Plastic pitchforks for plastic populists with styrene souls: Thomas Frank on the teabaggers

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Here Come the Plastic Pitchforks Our latest populism is vague on the issues.By THOMAS FRANK

Unless it rains today, thousands of average people will stand up across the land, declare their mad-as-hell-ness. Look for folks to holler for lower estate taxes and a replacement for Sarbanes-Oxley. They will put on three-cornered hats, wave "don't tread on me" flags, and imagine that they are channeling the spirit of Tom Paine as they do their part to ease the troubles of the economy's winners.

And Fox News, which plans to cover the tea parties, will no doubt hail this plastic populism as the realest kind of social uprising, a movement that is the rightful expression of this year's discontents.

The tea-party movement began in February, triggered by the administration's mortgage plan, which aimed to rescue homeowners in danger of foreclosure, and which was the target of CNBC's Rick Santelli's much-televised ire. At a tea party I attended two months ago, speakers railed against the administration's stimulus package and defended deregulation and free markets. "Your Mortgage is Not My Problem," read one placard -- not really a slogan to rally the yeomanry of every Middlesex village and farm.

But then things changed. Thanks to the bonuses handed out a few weeks ago at AIG's Financial Products division, the public fell into the grip of a left-wing political malady that the commentariat quickly diagnosed as "populism," a word they often coupled with "mindless," "frenzy," and "fury."

It was a terrible moment. Civilization tottered. Pundits wept. "Capitalism is under siege, its future unclear," moaned Newsweek's Robert Samuelson. The Washington Post's Charles Krauthammer accused President Barack Obama of "trying to lead the mob" against AIG, risking the entire economy in the process.

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