My description of populism sounds trivializing because, well, populism is trivial and whimsical.

Populism doesn't necessarily work in the people's best interest because you know, sometimes people are wrong and it takes leadership, not reactive politicians to do what needs doing

Pure populism is pure democracy, we could all vote via text messaging and to hell with representative democracy.

Populism means Feed the beast with what it wants.

Let me rephrase that:

As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.

This was read on the Senate floor in 1796 as stated. The Treaty of Tripoly was written by George Washington. I would think he would know upon which this country was founded. The first people who came to America were fleeing persecution from a government that had a state religion.

God is mentioned in the constitution. This is because that at that time atheism was rare and socially "not done". It also states in the 1st of the Bill of Rights "Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion"

I do not want my government sponsering any religious credo....not Christianity, Judeism, Islam or the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Sometimes people are wrong but you seem to think that politicians are somehow right more often than other people? This is elitism and part of the problem. Politicians are people too. If elected officials show above average aptitude at anything, that thing would be fund raising.

Voters were meant to be well informed and today voters are misinformed, disinformed and anything but well informed and this is by design. The same can be said of our representatives in many cases.

Populism can work but it can also be corrupted, same as our current system is.

And once again Populism doesn't mean giving people everything they want, it means making the people's best interests the number one priority.

You're right. Let's get rid of the government and run things by popular vote. It would work for courts of law and regulation, too. Just text message the citizens and let them vote on things. Save a lot of money.

B

You are really something. All of your posts demanding evidence and ridiculing people for tin-hat conspiracies and then u post something like this that is a total fallacy.

There would be no change necessary to our system for it to be a populist organization other than to eliminate the subversion and corruption. Holding elected officials to their campaign promises would be a huge step toward populism. This gets back to my orginal post in this thread. If government people did not exploit their positions and did what they were elected or hired for, the people's best interests would be represented.

What 'is in the best interest' of one person is frequently not in the best interest of another. For example, its certainly in the best interest of a politician to establish social programs that create and foster dependency in the electorate to ensure future votes. Whether this approach is in the 'best interest' of our country at large, or for that matter the people the programs are designed to "help", is certainly anything but clear.

Another example is our countries participation in the early stages of WW2 - most of the population was dead set against the US getting involved in the conflict but FDR correctly saw the lay of the landscape and did what he could to help the British. In this case populism would have created the wrong choice. There are many other examples where the purely popular decision would have been the wrong one.

Bot was trying to illustrate that populism taken to an extreme (like every citizen voting on every issue) might not be a desirable state of affairs.

Ever read Atlas Shrugged?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populism

Ever read the definition of the word?

I have read Atlas Shrugged but this thread didn't make me think of it until your post.

From Wikipedia:

And if pigs would fly, we could get a 12 gauge and hunt them. What's your point? Who is elected? A human being. You can never trust a human being not to get corrupt and do something for themselves. It is their nature. Plain and simple. Even if they start out pure as the driven snow, sooner or later they will get corrupted. If not, they cannot get anything done because they won't trade favors. Trading favors is what the problem is.

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After reading this thread I would have to say that after exploitation, ignorance and apathy would rank in the next two positions after exploitation.

You make make in good point in all of that other crap. People will trade favors but when the favors are not in the best interests of the citizens it is corruption. If the trade is along the lines of "you and your buddies can steal that billion and me and mine will steal this billion" then things are past explanations by human nature.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.preamble.html


Jeeze, it was a lot to lose without a fight. If you believe that a populist government is a bad thing you truly are a slave and you are your own overseer.

There can be no greater freedom than to be a slave only to your own mind. Thank you.

In a populist society you are the slave of the whims of the majority. That's an external control on the individual's mind by the whimsical nature of the average man.

Once again whimsy has no play in populism. Our country is designed as a populist system and was the most successful in history until corruption took over.

A populist system could be implemented in any form from a benevolent dicatator at one extreme to a participatory democracy at the other extreme. My worry with a participatory democracy is not whimsy but the brainwash influence of the media and we live with that anyway. Besides, people are apathetic on issues that matter anyway.

So, you are saying that corruption and subversion in our government are a good thing because otherwise we would be subjected to the horrors of populism?

If the will of the people is whimsy, to whose will are you saying we should be subjected?

How sad, this country is sunk. This brings images of rats raiding the larders on a sinking ship before they swim for it.

The argument you are making is rational and previously well-addressed by the Founding Fathers in the Federalist Papers.

If you read a bit further than the Preamble, you'll note that the Constitution reserves the power to legislate to a Congress of elected representatives and Senators. Like most everything else in the Constitution, this was done only after careful thought and consideration. Actually, you point out one good reason it was done this way: