Trump's presidency, first year: the politics of antebellum

In 2016, the United States elected its second populist president (after Andrew Jackson . 

A year after, both anti- and pro-Trump find themselves puzzled by the constant 180 degrees swings that characterize the new president's positions.

Author Michael Wolff wrote what in my opinion is the best description so far of Trump's political positions:

"The paradox of the Trump presidency was that it was both the most ideologically driven and the least.

It represented a deeply structural assault on liberal values—Bannon’s deconstruction of the administrative state meant to take with it media, academic, and not-for-profit institutions.

But from the start it also was apparent that the Trump administration could just as easily turn into a country club Republican or a Wall Street Democrat regime.

 Or just a constant effort to keep Donald Trump happy. Trump had his collection of pet-peeve issues, test-marketed in various media rollouts and mega-rallies, but none seemed so significant as his greater goal of personally coming out ahead of the game.”

I think  Wolff has captured the essence of populism: its lack of it. 

Populist leaders can talk with Far Left or Far Right "talking points". Think of Chavez and the Spanish Podemos or the Greek Syriza embracing "socialism" and "equality" criticizing their own Socialist parties for "betraying" socialism.

Look at Marie Le Pen's National Front or Nigel Farage's UKIP and you will find they criticizing their Right wing conservatives (Gaullists and Tories, respectively) for being "too soft" on their Right Wing causes: anti-immigration and protectionism.

Populist leaders use Left or Right-wing speeches alternatively: Left wingers like the chavista regime apply "law and order" harder than their berated Right-wing enemies. Right wingers like Le Pen blast "inequality" and "financial elites" harder than socialists or communists.

Like Wolff notices in describing Donald Trump's zigzagging politics, populist leaders only cling to one thing: keeping happy their own electoral base by channeling their anger with uncivil behavior (like calling names their rivals and flaunting "political correctness") blaming new "enemies of the people" for any failures. Populist leaders have no friends or allies, just "people working for me" -as Trump remembered those who bragged their influence on him.

Ignoring that basic premise was what provoked the fall of grace for Steve Bannon and his rather Napoleonic nationalistic dreams of becoming a "king maker".

It's good to remember how Benito Mussolini used ambiguity to drive coalitions between Far Right and Far Left:

"Tomorrow, Fascists and communists, both persecuted by the police, may arrive at an agreement, sinking their differences until the time comes to share the spoils. I realize that though there are no political affinities between us, there are plenty of intellectual affinities. Like them, we believe in the necessity for a centralized and unitary state, imposing an iron discipline on everyone, but with the difference that they reach this conclusion through the idea of class, we through the idea of the nation." 

As quoted in The Myth of the Nation and the Vision of Revolution, Jacob Talmon, University of California Press (1981) p. 494, Mussolini's declaration near the end of 1921.

For populists, principles and ideology are means towards a superior end: gaining and keeping popular support. Ideologues like Steve Bannon and the Far Right are discovering it now.

Populism thrives by fanning the flames of cultural and civil wars in both directions. 

Trump's presidency is basically a new "antebellum". 

The previous one started with the last (and only) previous populist presidency.

Here, an excerpt that might sound familiar to our days:

          Partisan Politicking (Antebellum)

The successful presidential campaign of Andrew Jackson in 1828 began the "Jacksonian" period of populist politics and participatory democracy for white men [...]

political strategists cultivated a candidate's popular appeal on the basis of his reputation for courage, bravery, and masculinity. This formula was amply demonstrated by Jackson's military history in fighting the Creek Indians and then as the hero of the battle of New Orleans against the British in 1815. Democrats hosted mass rallies, parades, and barbecues to stir up popular s upport and enthusiasm for Jackson, and to encourage voters to identify with their party. [...]

Jackson and subsequent presidential hopefuls in the antebellum era tended to avoid making clear statements of their positions on the important political issues of the day, from the national banking system to the tariff. They usually made vague and broad promises to cleanse the government of corruption and privilege, and while they did not usually specify how they planned to do so, their good intentions were usually enough to win over the electorate.

White men became actively involved in politics as a central component of their sexual, national, and even class identity. Though Jackson was a prosperous slaveowner by the time he ran for office, he portrayed himself as a man of the people and derided his opponent, John Quincy Adams, as an intellectual and an elitist. [...]

 In 1828, Jackson received 56% of the vote, the highest percentage of popular support for any president elected in the nineteenth century. Jackson had begun the process whereby successful and propertied candidates had to appeal to a mass electorate and fashion themselves as "men of the people" in order to win elections. [...]

No fundamental redistribution of wealth followed his or any subsequent elections. These candidates presumed to relate to the voters whilst representing the sort of heroism or success that was supposed to be possible for any man in America. Candidates in this new political era quickly learned that they could succeed by touting their military backgrounds or by appealing to popular sentiments and prejudices. 

Historians saw the parallels when Trump was just a candidate:

Left and Right-wing populists like candidates Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders found common ground in Jacksonian populism: