vote of Ross Perot.

  by jmknapp on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:22:57 AM PDT

  •  (Raises hand)

    Anti-Globalist Left here.

    :)

    by LithiumCola on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:52:11 AM PDT

  •  Huey Long of Louisiana too

    The Kingfish and the subject of "All the King's Men."

    http://en.wikipedia.org/...

    by deben on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:55:46 AM PDT

    •  But not a successful national politician

      There's always the occasional populist demagogue here and there. I think Father Coughlin was nominally a Democrat (he supported FDR in 1932). He had quite a following on the radio at least. Here's a good quote:

      "The great betrayer and liar, Franklin D. Roosevelt, who promised to drive the money changers from the temple, had succeeded [only] in driving the farmers from their homesteads and the citizens from their homes in the cities. . . I ask you to purge the man who claims to be a Democrat, from the Democratic Party, and I mean Franklin Double-Crossing Roosevelt."

      Maybe a lot of his rhetoric could be used in anti-Clinton screeds.

      by jmknapp on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:19:48 AM PDT

      •  Long is the archetypal populist for me

        I did a study a long time ago of liberalism and conservatism and this guy was the most problematic for me to place in the spectrum.  He took on every power, especially the oil companies, which were running Louisiana politics.  He also took on Franklin Roosevelt.  And his constituents dearly loved the whole mess, until somebody assassinated him.

        by deben on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:41:33 AM PDT

      •  Maybe, but it seems to me that

        any definition of "populism" as a kind of perennial philosophy that excludes FDR and LBJ is so historically-bound and uninformative as to be useless. What were FDR and LBJ really, then? They thought of themselves as liberals or in the progressive tradition of the early 20th century, but 40-70 years later what would those words mean? That they'd be yuppie, free-trade New Democrats? I doubt it. What they did, though they didn't use W.J. Bryant/Huey Long terms, is now obviously despised by the right and much of the affluent center as outright socialism. Buchanan and Paul and Huckabee cannot be true populists, because they will really do nothing to curb the power of corporations or the Federalist Society fetish of Property Rights (Paul at least talks about withdrawing from imperial war and ending corporate subsidies but he's not really believable - what would he do about Hugo Chavez, for example?).

        There is nothing racist or nativist about what at least Edwards wants to do (I think Obama just might too and Hillary, with her Eleanor Roosevelt thing, might end up wanting to be FDR-lite after all - who knows what's going to be politically necessary as well as conscionable during the economy of 2009?). In fact Edwards follows in the tradition of LBJ and both Roosevelts. If, similarly using an historical association as an essential definition, modern liberalism/progressivism has for now become too enmeshed in  neoliberal economics to speak to the needs of people who still have nominally sovereign nations with representative democracy where they get to vote, then populism seems like a pretty good word.

        by jlb1972 on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:47:31 AM PDT

  •  I'm a populist

    To me a populist supports working families instead of big corporations. I'm not a globalist either. Ross Perot was also right on NAFTA.

    by John Lane on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 07:23:39 AM PDT

  •  Populism is fine as long as it is tempered

    and largely controlled to keep it from the inevitable excesses by PROGRESSIVES. There are a lot of things about populism that make my skin crawl, not the least of which is the idea the government can not only do everything for us with only taxing the rich, blah blah. There are no free lunches regardless of what populists would tell you. IMO Edwards biggest mistake is pushing populism not progressivism.

    by snackdoodle on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 09:05:20 AM PDT

•  I tend not to buy into labels.

  The msm can label all they want. People are angry and their labels will not work, this year.

  by Owllwoman on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:29:11 AM PDT

•  The way the word gets used,

  and the reason the Republican Machine hates Huckabee, is that "populist" candidates tend to want to "redistribute wealth" downwards, away from the rich and to the poor.

  So for example here's Time Magazine from before the Iowa Causus:

  But as Huckabee now mounts his closing argument for the Iowa caucuses, he has moved full bore into the rhetoric of economic populism. "I am out to change the Republican Party. It needs changing. It needs to be inclusive of all those people across America for whom this party should stand," he said Sunday, on CBS's Face The Nation. On the trail, he speaks regularly of challenging the "Washington to Wall Street power axis." He frankly acknowledges the suffering of the stagnating middle class, and even offers up government as a part of the solution. "The President ought to be aware that the people struggle," he said in Muscatine on Friday morning. "He ought to be aware every time a decision is made — whether [or not] it's to raise taxes — how it's going to hurt the family out there, who can barely pay the grocery bill as it is."

  As a result of this, the Christian Conservative elite hates Huckabee as much as the Fiscal Conservative Elite.  New York Times:

  Huckabee Splits Young Evangelicals and Old Guard

  By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
  Published: January 13, 2008
  WASHINGTON — Much of the national leadership of the Christian conservative movement has turned a cold shoulder to the Republican presidential campaign of Mike Huckabee, wary of his populist approach to economic issues and his criticism of the Bush administration’s foreign policy. But that has only fired up Brett and Alex Harris.

  -- snip --

  "To the extent that Governor Huckabee succeeds in advancing this new agenda that combines cultural conservatism with an economic and foreign affairs populism," Mr. Green said, "it could undermine the existing Christian conservative political leaders and their organizations."

  -- snip --

  "Some of my Christian friends, just like some of my not-so-Christian friends, have become a little too Washingtonian," said Rick Scarborough, an aspiring successor to the previous generation of conservative Christian leaders. He recently argued that his allies were wrong to balk at Mr. Huckabee’s turn toward environmentalism and "social justice."

  "Can you imagine Jesus ignoring the plight of the disenfranchised and downtrodden while going after the abortionist?" Mr. Scarborough wrote on the conservative Web site WorldNetDaily.com.

  by LithiumCola on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:31:10 AM PDT

  •  Huck is the wedge that shows...

    ... the gap between corporate values and Christian values. He could split that alliance, if we're lucky.

    hink

    by MrHinkyDink on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:40:49 AM PDT

    •  The leadership of the Christian right

      is afraid of him, too; not just the traditional Fiscal Conservative elite.  He's a threat to the leadership of the Christian Right because their whole schtick is they can deliver the Christian vote to candidates favored by the Fiscal Conservatives . . . that is, the Republican Machine.

      Huckabee's campaign is therefore a dire threat to Pat Robinson and his ilk.

      So we get posts like this by a guy named David Limbaugh at World Net Daily (which I won't link to):

      Christian conservatives: Beware of Huckabee

      Posted: December 14, 2007
      1:00 a.m. Eastern

      -- snip --

      Christian conservatives must promote other conservative principles, without which this nation would never have flourished, much less been the freest, strongest and noblest nation in world history.

      We must redouble our commitment to free enterprise and fierce opposition to statism, which will destroy the spirit and reality of liberty as surely as abortion destroys babies in the womb. We must defend our borders, safeguard our national security, promote the unique American culture, shrink government spending and regulation, and reduce the federal tax burden.

      That's pretty transparent.  If the Christian Right starts to wake up to the fact that they're being used to funnel money upward, they might start to cause a serious problem for the Fiscal Republican bank accounts.

      by LithiumCola on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:47:23 AM PDT

      •  Oh no, another Limbaugh!

        Christian conservatives must promote other conservative principles,

        Stop right there, Limbaugh! I would think Christian conservatives must promote their Christian values. That's why "Christian" comes before "Conservative."

        hink

        by MrHinkyDink on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:59:04 AM PDT

•  christian conervatives

  Far from being absent or silent, are pretty solidly behind Mike Huckabee.  Which is why the MSM isn't talking about them.

  Be afraid - they didn't just go away.

  And by the way, I define a populist as someone who very specifically puts the interests of the people ahead of the interests of corporations.

  by ThirstyGator on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:41:46 AM PDT

•  John Edwards' message is not calling

  for a redistribution of wealth. His message is more philosophical as well as political.  The middle class is disappearing in the US, and corporate America is in control and is responsible for the disappearance of the middle class.  He is saying Just give the middle and working class their fair share - The people who work in the mills are as valuable as the people who own the mills.

  Corporate America wants Hillary Clinton because she is beholding to them, will accept Obama because he will work with them, and Edwards scares the pants off them.  

  by JFinNe on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:49:31 AM PDT

  •  I would certainly hope that Edwards's message

    is about redistributing wealth.  Wealth is being distributed as it is, in the wrong direction, so a "re-" seems to be in order.  The same applies to all the candidates on the Dem ticket.

    I don't get how the phrase "re-distribute wealth" got to be so anethema -- as if wealth isn't "distributed" in the first place.  I suppose it has to do with the myth that the "market" does some kind of "fair distribution" and anything else is cheating.

    But that's a myth, as I say.  It's not as though ADM got to be a huge corporation by "playing fair in a market".  Or any pharmecutical giant.  And so on.

    by LithiumCola on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 05:55:49 AM PDT

    •  It's the imagery

      When you say "redistribute," people imagine a smaller paycheck for them and a larger one for the deadbeat down the street.

      Not that I agree with that, mind you, but there is an image behind it and it's not a good one.

      I hate that the left has utterly failed to fight a decent battle when it comes to word games with the right.

      by BoiseBlue on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:05:02 AM PDT

    •  That's exactly it -

      the myth that the "market" does some kind of "fair distribution" and anything else is cheating

      In its heyday Enron glorified the "free market" as the true expression of nature blah blah, but what they essentially did was buy politicians to create regulations that only they were positioned to meet. (As Molly Ivins said, Texas is  a place where the rich play with public money.) There's no difference between the  Enron episode and the once-vilified legislatures of the Gilded Age that were entirely owned by the railroad magnates who took all the credit for "building the nation."

      by jlb1972 on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 07:08:58 AM PDT

•  WTH?

  That the heck is a neocon?  Could one use neocon and neo-fascist interchangeably?

  What the heck is a social conservative?  Does social conservative mean devoutly religious?

  Are neocon and social conservative simply nice names for ugly political qualities?

  Let's call them by names that represent what these people really represent.  Let's not sugar coat these ideologies.

  by nofltwlt on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:03:57 AM PDT

•  Populist=unloyal subjects of the divine elite n/t

  by java4every1 on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:23:01 AM PDT

•  the historical roots of the term go back

  to the People's or Populist Party of the 1890s--whom, it should be noted, were to the left of the Dem party on economic issues.  But the Dems successfully co-opted the Pops at the national level, and the white supremacist Dem party killed them at the state level in the South.

  "Populist" was made a pejorative by the opponents of the Populist party--think the Republican party and its economic interests, and conservative Dems.

  In the 1950s--in part under the influence of the Cold War and as a backlash against fascism--Richard Hofstadter and other historians revised historical understandings of the Populist party of the 1890s.  They viewed the Pops not as authentic and committed American radicals with a clear and meaningful program, but as dangerous, anti-Semitic looneys whose appeal to the people was more rhetorical and anger-filled than substantive.  

  It's that latter view of the Pops and of "populism" that seems to be reflected in that blockquoted passage.

  by Hprof on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:35:20 AM PDT

•  Populism is ...

  as your definition suggests a political idea that claims the people (the populous) is threatened by some type of elite group.

  Thus, Gore's message in 2000 "the people vs. the powerful" was described as "populist."

  Edwards message that the people are threatened by corporations is another version of this.

  But the right wing has also used populist rhetoric when it suggest the people are threatened by a "secular elite."

  Reaganonomics used populist rhetoric.

  In modern politics, populism is more descriptive than it is ideological.  Virtually any political idea can use populist rhetoric to sell its message.

  Many people don't like populist rhetoric because it always suggests there's an enemy of the people.

  by Moresby on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:40:44 AM PDT

•  Webster's.

  
  

  populist
  
  

  Pronunciation: \ˈpä-pyə-list\
  Function: noun
  Etymology: Latin populus the people
  Date: 1892
  
  

  1. a member of a political party claiming to represent the common people; especially often capitalized : a member of a United States political party formed in 1891 primarily to represent agrarian interests and to advocate the free coinage of silver and government control of monopolies
     
     

  2. a believer in the rights, wisdom, or virtues of the common people

  
  

  by two roads on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 06:52:51 AM PDT

  •  two roads - that's good n/t

    by Abra Crabcakeya on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 08:51:11 AM PDT

•  Old def: economic liberal, social conservative

  Once upon a time "populist" was used to represent a fourth point on the liberal-conservative-libertarian compass.

  By this (old) definition, a populist was sort of the inverse of a libertarian. Classic populists would have favored the current Repub anti-choice and anti-gay thinking, for instance, but they would favor government regulation and intervention in the economy, a progresive tax structure that requires the rich to pay their share, and quite possibly single-payer health care.

  I find it hard to believe that the current Republican party would allow a real populist to survive within it, and I certainly don't think Huckabee is one, though he'd like to pretend to be.

  by rodentrancher on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 07:23:59 AM PDT

  •  Not really originally social conservative

    The Knights of Labor, one of the key groups that founded Populism, was one of the most inclusive organizations of that time, with both black and women members.      

    It was primarily a movement for economic justice and government regulation of big business.  While I'm sure there were some populists with socially conservative views, they certainly weren't unusually so for the time period.

    It seems to me establishment opinion makers have been trying to dilute the true and intended meaning of the term since it was invented.  

    by acerimusdux on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 08:18:40 AM PDT

•  Populist

  It has a very specific meaning, especially if you capitalize it.  That goes to the original meaning of the word.  The earliest usage is around 1892, "the Peoples Party" where it basically means a grassroots campaign of collective action, to restore economic fairness and reform government.

  The Populist movement arose out of agrarian groups such as the grange and the Farmers Alliance.  Northeastern bankers who insisted the nation stay on the gold standard had caused 20 years of deflation, beginning with the panic of 1873, bankrupting a lot of farmers who had to pay off loans on their land in more costly dollars while getting less for their crops.

  Finally these farmers groups and labor groups like the Knights of Labor organized, and joined together to form the People's Party.  In addition to ending the gold standard, they called for a graduated income tax, direct election of Senators, civil service reform, a working day of eight hours and Government control of all railroads, telegraphs, and telephones.

  After William Jennings Bryan was nominated in 1896 by the Democrats, the Populist (People's) Party largely broke up, but a natural successor emerged when Teddy Roosevelt broke off from the Republicans to in the Progressive Party of 1912, which added to the agenda women's suffrage, workers compensation, social welfare legislation, labor protections, and requiring industry to provide health insurance.

  by acerimusdux on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 07:53:48 AM PDT

•  To me , means what acerimusdux said - plus

  The usual usages of the labels "conservative " and liberal" bear almost no discernible relationship with the words as they have been part of standard English for a couple or more hundred years.
  Only defs currently in vogue that are ,IMO ,other than nonsense  - conservative : resistant to change . liberal : open to change in ways of doing things. I think of myself as liberal in thought and philosophy to the point of radicalism . Tempered by a conservatism in personal behavior to the point of Being An Old Fart.
     If you want to do it - go ahead , just don't wake me up at 2:00 AM or make our trees die because of what you want to try out. (But if your only reason to do it is to pile up a lot of money - hell no , I'll fight you about that )

  by Abra Crabcakeya on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 08:48:39 AM PDT

  •  From one old fart to another LOL!

    "I think of myself as liberal in thought and philosophy to the point of radicalism . Tempered by a conservatism in personal behavior to the point of Being An Old Fart."

    I agree with that statement.:-)
    Peace

    "Time is for careful people, not passionate ones"

    by roseeriter on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 09:06:27 AM PDT

    •  Found a book of yours -

      at the moment in time I was ready to lead the other peasants up to the Books-A-Million castle with pitchforks and torches , LOL! So , I ddn't order it , but will harrass our town's library into putting it on the shelf. They do a much better job than me at spreading a book around - postage kinda high. (helps that I write them a check almost every month........)
      And Peace Unto You As well , Red-Headed Stranger.

      by Abra Crabcakeya on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 09:17:32 AM PDT

      •  Cool. I got them in most of NHs libraries

        my daughter is a librarian so that helped LOL!

        Have a great day!

        "Time is for careful people, not passionate ones"

        by roseeriter on Sun Jan 13, 2008 at 09:21:01 AM PDT