The Noble Lie

"In Le Figaro magazine of 6 January 2007, Alain-Gerard Slama wrote that 'the two cardinal values on which democracy rests are liberty and growth.' This is a perfect defintion of liberalism. One in which, of course, what the author takes care to call 'democracy' is simply the liberal system, bending the word to the requirements defined in modern 'semantic workshops'. (This is the name in the United States for bodies charged with imposing on the public at large, by way of the control of the media, the use of words that best meets the needs of the ruling classes.) This now customary slight of hand naturally authorizes a whole series of very useful discrepancies. If the word 'democracy', for example, must now be used only to define liberalism, then a new term is needed to denote that 'goverment of the People, by the People, for the People' which was seen as the very essence of democracy not so long ago. The new term chosen by the semantic workshops is 'populism'. All that is needed, then, is to equate populism (in the face of any basic historical knowledge) with a perverse variant of classic fascism, and the effects desired can be obtained with a disconcerting facility. If it occurs to you, for example, that people should be consulted on this or that problem that affects their future, or that the incomes of the business world's great predators are really indecent, something within you immediately warns that you're in danger of falling into the most disturbed 'populism', and consequently that the 'filthy Beast' is approaching you in great strides. As a well-brought-up citizen (well brought up by the media industry), you immediately know what you should really think and do."

Jean-Claude Michea, "Realm of Lessser Evil"