It's necessary to restate the solid principles of populism and reassert its true spirit because both are now being subverted and severely perverted by corporate manipulators and a careless media establishment. 




     These debasers of the language misapply the populist label to anyone who claims to be a maverick and tends to bark a lot. 



     Although the targets they're usually barking at are poor people, teachers, minorities, unions, liberals, protestors, environmentalists, immigrants, LGBTQ or other demonized groups that generally reside far outside the center of the power structure — the barkers are indiscriminately tagged as populist voices — even when their populist pose is funded by and operates as a front for one or another corporate interest. 




     That's not populism; it's rank hucksterism, disguising plutocrats as champions of the people. 




     And it is important that we call them out on it.