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Comment by basch | Hacker News Reader

>Instead we have one that puts the worst of human foibles on full display

How did we get here? What drove the worldwide populist uprising? It's not like this event was unique to the USA, it happened all around the world, near simultaneously.

Did people get left behind by globalism and a few influential people in the limelight (Wall Street, Hollywood in America)? Politics started speaking towards a narrower and narrower sect of the populations, confusing the loudest for the most. Or was it hate weaponized by a different elite, who themselves felt they were being left behind? Sort of a chicken and the egg.

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> What drove the worldwide populist uprising?

In America, it's easy to see why, if you're actually willing to pay attention to the complaints of the white working class. They are tired of being exploited for tax money while not receiving anywhere near the entitlements of other groups, tired of not being officially in the civil rights legislation, tired of their communities being flooded with foreigners that don't share their values, and tired of being replaced. Opiate crisis, brain-drain taking all the youth away from small towns, Walmart destroying Main Street, and other phenomena have combined to make much of America a desolate shadow of its former glory.

A lot of this is the direct outcome of policy decisions nobody agreed to. Nobody would have agreed to the 1965 Hart-Cellar act if they had known that the result would be the end of American culture as they knew it.

Such an uprising was inevitable and it will continue to get more strident as long as the actual concerns of these people are brushed off or claimed to be offensive concepts. It's not a matter of being "left behind", it's a matter of being replaced.

All of the above. I would add a breakdown of local community institutions - churches/temples/mosques, fraternal clubs, unions, etc., and the switch to online "communities" with no real human contact.

And the pandemic didn't make that better. "No human contact" is maybe the toughest part of sheltering in place for many people.

I'm not sure why this comment is downvoted considering how many references I've seen to "Bowling Alone" on HN over the years.

My personal opinion is people voted for Obama out of hope. They felt betrayed as nothing really changed. Voted for Trump as a FU, voted brexit as FU and so on.

And part of this "FU" must be that if you have nothing you have nothing to lose. If you have nothing in the stock market, you don't care how the SP500 or Nasdaq performs, as long as your job is safe. The top of the top outperforming everything else is just another transfer of wealth, and an increase in wealth inequality.

Starting a mansion on fire, knowing your tent hundreds of miles away is safe, and even if its not, a new tent is relatively cheap.

The tea party, occupy wall street, and the latest worldwide populist wave are different coin sides all rooted in the same feeling of victimization. It's a purposeful intent to crumble and erode institutions that have amassed wealth. The feedback loops of tax loopholes and lobbying, siphoning off and storing value, pretending their holdings dont cause others problems, are culpable.

How did we get here? What drove the worldwide populist uprising?

Speaking as one who never was in any danger of voting for Trump, what would be my alternative? The warhawk spouse of a womanizing politician I tired of 20 years ago? IOW, same shit, different decade? And then we're all shocked that the populist candidate actually pulled it off this time? Maybe the world collectively asked, "what's the worst that could happen?" Well, now we know.

>Speaking as one who never was in any danger of voting for Trump, what would be my alternative? The warhawk spouse of a womanizing politician I tired of 20 years ago? OW, same shit, different decade?

Yes, between the "warhawk" with eight years of ancillary experience in the White House, who served in the Senate and as Secretary of State, and the reality tv show host whose only political experience was failing at a previous presidential run, the former was still the most viable candidate for the job, even though her husband got a blowjob that one time.

Doesn't that depend what you want out of a candidate, someone to accelerate the status quo, or a forest fire? Nearly half the voting population voted for forest fire wrecking ball, on purpose.

Ok, fair enough. Just wanting to watch the world burn would be the exception.

Although I don't consider that to be legitimate participation in the political process, so much as an act of sabotage.

20% of the population trying to burn up .5% of the population, with collateral damage, is not the same thing as self sabotage.

There's a difference between burning your own neighborhood down, and burning Wall Street / Washington / Hollywood / Silicon Valley down.

Lighting a fire doesn't affect everyone equally, it burns up who has the most wood. It's an attack proportional to inequality, not a uniform one.

But what should legitimate participation look like for a group who feels that the political process itself has failed them?

One could argue lack of experience is a positive kpi for politicians

the left treats the current first lady as a complete and utter joke that's completely useless. Now imagine what even average moderate people think of Bill Clinton's wife and they wanted her to run for presidency which she sort of kind of tried too.... She can't even satisfy her own man her number one job how can she run a country?

> Secretary of State

Sen Clinton set the middle east on fire as Secretary of State. And then ran away before it blew up in her face leaving Sen John Kerry to clean up the mess.

Seriously there is something really shabby about the current political parties in the US. People forget Trump didn't just narrowly beat Clinton. He utterly trounced Jeb Bush.

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