12 years ago, it was Kohl whom my 15 year old self found to be a starting point for new breed of politicians and the trend of "more populism with each election" that lasted to this day
I found a startling continuity in electoral platforms of Kohl-Chirac-Sarco. They had one thing in common: they did not really had anything constituing a political platform. They all had slight populist tones in their campaigns, well every politician have these, but what was more important to note is that they really had nothing else besides very weak, generic, politically-amorphous "we will spend more on this, less on that la la la."
Basically, their message to the electorate was nothing more than their smiling faces on billboards, and a promise of "more free bacon after you elect me"
And this promise of "free bacon" was only getting more and more accepted.
And with time, Western political cultures degenerated to a point where anything, but a discourse of "what kind of free bacon you want this time" became irrelevant.
The moment this happened, the clique I call "ultrapopulists" rushed on to the forefront. I think that was well expected: if all buyers in a beer shop are pathologic alcoholics, it makes sense to just to sell the strongest, cheapest, unrefined booze you have. In other words: alcoholics do not come to a liquor store for a craft beer. And the same phenomenon is now happening in Western politics