Republicans: are you worried about populism plaguing the party
- Thread starter UCFhonors
- Start date
As opposed to statism? Not at all. As long as the populist movement is more in line with the american revolution than the french revolution I think its a good thing. There needs to be some balance and thats been lacking for most of the last 100 years.
Both parties lean statist, which is natural in a republic. There is a ruling faction of the party and they tend to secure and perpetuate their power. Last cycle, the statists in the democrat party used their power to keep the populists in check (sanders vs Clinton). The republicans tried but the populists ended up being enough in number to get trump nominated. It was the people vs. the establishment.
Populism can be a good thing when its goal is to increase liberty but bad when it used for majority rule authoritarianism. Its just as easy for 51% to take away the rights of others as it is for a dictator. Thats why we dont have a direct democracy.
I've been thinking about this topic over the last few days because of the several actions of trump that have the left up in arms. My sensibilities tell me that the only way that trump will be unseated in 2020 is if a comparable populist movement emerges in the democrat party. Im not sure that this is possible. Maybe in 20 years, due to the socialist nature of Sanders and how his message resonated with 18-25 year olds.
On the contrary, populism is helping to save it. It took a torpedo since Trump cucked & bombed Syria etc.
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