Populism is just a silly term made up by losers. Seriously. Our system is designed to be "populist". It's designed so the guy with the popular beliefs of our society gets elected and put in charge. It's literally SUPPOSED to be that way. Putting "ism" behind a word is supposed to make it sound bad. It works.
America has a hybrid form of government, based on the template set forth by Cicero in "De Republica". Cicero agreed with Plato and Aristotle that there were 3 basic forms of government: Monarchy, aristocracy and republic. These three decayed and had corrupt forms: namely, tyranny, oligarchy and democracy. Cicero said that, to keep the best aspects of all three (and to mitigate their worst aspects) it might be good to create a hybrid form of government, composed of all three . . . with a President [representing monarchy], a senate [representing aristocracy] and a House of Representatives [representing republic].
The Founding Fathers in America followed this recipe.
Of the three branches, only the House of Representatives had people DIRECTLY voting for the politician. (The House of Representatives represented the common man.)The other two [senate and President] had a two-tier system, whereby the politicians were installed by wiser minds. In the senate the people voted for the state legislators and the state legislators installed the senator. Likewise, with the Presidency, where the people voted for the electors and the ELECTORS chose the President.
Senators and the President were supposed to be somewhat removed from the common man, due to the common man's lack of knowledge regarding political science. Senate and the Presidency were more aristocratic in nature, with the representatives removed somewhat from politics (like Supreme Court Justices who are not directly elected, to tamp down on political conflicts of interest).
So populism was very limited in our Constitutional system, with only the House of Representatives being given over to "the people". The other two branches mitigated the excesses of the House by having men of higher stature in those positions.
In fact [to go by what John Stuart Mill said in 1861] the House was just a tack-on to prevent revolution. It was an afterthought to give the poor SOME say . . . but not much.
The adults were supposed to be in the senate and White House, to counteract the wild extravagances of the common people [who would just try to vote themselves money from the Treasury through welfare schemes].
That's the difference between a democracy and a republic. In a democracy, whatever is popular is implemented. (Like how candy is always more popular than medicine.) In a republic, it's not what's popular that counts, but what's right.
A democracy exists by mob rule and cares nothing for individual rights. Only the collective matters. Whereas, in a republic, the mob counts for nothing, and the rights of the individual are protected.
All things considered, I prefer a republic to a democracy. Like Plato, Aristotle and Cicero, I consider a democracy the corrupt form of a republic. (Sadly, in America, we already degraded from a republic into a democracy. And we went bankrupt because of it. And that's why we're now living through a coup where an oligarchy is taking over. This always happens in the cycle. Plato said, "Democracy is the last stage before a dictatorship.) Take a look at the District of Columbia, with razor wire and barricades around it. This is a coup that happened because the wealthy were pissed off at the democracy that had previously run the nation's finances into the ground.
I leave you with a quote from Alexander Fraser-Tytler: "A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship".
Choosing representative government, more importantly, the whole idea behind freedom of choice for anything goes all the way back to biblical days. Before Cicero, Aristotle, and the like. The founding fathers born from the quakers before them drew from Biblical principles in building our government and constitution. Quote ancient Greeks all you want the principles you speak of came before them. God commanded His people to choose leaders and is the ultimate giver of freedom of choice. Read your Bible and you will learn the real source for many things in history. God loves us so much He gives us the freedom to choose and follow Him or not. His gift, your choice, and your consequence as the result of your choice.
Ancient Israel never developed a republic. They didn't even have a word for one. (They had kitarchy: i.e., rule by judges, and later monarchy. After that, they settled into theocracy.)
With all due respect, to attribute our system of government to them is as anachronistic as trying to attribute Calculus to them, or the aqueduct.
Read the Bible in vain to find out about a system of government like ours. Read Cicero's "De Republica," by contrast, and you will see an exact blueprint.
By the way, just as our political ideas were shaped by him, our entire educational system was also based on Cicero's reforms. Of the 10 grades they had in school when the Founding Fathers attended class, 8 of them centered on the teaching of Cicero as the main curriculum. His influence on their thinking cannot be overestimated. See a lecture on Cicero here, to see what I'm talking about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rswj2AvC1Xk
Populism is just a silly term made up by losers. Seriously. Our system is designed to be "populist". It's designed so the guy with the popular beliefs of our society gets elected and put in charge. It's literally SUPPOSED to be that way. Putting "ism" behind a word is supposed to make it sound bad. It works.
America has a hybrid form of government, based on the template set forth by Cicero in "De Republica". Cicero agreed with Plato and Aristotle that there were 3 basic forms of government: Monarchy, aristocracy and republic. These three decayed and had corrupt forms: namely, tyranny, oligarchy and democracy. Cicero said that, to keep the best aspects of all three (and to mitigate their worst aspects) it might be good to create a hybrid form of government, composed of all three . . . with a President [representing monarchy], a senate [representing aristocracy] and a House of Representatives [representing republic].
The Founding Fathers in America followed this recipe.
Of the three branches, only the House of Representatives had people DIRECTLY voting for the politician. (The House of Representatives represented the common man.)The other two [senate and President] had a two-tier system, whereby the politicians were installed by wiser minds. In the senate the people voted for the state legislators and the state legislators installed the senator. Likewise, with the Presidency, where the people voted for the electors and the ELECTORS chose the President.
Senators and the President were supposed to be somewhat removed from the common man, due to the common man's lack of knowledge regarding political science. Senate and the Presidency were more aristocratic in nature, with the representatives removed somewhat from politics (like Supreme Court Justices who are not directly elected, to tamp down on political conflicts of interest).
So populism was very limited in our Constitutional system, with only the House of Representatives being given over to "the people". The other two branches mitigated the excesses of the House by having men of higher stature in those positions.
In fact [to go by what John Stuart Mill said in 1861] the House was just a tack-on to prevent revolution. It was an afterthought to give the poor SOME say . . . but not much.
The adults were supposed to be in the senate and White House, to counteract the wild extravagances of the common people [who would just try to vote themselves money from the Treasury through welfare schemes].
That's the difference between a democracy and a republic. In a democracy, whatever is popular is implemented. (Like how candy is always more popular than medicine.) In a republic, it's not what's popular that counts, but what's right.
A democracy exists by mob rule and cares nothing for individual rights. Only the collective matters. Whereas, in a republic, the mob counts for nothing, and the rights of the individual are protected.
All things considered, I prefer a republic to a democracy. Like Plato, Aristotle and Cicero, I consider a democracy the corrupt form of a republic. (Sadly, in America, we already degraded from a republic into a democracy. And we went bankrupt because of it. And that's why we're now living through a coup where an oligarchy is taking over. This always happens in the cycle. Plato said, "Democracy is the last stage before a dictatorship.) Take a look at the District of Columbia, with razor wire and barricades around it. This is a coup that happened because the wealthy were pissed off at the democracy that had previously run the nation's finances into the ground.
I leave you with a quote from Alexander Fraser-Tytler: "A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship".
Choosing representative government, more importantly, the whole idea behind freedom of choice for anything goes all the way back to biblical days. Before Cicero, Aristotle, and the like. The founding fathers born from the quakers before them drew from Biblical principles in building our government and constitution. Quote ancient Greeks all you want the principles you speak of came before them. God commanded His people to choose leaders and is the ultimate giver of freedom of choice. Read your Bible and you will learn the real source for many things in history. God loves us so much He gives us the freedom to choose and follow Him or not. His gift, your choice, and your consequence as the result of your choice.
Ancient Israel never developed a republic. They didn't even have a word for one. (They had kitarchy: i.e., rule by judges, and later monarchy. After that, they settled into theocracy.)
With all due respect, to attribute our system of government to them is as anachronistic as trying to attribute Calculus to them, or the aqueduct.
Read the Bible in vain to find out about a system of government like ours. Read Cicero's "De Republica," by contrast, and you will see an exact blueprint.
By the way, just as our political ideas were shaped by him, our entire educational system was also based on Cicero's reforms. Of the 10 grades they had in school when the Founding Fathers attended class, 8 of them centered on the teaching of Cicero as the main curriculum. His influence on their thinking cannot be overestimated. See a lecture on Cicero here, to see what I'm talking about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rswj2AvC1Xk