'The Elites Have Failed!'

My Oxford Union Speech

Dear Reader,

Thank you for your patience. This last month I have been consumed with both my Oxford Union debate preparation and hosting the inaugural Dissident Dialogues Festival of Ideas in New York City.

I am pleased to tell you that The Winston Marshall Show will resume broadcasting shortly. I have just finished filming juicy interviews with Masih Alinejad, Lee Fang and Ibn Warraq.

But before that I wanted to share my Oxford Union Speech from my debate with Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi. A speech that she did not enjoy. But you might.

The motion was: ‘Populism is a Threat to Democracy’.

Madame Pelosi argued in favour. I argued against. Populism is not a threat to Democracy. Elites like her are.

For viewing and listening pleasure here is my speech on video and audio. For the other speeches visit the Oxford Union YouTube Channel.

Full transcript of my speech included below.

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Ladies and Gentlemen,

Words have a tendency to change meaning. When I was a boy, “woman” meant someone who didn’t have a cock.

Populism has become a word used synonymously with “racist”, we’ve heard “ethnonationalist”, with “bigot”, with “hillbilly”, “redneck”, with “deplorables”. Elites use it to show their contempt for ordinary people.

This is a recent change.

Not long ago Barack Obama, whilst still President, at the North American Leaders’ Summit, in June 2016, he took umbrage with the notion that Donald Trump be called a populist. How could Trump be called a “populist”, he doesn’t care about working people. If anything, Obama argued, he was the populist. If anything, Obama argued, Bernie was the populist. It was Bernie who’d spent five decades fighting for working people. But Trump?

Something curious happens. If you watch Obama’s speeches after that point, more and more recently, he uses the word “populist” interchangeably with “strong man”, with “authoritarian”. The word changes meaning. It becomes a negative. A pejorative. A slur.

To me “populism” is not a dirty word. Since the 2008 crash, and specifically the trillion dollar Wall Street bail out, we are in the populist age. And for good reason. The elites have failed.

Let me address some common fallacies. Some of which have been made tonight.

If the motion was that demagoguery was a threat to democracy I would be on that side of the house.

If the motion was that political violence was a threat to democracy I’d be on that side of the house. January 6th has been mentioned, a dark day for America indeed.

And I’m sure Congresswoman Pelosi will agree that the entire month of June 2020 when the Federal Court House in Portland, Oregon, was under siege and under insurrection by radical progressives, those too were dark days for America.

PELOSI: “There is no equivalence there, so, but it is not like what happened on January 6th, which was an insurrection incited by the President of the United States”

So you don’t agree? That fine you don’t agree. Thats fine.

So you don’t agree.

But you’ll condemn those days?

PELOSI NO RESPONSE

My point though is that all political movements are susceptible to violence and indeed insurrections.

If we were arguing that fascism was a threat to democracy I would be on that side of the house.

Indeed the current populist age is a movement against fascism.

Populism as you know is the politics of the ordinary people against an elite. Populism is not a threat to democracy. Populism is democracy.

Why else have universal suffrage if not to keep elites in check?

Ladies and gentlemen, given the success of Trump and more recently Javier Milei taking a chainsaw to the state behemoth of Argentina’s bureaucratic monster, you’d be mistaken for thinking this was a right-wing populist age.

But that would be ignoring Occupy Wall Street. That would be ignoring Jeremy Corbyn’s “for the many not the few”. That would be ignoring Bernie against the billionaires, RFK Jr against Big Pharma.

And more recently, George Galloway against his better judgement.

Now, all of them, including Galloway, recognised genuine concerns of ordinary people being otherwise ignored by the establishment.

I am actually rather surprised that our esteemed opposition Congresswoman Pelosi is on that side of the motion.

I thought the Left were supposed to be anti-elite. I thought the Left were supposed to be anti-establishment. Today, particularly in America, the globalist-left have become the establishment.

I suppose for Mrs Pelosi to take this side of the motion, she would be arguing herself out of a job.

But it’s here in Britain where right and left populists united for the supreme act of democracy. Brexit.

Polls have shown the number one reason people voted for Brexit was for sovereignty. For more democracy.

What was the response of the Brussels elite?

They did everything in their power to undermine the democratic will of the British people.

And The Westminster elite were just as disgraceful.

As we’ve heard, David Cameron called the voters “fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists”. The Liberal Democrats did everything they could to overturn a democratic vote. Keir Starmer campaigned for a second referendum. Elites would have had us voting and voting and voting until we voted their way. Indeed that’s what happened in Ireland. And in Denmark.

Let’s look at some of the other populist movements.

The Hongkonger populist revolt is literally called the “pro-democracy movement”.

The Farmer Revolts from Netherlands to Germany, France, Greece to Sri Lanka. Farmers have taken their tractors to the road to protest ESG policy that’s floated down to us from the all-knowing infallible elites of Davos.

The Trucker movement in Canada became anti-elitist when petty tyrant Prime Minister Justin Trudeau froze their bank accounts. Not the behaviour of a democratic head of state.

The Gilets Jaunes in France, ULEZ in London. Working people protesting policy that hurt them. And how were they treated? They were called “conspiracy theorists”. They were called “Far-Right”. By the mayor as well.

Ladies and gentlemen, populism is the voice of the voiceless. The real threat to democracy is from the elites.

Now don’t get me wrong. We need elites. If President Biden has shown us anything, it’s that we need someone to run the country. When the President has severe dementia, it’s not just America that crumbles. The whole world burns.

But let’s examine the elites.

European corporations spend over €1 billion a year lobbying Brussels. US corporations spend over $2 billion a year lobbying in DC.

2/3rds of congress receive funding from pharmaceutical companies.

Pfizer alone spent 11 million dollars on lobbying in 2021 and made 10 billion dollars in profit.

No wonder then that 66% of Americans think the economy is rigged against them for the rich and the powerful.

And by the way, we used to have a word for when big business and big government were in cahoots. And I think any students here of early 20th century Italian history know what I’m talking about.

What about Big Tech?

Throughout the pandemic Biden’s team, the FBI and Department of Homeland Security colluded with Big Tech in censoring dissenting voices.

Not kooky “conspiracy theorists”. People like Dr Jay Bhattacharya the Stamford epidemiologist. People like Harvard scientist Martin Kulldorf. People spreading true information, not “misinformation”, true information at odds with the government narrative.

Need I remind you - democracy without free speech is not democracy. This was a direct breach, by the way, of the First Amendment.

Before Covid, intelligence services colluded with Big Tech to have Trump suspended off Twitter.

Yes, the same platform which hosted the Taliban and Ayatollah “death to Israel” Khamenei.

They thought the President crossed the line when he tweeted on Jan 6th “remain peaceful. No violence! Respect the law and our great men and women in Blue”. That’s a quote.

You may be thinking now that Trump is a populist. You are right. He didn’t accept the 2020 elections and he should have.

So should Hilary in 2016. So should Brussels and so should Westminster in 2016.

And so too should Congresswoman Pelosi instead of saying the 2016 election was “hijacked”

PELOSI: “What?”

Quote “hijacked”.

PELOSI: “It was”

Thank you!

PELOSI: “That doesn’t mean we don’t accept the result of it”

What about the mainstream media?

Let me read you some mainstream media headlines:

The New Yorker - the day before the 2016 elecAon:

“The Case Against Democracy”

The Washington Post - the day after the election:

“The Problem With Our Government is Democracy”

The LA Times, June 2017:

“The British Election Is A Reminder Of The Perils Of Too Much Democracy”

Vox, June 2017:

“Two Eminent Political Scientists Say: The Problem With Democracy Is Voters”

New York Times, June 2017:

“The Problem With Participatory Democracy Is The Participants”

Mainstream media elites are part of a class who don’t just disdain populism. They disdain the people.

If the Democrats had put their energy into delivering for the people Trump wouldn’t even have a chance in 2024. He shouldn’t have a chance. You’ve had power for four years. From the fabricated Steele Dossier to taking him off the ballot in both Maine and Colorado. The Democrats have become the anti-democrat party.

All we need now is the Republicans to come out as the pro-monarchist party.

Ladies and gentlemen, populism is not a threat to democracy. But I’ll tell you what is. It is elites ordering social media to censor political opponents.

It’s police shutting down dissenters, be it anti-monarchists in this country or gender-critical voices here. Or last week in Brussels, the National Conservative movement.

I’ll tell you what is a threat to democracy.

It’s Brussels, D.C., Westminster, the Mainstream Media, Big Tech, Big Pharma, corporate collusion and the Davos cronies.

The threat to democracy comes from those who write off ordinary people as “deplorable”.

The threat to democracy comes from those who smear working people as “racists”.

The threat to democracy comes from those who write off working people as “populists”.

And I’ll say one last thing.

This populist age can be brought to an end at the snap of a finger. All that needs to be done is for elites to start listening to, respecting, and God-forbid, working for ordinary people.

Thank you.

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Stay tuned for a full lowdown of the evening, including what Pelosi was snidely mouthing at me whilst I was speaking…

WM