How to Gain Populist Credibility Without Really Being Populist

I spent the weekend pulling weeds, playing golf and writing songs. But thank god, Digby was on the case.

He parses populism and progressivism, quotes other writers liberally, and helps you think about why the right has been more successful "in inflaming the populist impulse in America."

"They are not squeamish about using just those pathologies -- and only those pathologies [fascism, nativism, anti-intellectualism, persecution of unpopular minorities, exaltation of the mediocre, and romantic exaggeration of the wisdom and virtue of the masses] -- to gain populist credibility in spite of a blatant lack of populist policy."