National Science Foundation Gives Tens of Millions to Fight COVID ‘Disinformation,’ Populism

Government efforts to squelch purported misinformation and disinformation on the most contested subjects in American politics don’t stop with Cabinet-level agencies.

The National Science Foundation has awarded at least $39 million in grants and contracts in fiscal years 2021 and 2022 for projects that target misinformation or disinformation, frequently pertaining to COVID-19 and elections.

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Commentary: The Right’s New Class War

Much has been made of the idea that the GOP and the American conservative movement in general are currently in the midst of an ideological “civil war” which began the moment Donald Trump left office. Supposedly, the Paul Ryan fusionist ideology of the GOP establishment is battling a new Trumpian populism, both intellectually and electorally. If such a civil war was ever really under way, it was over by 2016. Trump is overwhelmingly popular with the GOP base, and would capture the 2024 nomination effortlessly. Outside of National Review columns and CNN panels, NeverTrumpers are basically nonexistent, and even House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) now feels the need to adopt the Trump brand to stay politically relevant. The civil war is over. The “populists” won.

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Commentary: The Rising Generation’s Intuitive Populism

A modern populist movement with the twin goals of expanding individual liberty and strengthening the bonds of community exists as a result of a communications revolution that has empowered people to control their own lives. That’s good news. The danger, however, is that the new populism will succumb to the old temptations of collectivism—a devolution made possible by the conflation and prioritization of virtual community over traditional community.

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Leaders Skip Davos Amid Domestic Troubles, Anti-Globalist Backlash

The World Economic Forum summit in Davos, Switzerland, that wrapped up Friday, had some notable absentees, including President Donald Trump. With a backlash against a perceived ruling elite gaining ground in many countries, analysts say some leaderssteeredclear of a gathering often seen as an inaccessible club for the world’s super-rich. Others argue it is vital they get together to discuss urgent issues like climate change and world trade. On the surface, though, it was business as usual: On a sealed off, snowbound mountaintop, world leaders rubbed shoulders with global executives, lobbyists and pressure groups. It remains a vital gathering of global decision-makers, said Leslie Vinjamuri, head of the U.S. and the Americas Program at policy group Chatham House. “They’re there to do business, they’re there to engage in an exchange of ideas. And so I think it’s still tremendously important.” President Trump stayed away because of the partial U.S. government shutdown, which ended Friday. China’s President Xi Jinping wasn’t there, neither was Britain’s Theresa May, nor France’s President Emmanuel Macron. “They’re tremendously preoccupied with the troubles they face at home, which isn’t a good sign for globalism. The criticism and the critique that surrounds Davos is extraordinary. People say, ‘You…

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Commentary: Tucker Carlson, the Deep State Establishment, the Tea Party, and Modern Populism

Tennessee Star

by Thaddeus G McCotter   I listened the other day to Tucker Carlson’s populist dirge on what’s ailing America. Then I perused some rejections, critiques, and commendations of it. Then I shrugged. To be charitable, it certainly wasn’t their fault. It’s the fruit of our communication revolution, wherein the head rush from new media’s immediacy renders antiquated the sober digestion of more lengthy philosophical debates. Small wonder, then, one so frequently searches for abiding comfort in these trying times by, again, turning back the dog-eared pages written by Burke, Kirk, Buckley, Röpke, and Nisbet, among so many other titans of conservative thought. But I digress . . . Or do I? In what does the current debate instruct us that aforementioned works haven’t already? The predatory economy Carlson describes is not market capitalism; it is the “business-government model” of crony capitalism long ago defined and decried by Belloc and Chesterton. Its remedy was found in the “German Miracle” outlined in Röpke’s A Humane Economy. One would also know from Burke, Kirk, and Buckley that, since the French Revolution, it is not greed but ideology—the Enemies of the Permanent Things’ lust to desecrate all you hold dear in order to remold humanity according to their own insidious whims—that has…

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Commentary: Democrat Oversteps on Trump Impeachment Will Stir Populist Uprising

by Jeffrey A. Rendall   While viewing news coverage of the recent protests in Paris over the French government’s tax hike on fuel it reminded me (a little) of our very own American citizen uprising over the government’s excessive and unpopular taxation policies of the 18th century. Seeing as this is the time of year Americans celebrate Christmas – and are therefore intensely aware of pressures on family budgets – it’s also appropriate to remember the anniversary of the “protest” that started a populist wave, the legendary “Boston Tea Party.” December 16 marked the 245-year anniversary of the “party,” where highly agitated (and probably inebriated) Bostonians disguised as Indians raided East India Company ships at anchor and enthusiastically tossed the tea into the harbor. Tea and salt water don’t mix, so essentially the act of vandalism cost the Mother Country’s merchants tens of thousands of pounds of product. And it got the British government very angry at the Americans. Lord North and parliament imposed martial law on the Bostonians, the colonies rode the slippery slope towards separation and independence and the rest is… history. Whereas the citizens (some might call them anarchists) in Paris were allegedly upset over President Emmanuel Macron’s…

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Ingraham Takes America Behind the Scenes of Historic 2016 Election

In order to understand whether the current president’s “America First” agenda has staying power beyond this administration, it’s important to look back and properly define the growing populist movement in the United States, according to LifeZette Editor-in-Chief Laura Ingraham. Ingraham started a tour this week to promote her new book, “Billionaire at the Barricades: The Populist…

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Is a Populist Christian Movement Needed to Renew the Faith?

George Rasley, ConservativeHQ Editor April 15, 2017 The populist movement that swept Donald Trump into the presidency here in America, forced the United Kingdom to exit the European Union and that has roiled the politics of other European countries has been driven by the ineffectiveness, arrogance, and the cultural and political corruption of the Western establishment elite. Citizens of Western democracies have finally had enough of politicians who force outrageous ideas of political correctness upon them, but leave the roads full of potholes, legions of citizens un-employed or under-employed, and neighborhoods rife with crime. And the objects of this populist rebellion are not only the politicians who have been voted out of office or defeated, like Hillary Clinton, they have been the other elite institutional enforcers of political correctness. After joining the politically correct Left in enforcing bizarre and dangerous rules allowing men to enter the women’s restrooms and dressing rooms at their stores, Target lost $20 billion in market capitalization as the company’s stock value plunged after the corporation publicly declared its support in April 2016 for the very unpopular “gender identity” transgender political agenda. The losers weren’t the elite company managers who chose to enforce their will on…

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