the important part of populism isn't the fear and discontent, it's the pandering. some fear and discontent is valid, some isn't, that's not relevant to whether

the important part of populism isn't the fear and discontent, it's the pandering. some fear and discontent is valid, some isn't, that's not relevant to whether something is populist or not. populism is telling people that there's a nice easy clean solution to their fear and discontent, when in reality problems are complicated and difficult to solve without causing other equally valid problems.