Buzz Buzz Buzz
Don’t you just hate it when the news media latches onto a new word and then beats it like a drum until all the meaning has been whipped out of it?
You can’t swing a cat in a TV newsroom, anchor desk or print media press room without hitting someone using the new buzzword “Populist”. It is simply all the rage. The country was anxiously waiting for another buzzword that could fit into just about every news story and fortunately, with the election of Scott Brown in Massachusetts, we have found one.
And just in time too. Most of our old buzzwords and catch phrases have died by the wayside. Global warming is now timidly called climate change, alternative energy and recycling is now green anything and everything, the phrase war on terror has been stricken entirely from our speech and the word terrorist has been replaced by lone radical, the term unilateral is no longer uttered even when the new president unilaterally chooses to send an additional 40,000 American troops to Afghanistan, healthcare now means insurance and change equates to socialism.
Be assured that every candidate from either party is going to present himself as a populist. The real key will be once they do will anybody ask them to define what that means.
The list of suddenly populist candidates is wide and varied. California liberal Democrat and ex Linda Ronstadt sweetie pie Jerry Brown is said to be looking to regain the governor’s job in that liberally doomed and union controlled state and is already claiming some newfound populist roots in his possible run against the likely Republican candidate, mega-millionaire and former CEO and founder of eBay Meg Whitman. Even Barack Obama, the Chosen One, is going to attempt to shed his elitist persona and present a new populist personality.
The fact that Jerry Brown or Barack Obama or any of the Democrats currently controlling the reins of Congress would even attempt to deceive the voting public into believing them to be pragmatic populists is stunning in its audacity and laughable in its absurdity. It only goes to show how little these liberals in populist’s clothing know about the definition of populism and moreover how very little they think of the intellect of the voting public.
The definition of a populist is a member of a political party claiming to represent the common people. It dates back in this country to the 1890’s when the Populist Party was formed to mainly address agrarian issues. The part the Democrats miss is that a populist represents the interests of the people but does not dictate to the people what those interests should be. A populist listens, a liberal Democrat, not so much.
Literally hundreds of millions of dollars are about to be spent by Democrats in an attempt to keep their coveted seat in the hallowed Halls of Congress. Without a doubt, most of those seeking reelection will be spending heavily on recasting their image in a populist mold. Even those that need not take up the populist banner will do so in an effort to show a unified and populist Democratic front. The Pennsylvania Avenue Messiah will become the lead populist in an attempt to rally the political troops and abate at least some of the political damage caused by his dismal failures thus far.
I believe this will be exactly the wrong strategy for these out of control tax and spend liberals to take as it will do nothing but alienate their liberal base and anger real conservative populists by attempting to insult their intelligence. The fact that Democrats explain away the loss of the Massachusetts US Senate seat to Scott Brown as being caused by voters still being upset with the Bush administration shows how truly clueless they are about the nation’s outrage as displayed by groups like the Tea Party movement and other true conservative populist believers.
It will be up to the voters in November to decide if we are going to buy the new and improved populist Democrat Party or if we are going to send the members of this faux-populist party packing.
Just the thought of that makes this old populist proud.
