Everyone, Citing dumb things said and done by Democrats in no way, shape, or form offers any sort of rebuttal to Hanania's book. He'd probably agree with you!
Well, the inconvenient truth is that in current reality, it is indeed asymmetrical. Woke dumbness hasn't killed as many people or worsened peoples' lives or been nearly as corrupt as MAGA dumbness has. And as of now, while Dem leaders may mouth platitudes to wokeness, I just don't see the rot in the Dem leadership (yet) that I see in the GOP leadership, which has completely bent the knee to MAGA. Do you seriously believe that Dems would allow a President of theirs to be so wildly corrupt and as awful a human being as the GOP has allowed Trump to be?
Read the book The Revolutionary Center? "I also worry that people on both the right and the left underestimate the importance of process". To me this is probably the most meaningful thing you say in your entire post; and not purely because i have said it to others.
And why do you think so many are so uninformed or might i say just dumb today?
The media environment has deteriorated greatly during my lifetime. Today, much of the media is spewing out misinformation and crazy conspiracy theories.
Although it’s a cliche to comment on some piece of satire that the world actually turned out in the way that was portrayed, in the case of the 1976 movie “Network” the cliche is actually pretty close to valid. Paddy Chayefsky, oracle.
True, and am a bit older than you i think so i share your pain. Not just the media; it is educators, too. And truth and politics seem not incompatible, and especially so as it has to do with political parties and truth. Hope springs eternal and at some point some common sense thinking might actually take hold.
It turns out that most people actually can't in entrusted to tell apart truth from lies when there isn't an elite controlling information and making sure that most media is truthful.
"Only Democrats engaged with serious publications in substantial numbers. Among that group, 31 percent read The New York Times, and 26 percent read The Washington Post. "
This is: "Our propaganda should be counted among 'serious publications' -- YOUR propaganda should be viewed as propaganda."
Did you not read the next line about the WSJ (which Dems read more than Repubs)? Or do you consider the WSJ leftist propaganda now? It's merely reality that these days, Dems read more than Repubs, who prefer visual content like Fox News and Internet stuff that doesn't require as much reading/mental brainpower. Or are you trying to argue that Fox News and various right-wing podcasts and channels have standards for truth and analysis that are on par with the NYT and WSJ?
Did you not read the next like about the WSJ (which Dems read more than Repubs)? Or do you consider the WSJ leftist propaganda now? It's merely reality that these days, Dems read more than Repubs, who prefer visual content like Fox News and Internet stuff that doesn't require as much reading/mental brainpower. Or are you trying to argue that Fox News and various right-wing podcasts and channels have standards for truth and analysis that are on par with the NYT and WSJ?
“The traditional left/right dichotomy is increasingly being replaced by a split between the well informed and the poorly informed, with the latter drifting toward authoritarian populism.”
I will not comment any further other than to point out that the claim that the left is well informed, given that majorities on the left literally prefer socialism, believe Israel does not have the right to exist as a Jewish state (because genocide and oppression), and prefer China, Venezuela and Iran to Israel is… laughable.
Given that Hanania’s entire book is about right populism, not left populism, and Hanania claims that it is the right that is poorly informed overall, while the left is well informed overall, what other reasonable interpretation is there?
I mentioned Venezuela not at all to be about populism (China and Iran certainly cannot reasonably be construed as populist) of the country in question, but to demonstrate the absurdity that people who hold a more favorable view of Iran and Venezuela can be considered “well informed”.
If you are claiming that the radical left is also poorly informed and populist authoritarian - which would be a reasonable enough claim - then you need to claim that explicitly, because that is nowhere in Hanania’s currently espoused worldview.
I have not read the book and have no intention of doing so.
However, I used to read his Substack quite a lot, until last year when he went SO over the top with his TDS and fixation on the MAGA right fringe and his claims that all of the right is now the MAGA right.
And his claim that leftist midwits are Elite Human Capital (EHC) while not only is “MAGA” stupid, but Elon Musk himself does not qualify as EHC.
To repeat, I brought up Venezuela solely because of that recent poll that showed that the average Democrat now holds a higher opinion of Venezuela, China and Iran than of Israel. And I consider that evidence of NOT being well-informed. I suspect on that narrow point even you agree with me.
Now, if you have evidence that Richard claims that the woke left that favors socialism are equally poorly informed and equally populist authoritarians as he does the MAGA right, please produce it.
Otherwise my claim that today’s Richard is all about claiming the ignorance of the MAGA right, and downplaying the greater ignorance of the left, stands.
A 15% critique of the left, 85% critique of the right, using a broad brush against the right but failing to do the same against the left, does not undercut my claim at all.
Especially when it is today’s Dem party in the last 11 years that has moved much further away from classical liberal economics than has Trump’s GOP, even if the latter too has indeed moved away from it as well.
In the end, the poor predictions I made mostly come down to getting a single thing wrong. I simply misjudged the degree to which the Trump movement had become a cult of personality.”
“I thought that by 2024, we were at a balance of maybe 60% Trump cult, and 40% conservative ideology. But I was wrong, and we were at a place of something like 80% Trump cult, and 20% conservative ideology. Moreover, what we call ‘conservative ideology’ in 2024 is not what it was in 2016. It’s more conspiratorial, less enamored by free markets, more pro-Putin abroad, and anti-vaxx.”
“It’s become clear, however, that in national politics there isn’t much of a conservative movement left outside of the Trump cult of personality. Even if Republican politicians or conservative media figures are themselves not Trump cultists, they depend on voters and an audience that puts loyalty towards one man above all else.”
“The intellectual and moral state of the conservative movement was actually much worse than I thought, and it’s simply not realistic to expect smart policy or competent governance from a movement this dumb,…”
“Even intelligent people, when they’re part of MAGA, become stupid when it comes to policy…”
“The right is an epistemological wasteland right now…”
“A movement this low in human capital simply poisons everything.”
“The theory that ‘conservatism is becoming little more than a Trump cult’ has held up extremely well for nearly a decade now, and even though I subscribed to it before the last election, my main mistake was that I underestimated its strength.”
There are more such comments in other of his posts, but this would seem to be more than sufficient.
I am willing to accept an apology, but I suspect none will be forthcoming.
I hold a dim view of Venezuela, Iran, and the PRC, but why exactly _should_ anyone have a high opinion of Israel? Can you not comprehend that someone can be very informed and not think much of Israel?
Exactly, and I saw from across the Hudson River in NJ that was the frog slow boiling while paying, all in, more than half my income to the governmentS. And then I got wise, moved to FL and its not just a little bit better, its a lot better. Know what pays for my homeS in FL and TN? The taxes I'm not paying to the People's Republic in NJ. Product of misinformation or perhaps an ancedotal, individual lived experience? How many have voted with their feet in my lifetime?
The Occam's Razor answer to why populism is growing comes from the great Howard Beale statement, "I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!"
"Only Democrats engaged with serious publications in substantial numbers. Among that group, 31 percent read The New York Times, and 26 percent read The Washington Post."
"In the introduction, Hanania dissects the populist movement with precision, showing how a segment of the right has recently become deranged over politics, partly due to an avalanche of misinformation in social media"
This reflects an inability to reflect on the shortcomings of the Democrat party. Indeed underpinning this thought is the concept that one would rationally support the left but for misinformation. Couldn't possibly be rational, right?
Well if you're going to do Brexit, really the only reason you would do it is because the free trade deals you can get from outside the EU outweigh the benefits of being in the EU's free trade zone.
Brexit was done because the lower middle class populists, disproportionately outside the London area, didn’t like losing sovereignty to Brussels, and probably correctly saw that existing institutions weren’t working in their favor. IN Arnold Kling terms, they were disproportionately Brokenists.
While the London area elites either liked losing sovereignty to Brussels or didn’t mind it and knew - correctly - that they benefited financially from being in the EU, and surely are Institutionalists who correctly saw that the existing institutions *were* working in their favor.
So each side acted relatively rationally from their economic POV.
Those working class folks outside London likely have/had a small economic downside from Brexit. The elites in London proportionately have suffered a much larger downside.
Only if you believe becoming worse off is somehow rational. Not to mention that you have roughly zero data to support your viewpoint. I'm more likely to believe that Brexit actually hurt the regions who voted for Brexit the most.
Stagnation and populist insurgency seem to be characteristic of politics across the major Eurozone economies. I’d posit other causes for the UK’s malaise.
Well, a little, but it’s more heavily linked to net zero targets being written into law. That feeds into nimbyism because a whole bunch of subsidiary protocols and regulations have to consider it, which leaves any kind of development open to legal challenge on that basis.
When I consider reaching across the aisle to the idiot pinkos, my first trade would be for a swingeing carbon and no other interventions (the other would be to double housing benefit but make it entirely monetary).
The entire first world, in fact. So what has spread over the entire first world? Internet and smartphones. After all, the US most definitely has seen a populist insurgency in politics and isn't anywhere as stagnate as the EU.
But even still, the UK has actually done worse than the EU since Brexit, so Brexit can't get escape blame for making the UK worse off than it could have been if it had stayed in the EU.
Great column overall. I was struck by the less civil than usual tone of some comments. I guess it lends some support to Hanania’s broad point about elite human capital having deserted the right.
I am curious about the point underlying your retort to the comparison of China vs India as supporting authoritarianism vs democracy: difference in IQ, not political regime, as the key factor?
I do think that China's economic regime is more growth friendly than India's regime, at least in some respects. Differences in human capital (not necessarily IQ) also play a role.
What did you think of the essay linked to in item 4 here? (Your comment is at the top, but I take it to be more about TC's framing, not the essay itself). Is Oks simply stating a well-known or widely agreed upon explanation of their relative growth performance, or is his view controversial?
“The traditional left/right dichotomy is increasingly being replaced by a split between the well informed and the poorly informed, with the latter drifting toward authoritarian populism.”
In Romania and Germany some "far-left" parties (socialists?) and far-right parties are exploring forming a ruling coalition. I think something similar is happening in Hungary. Anecdote, and some data, indicate that descendants of "good communists" are supporters of authoritarian governments, including far-right parties. I was told that the far-left and far-right want a more authoritarian government (because rent-seeking is easier than personal economic effort?), and each group is confident that once the authoritarian government arrives their group will have control, not the other group. I won't be surprised if we see more joining of the MAGA wing and the far-left whatever wing of the Democrats in the USA.
The gist I got from the people who oppose Orban and the Romanian counterpart seemed to say "we know about authoritarian governments and we don't want it, no matter the justification, whether justified by divine right, or because of communism, or because of fascism, or any other justification".
You gave some examples of the variety of populist governments, but isn't it the case that populist governments eventually become more authoritarian. I don't like popular democracy, and I think people who want the US to move more in that direction (e.g. eliminate the electoral college) don't appreciate why popular democracy per se is not in the US Constitution.
"In Romania and Germany some "far-left" parties (socialists?) and far-right parties are exploring forming a ruling coalition."
That's what Andy (above) didn't understand.
I don't believe the Electoral College serves a useful role in checking populism, but I agree that a constitution should have some checks on popular opinion, such as term limits for the president, America's Bill of Rights and the Supreme Court. But it was the Electoral College that allowed populist Trump to beat non-populist Hillary Clinton. So that seems like a separate issue from populism.
I do agree that populists often move in an authoritarian direction, as we saw with Chavez, Peron, and numerous other examples.
Everyone, Citing dumb things said and done by Democrats in no way, shape, or form offers any sort of rebuttal to Hanania's book. He'd probably agree with you!
Respectfully, Scott, what this claim does is willfully ignore today’s Hanania’s asymmetry.
He claims the woke left “dumbness” is not a reflection of the left overall and the Dem party, but claims that MAGA “dumbness” *is* the entire right.
So much so that the left overall is EHC, while the right is not, and even Elon Musk is not.
Well, the inconvenient truth is that in current reality, it is indeed asymmetrical. Woke dumbness hasn't killed as many people or worsened peoples' lives or been nearly as corrupt as MAGA dumbness has. And as of now, while Dem leaders may mouth platitudes to wokeness, I just don't see the rot in the Dem leadership (yet) that I see in the GOP leadership, which has completely bent the knee to MAGA. Do you seriously believe that Dems would allow a President of theirs to be so wildly corrupt and as awful a human being as the GOP has allowed Trump to be?
But you agree that Trump is a kakistocrat, correct?
Read the book The Revolutionary Center? "I also worry that people on both the right and the left underestimate the importance of process". To me this is probably the most meaningful thing you say in your entire post; and not purely because i have said it to others.
And why do you think so many are so uninformed or might i say just dumb today?
The media environment has deteriorated greatly during my lifetime. Today, much of the media is spewing out misinformation and crazy conspiracy theories.
Although it’s a cliche to comment on some piece of satire that the world actually turned out in the way that was portrayed, in the case of the 1976 movie “Network” the cliche is actually pretty close to valid. Paddy Chayefsky, oracle.
True, and am a bit older than you i think so i share your pain. Not just the media; it is educators, too. And truth and politics seem not incompatible, and especially so as it has to do with political parties and truth. Hope springs eternal and at some point some common sense thinking might actually take hold.
It turns out that most people actually can't in entrusted to tell apart truth from lies when there isn't an elite controlling information and making sure that most media is truthful.
Yes, exactly.
"Only Democrats engaged with serious publications in substantial numbers. Among that group, 31 percent read The New York Times, and 26 percent read The Washington Post. "
This is: "Our propaganda should be counted among 'serious publications' -- YOUR propaganda should be viewed as propaganda."
Did you not read the next line about the WSJ (which Dems read more than Repubs)? Or do you consider the WSJ leftist propaganda now? It's merely reality that these days, Dems read more than Repubs, who prefer visual content like Fox News and Internet stuff that doesn't require as much reading/mental brainpower. Or are you trying to argue that Fox News and various right-wing podcasts and channels have standards for truth and analysis that are on par with the NYT and WSJ?
Did you not read the next like about the WSJ (which Dems read more than Repubs)? Or do you consider the WSJ leftist propaganda now? It's merely reality that these days, Dems read more than Repubs, who prefer visual content like Fox News and Internet stuff that doesn't require as much reading/mental brainpower. Or are you trying to argue that Fox News and various right-wing podcasts and channels have standards for truth and analysis that are on par with the NYT and WSJ?
“The traditional left/right dichotomy is increasingly being replaced by a split between the well informed and the poorly informed, with the latter drifting toward authoritarian populism.”
I will not comment any further other than to point out that the claim that the left is well informed, given that majorities on the left literally prefer socialism, believe Israel does not have the right to exist as a Jewish state (because genocide and oppression), and prefer China, Venezuela and Iran to Israel is… laughable.
Especially coming from an economist.
When this is what the supposedly “well-informed” are voting for: https://jkotkin.substack.com/p/zohran-mamdanis-socialist-new-york
"the claim that the left is well informed"
LOL, that is most definitely NOT what the quoted sentence claims. Venezuela is authoritarian populism, as I specifically pointed out in the post.
Given that Hanania’s entire book is about right populism, not left populism, and Hanania claims that it is the right that is poorly informed overall, while the left is well informed overall, what other reasonable interpretation is there?
I mentioned Venezuela not at all to be about populism (China and Iran certainly cannot reasonably be construed as populist) of the country in question, but to demonstrate the absurdity that people who hold a more favorable view of Iran and Venezuela can be considered “well informed”.
If you are claiming that the radical left is also poorly informed and populist authoritarian - which would be a reasonable enough claim - then you need to claim that explicitly, because that is nowhere in Hanania’s currently espoused worldview.
"I mentioned Venezuela not at all to be about populism"
Hanania cites it. You seem to have strong opinions, have you read the book?
I have not read the book and have no intention of doing so.
However, I used to read his Substack quite a lot, until last year when he went SO over the top with his TDS and fixation on the MAGA right fringe and his claims that all of the right is now the MAGA right.
And his claim that leftist midwits are Elite Human Capital (EHC) while not only is “MAGA” stupid, but Elon Musk himself does not qualify as EHC.
To repeat, I brought up Venezuela solely because of that recent poll that showed that the average Democrat now holds a higher opinion of Venezuela, China and Iran than of Israel. And I consider that evidence of NOT being well-informed. I suspect on that narrow point even you agree with me.
Now, if you have evidence that Richard claims that the woke left that favors socialism are equally poorly informed and equally populist authoritarians as he does the MAGA right, please produce it.
Otherwise my claim that today’s Richard is all about claiming the ignorance of the MAGA right, and downplaying the greater ignorance of the left, stands.
A 15% critique of the left, 85% critique of the right, using a broad brush against the right but failing to do the same against the left, does not undercut my claim at all.
Especially when it is today’s Dem party in the last 11 years that has moved much further away from classical liberal economics than has Trump’s GOP, even if the latter too has indeed moved away from it as well.
"his claims that all of the right is now the MAGA right."
I would encourage you to write comments that do not misrepresent the views of others.
But since you implied that I was misrepresenting, please read for yourself.
The definitive pull quote is from near the end of the piece. Otherwise I cite chronologically as he wrote it.
“The fact that the right had become a low human capital cult wasn’t simply a passing interest of mine. I was obsessed with the idea!”
https://www.richardhanania.com/p/what-i-got-wrong-about-trump
“ Low Human Capital Poisons Everything
In the end, the poor predictions I made mostly come down to getting a single thing wrong. I simply misjudged the degree to which the Trump movement had become a cult of personality.”
“I thought that by 2024, we were at a balance of maybe 60% Trump cult, and 40% conservative ideology. But I was wrong, and we were at a place of something like 80% Trump cult, and 20% conservative ideology. Moreover, what we call ‘conservative ideology’ in 2024 is not what it was in 2016. It’s more conspiratorial, less enamored by free markets, more pro-Putin abroad, and anti-vaxx.”
“It’s become clear, however, that in national politics there isn’t much of a conservative movement left outside of the Trump cult of personality. Even if Republican politicians or conservative media figures are themselves not Trump cultists, they depend on voters and an audience that puts loyalty towards one man above all else.”
“The intellectual and moral state of the conservative movement was actually much worse than I thought, and it’s simply not realistic to expect smart policy or competent governance from a movement this dumb,…”
“Even intelligent people, when they’re part of MAGA, become stupid when it comes to policy…”
“The right is an epistemological wasteland right now…”
“A movement this low in human capital simply poisons everything.”
“The theory that ‘conservatism is becoming little more than a Trump cult’ has held up extremely well for nearly a decade now, and even though I subscribed to it before the last election, my main mistake was that I underestimated its strength.”
There are more such comments in other of his posts, but this would seem to be more than sufficient.
I am willing to accept an apology, but I suspect none will be forthcoming.
I am NOT misrepresenting his views. He has made this claim repeatedly.
I would encourage you not to suggest to commenters that they are making a misrepresentative claim when they are not doing so.
I hold a dim view of Venezuela, Iran, and the PRC, but why exactly _should_ anyone have a high opinion of Israel? Can you not comprehend that someone can be very informed and not think much of Israel?
That you don’t comprehend that whatever you think of Israel, thinking more highly of Iran and Venezuela is…
Well, no more needs to be said, does it?
"When this is what the supposedly “well-informed” are voting for: https://jkotkin.substack.com/p/zohran-mamdanis-socialist-new-york"
Exactly, and I saw from across the Hudson River in NJ that was the frog slow boiling while paying, all in, more than half my income to the governmentS. And then I got wise, moved to FL and its not just a little bit better, its a lot better. Know what pays for my homeS in FL and TN? The taxes I'm not paying to the People's Republic in NJ. Product of misinformation or perhaps an ancedotal, individual lived experience? How many have voted with their feet in my lifetime?
The Occam's Razor answer to why populism is growing comes from the great Howard Beale statement, "I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!"
Haninia's sketchy past is disqualifying for me.
"Only Democrats engaged with serious publications in substantial numbers. Among that group, 31 percent read The New York Times, and 26 percent read The Washington Post."
Now that is funny.
I suppose you find the truth funny. Dems also engage more with the WSJ. Do you not consider the WSJ a serious publication?
"Do you not consider the WSJ a serious publication?"
Not for about a dozen years now.
"In the introduction, Hanania dissects the populist movement with precision, showing how a segment of the right has recently become deranged over politics, partly due to an avalanche of misinformation in social media"
This reflects an inability to reflect on the shortcomings of the Democrat party. Indeed underpinning this thought is the concept that one would rationally support the left but for misinformation. Couldn't possibly be rational, right?
I think it’s unlikely that the UK’s stagnation is primarily down to Brexit. It suits some constituencies to make that claim though.
Well if you're going to do Brexit, really the only reason you would do it is because the free trade deals you can get from outside the EU outweigh the benefits of being in the EU's free trade zone.
Yes, and that didn't happen.
There’s a whole bunch of other ruinous policy mandates and regulation you also escape, should your political class so wish.
Nice in theory. In reality, the UK has suffered more economically from Brexit than if they had stayed in the EU.
It’s hard to parse imo. Growth rates in Germany and France haven’t exceeded the UK’s.
Brexit was done because the lower middle class populists, disproportionately outside the London area, didn’t like losing sovereignty to Brussels, and probably correctly saw that existing institutions weren’t working in their favor. IN Arnold Kling terms, they were disproportionately Brokenists.
While the London area elites either liked losing sovereignty to Brussels or didn’t mind it and knew - correctly - that they benefited financially from being in the EU, and surely are Institutionalists who correctly saw that the existing institutions *were* working in their favor.
So each side acted relatively rationally from their economic POV.
Those working class folks outside London likely have/had a small economic downside from Brexit. The elites in London proportionately have suffered a much larger downside.
As in most things in life, incentives matter.
Only if you believe becoming worse off is somehow rational. Not to mention that you have roughly zero data to support your viewpoint. I'm more likely to believe that Brexit actually hurt the regions who voted for Brexit the most.
Stagnation and populist insurgency seem to be characteristic of politics across the major Eurozone economies. I’d posit other causes for the UK’s malaise.
Yes, you could argue that NIMBYism is the number one problem, not Brexit.
That and energy policy
And isn't the bad energy problem sort of related to NIMBYism? No nukes or fracking or windmills or solar in my backyard.
Well, a little, but it’s more heavily linked to net zero targets being written into law. That feeds into nimbyism because a whole bunch of subsidiary protocols and regulations have to consider it, which leaves any kind of development open to legal challenge on that basis.
When I consider reaching across the aisle to the idiot pinkos, my first trade would be for a swingeing carbon and no other interventions (the other would be to double housing benefit but make it entirely monetary).
The entire first world, in fact. So what has spread over the entire first world? Internet and smartphones. After all, the US most definitely has seen a populist insurgency in politics and isn't anywhere as stagnate as the EU.
But even still, the UK has actually done worse than the EU since Brexit, so Brexit can't get escape blame for making the UK worse off than it could have been if it had stayed in the EU.
Yes, Hanania discusses the global nature of the phenomenon.
I suspect "it's the phones", meaning also the internet and cable TV. I.e., a media environment tailored to the wishes of the public.
Great column overall. I was struck by the less civil than usual tone of some comments. I guess it lends some support to Hanania’s broad point about elite human capital having deserted the right.
I am curious about the point underlying your retort to the comparison of China vs India as supporting authoritarianism vs democracy: difference in IQ, not political regime, as the key factor?
I do think that China's economic regime is more growth friendly than India's regime, at least in some respects. Differences in human capital (not necessarily IQ) also play a role.
What did you think of the essay linked to in item 4 here? (Your comment is at the top, but I take it to be more about TC's framing, not the essay itself). Is Oks simply stating a well-known or widely agreed upon explanation of their relative growth performance, or is his view controversial?
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2026/06/thursday-assorted-links-555.html
(Great review of Hanania, of course).
“The traditional left/right dichotomy is increasingly being replaced by a split between the well informed and the poorly informed, with the latter drifting toward authoritarian populism.”
In Romania and Germany some "far-left" parties (socialists?) and far-right parties are exploring forming a ruling coalition. I think something similar is happening in Hungary. Anecdote, and some data, indicate that descendants of "good communists" are supporters of authoritarian governments, including far-right parties. I was told that the far-left and far-right want a more authoritarian government (because rent-seeking is easier than personal economic effort?), and each group is confident that once the authoritarian government arrives their group will have control, not the other group. I won't be surprised if we see more joining of the MAGA wing and the far-left whatever wing of the Democrats in the USA.
The gist I got from the people who oppose Orban and the Romanian counterpart seemed to say "we know about authoritarian governments and we don't want it, no matter the justification, whether justified by divine right, or because of communism, or because of fascism, or any other justification".
You gave some examples of the variety of populist governments, but isn't it the case that populist governments eventually become more authoritarian. I don't like popular democracy, and I think people who want the US to move more in that direction (e.g. eliminate the electoral college) don't appreciate why popular democracy per se is not in the US Constitution.
This was a great column. Thank you.
Thanks, this is a very good example:
"In Romania and Germany some "far-left" parties (socialists?) and far-right parties are exploring forming a ruling coalition."
That's what Andy (above) didn't understand.
I don't believe the Electoral College serves a useful role in checking populism, but I agree that a constitution should have some checks on popular opinion, such as term limits for the president, America's Bill of Rights and the Supreme Court. But it was the Electoral College that allowed populist Trump to beat non-populist Hillary Clinton. So that seems like a separate issue from populism.
I do agree that populists often move in an authoritarian direction, as we saw with Chavez, Peron, and numerous other examples.