Reply #5: The author's logic is backward.

[Uncle Joe]

"In practice, populism almost always entails anger and resentment.

A combination of factors has the United States ripe for populist sentiments. The financial collapse which surfaced fully at the end of the Bush administration resulted in help to both the major financial firms and the people. The financial firms got $14 trillion dollars worth of bailouts. The people got $1.8 trillion in President Obama's stimulus package, much of which consisted of tax cuts for political favorites.

On a more basic level, the disparity in wealth shows that the top just 5% of the population controls 59% of the nations wealth. Include the next 5% and you find that 10% of the population controls 71% of the wealth. The parties and the media can trot out all the diversions they want, people know this and they're increasingly upset as the recession/depression bears down on the vast majority of citizens."

Anger and resentment entail populism, not the other way around.

The critical questions being.

Does the anger and resentment have a righteous basis?

Does Populism offer a logical, productive solution to the anger?

I believe the answer to both is yes, on many issues from health care, to dysfunctional, unsustainable income disparities, to legalizing or decriminalizing drugs, to for profit prisons and our world record breaking prison population, to ever increasing corporate supremacy over "We the People's Government and in turn over the people, to ignoring and downplaying the critical implications of Global Warming Climate Change and it's devastating consequences against the average American.

Thanks for the thread, Joanne.