Yves here. Most commentary on the Biden stimulus plan has focused on some of the programs or the overall level of spending, and not the structure and philosophy. This article describes why continuing a classic neoliberal approach is at best a band-aid.
The new Democratic administration is poised to make its first proud step in delivering on its electoral promise to build back (America) better: the successful adoption of a $1.9 trillion stimulus package, the main components of which are a third round of stimulus checks, a renewal of federal unemployment benefits, and a boost to the child tax credit, as well as funding for school reopenings and vaccinations. It will probably not include a federal minimum wage hike.
Yves here. It can’t be said often enough that the apparent success of the Capitol seizure came about because the occupiers pushed on an open door. The mob looked to be 5,000 tops, a number that should have been trivial to keep away or at worst, overwhelm. We’ll have a better idea soon of much muscle these Trump opponents have, although the 24/7 media panic has given them a big boost. However, if no more than 50,000 show up at the Inauguration, they are paper tigers, and it would take over 150,000 to get me concerned.
However, the authors equate Trump radicals with the working class, which strikes me as simplistic. Despite having a lower proportion of college graduates than Clinton/Biden voters, Trump voters have markedly higher incomes, in 2016, over $10,000 per household, a significant increment, particularly if you factor in that they are less well represented in high wage cities like New York. San Francisco, Boston, and Los Angeles. Recall, for instance, that Zip Tie Guy wa
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Back in July 2018, when the idea that led to the birth of the #rethinkingPopulism project was being fleshed out, we argued that, at a time when the ways we think about and practice politics were undergoing a profound transformation, and with populism, as a concept and political strategy, having acquired centre stage in these reconfigurations, we needed a rigorous and constructive debate on how we can develop an understanding of populism that retains a critical edge in intellectual and political terms.
Thin definitions of populism as an ideology proposed by Mudde and Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser, as a largely discursive and stylistic repertoire as Rogers Brubaker suggests, or as a political strategy as Kurt Weyland proposes, share an understanding of populism as characterized by “people-centrism” and a binary, antagonistic representation of society and politics, taking the concrete form of “anti-elitism.” Despite their differences, these approache
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由于新冠肺炎疫情打击，继近年出现的「美国衰落论」和「美国过度衰落论」的辩论后，美国近月又开始出现「痉挛论」（convulsionism）论述。本文尝试梳理美国社会正在经历的「道德痉挛」危机的历史轨迹和深层面向，进而探讨其文化根由，并研判未来发展。
10月初，美国《大西洋》（The Atlantic）杂志出版题为《美国正患有道德痉挛》（America Is Having a
Moral
Convulsion）的文章，剖析当前美国政治和制度信心危机的发展周期、不同面向和历史根由。作为结合历史社会学、心理学和政治学的跨科际理论，「道德痉挛论」指一个社会正经历着普遍性文化失序局面，导致社会撕裂、衝突，甚至内战。身处其中的民众因而对政府和各种现存制度极度不信任，使得国家和社会各领域陷于不断失控抽搐的状态。而且，由于国家和社会痉挛自我复原需