I think the American public had made a very big gamble very big risk with giving so much power to Trump let's kind of start with what do you think uh power is in the year 2025 Trump defines power as fear Trump says power is fear what do you think power is well the question is what do you do with power do you use power just to gain more power or do you try to use power in order to change the world for the better uh in order to improve people's lives and that's always the big
question in politics unfortunately at the present moment we have too many politicians who think about power as just a means to gain more power sure and this has always been the danger in democracy you know for thousands of years going back to ancient democracies democracy is a system in which you give power to somebody right on condition that after 4 years or so they give it back and the public can make another decision did you use your power wisely and compassionately for four years okay then we give it again or if not we give it
to somebody else the question is always what happens if you give power to somebody who doesn't want to give it back they now have all the power say they can use it to just stay in power and I think the American public had made a very big gamble very big risk with giving so much power to Trump who already proved that uh he wants to stay in power at all costs right so we will see what happens and why do you think they did that why what what was the reason that Trump won in this
incredibly uh you know I mean just very definitive way I mean all I mean you know I think what was it 8 million more people voted for him now than he did the last time so I don't know I'm not an expert on American society or politics so yeah what I was trying to get you to talk about really was the trend of populism is it a trend GL absolutely you see it across across the world you know now we saw in South Korea what was happening that you see again leaders all over the world
that are more interested in power and staying in power than in serving the people and doing good but why why do we see this happening so often in so I me the the the trend populist political movements are not new they've been happening around the world all the time mhm what is the one thing that kind of provokes that uh if you look back in history and even the present tense is there one is there one common thing that provokes a popularist mov um I think at at the heart of populism there is a distrust
of humanity a distrust of human beings right um you see it both on the radical right and also on the radical left they have different ideas about many things but one thing unites them it is thinking that the only reality is power right and that all human interactions are power struggles right they don't believe populists that humans and human institutions really care about the truth in the populist imagination when I'm now talking with you this is a power struggle everything we say is just trying to manipulate each other or to manipulate the viewers right so
the question to ask whenever you hear somebody says something the question to ask is not is it true what is the evidence the question to ask is who is winning right who is gaining power whose interests are being served this view of humanity as if all humans are power crazy demons this erodes trust in human beings it erodes Trust in institutions in the media in University in courts people think oh these are just conspiracies of people to gain power and if you lose trust in all institutions democracy collapses democracy functions based on trust right if
there is no trust the only system that can still function is a dictatorship right because dictatorship is is built on terror not on trust you need to frighten people not make them Trust trust now the main thing to say about this populist worldview is that it's not just very cynical it's simply wrong yes humans are interested in power to some extent but every human being also has an authentic deep yearning for the truth we really want to know the truth about the world right why because if you don't know the truth about life you will
never be happy correct uh because you don't know what are the true sources of your misery even if you are the most powerful person in the world if you don't know the truth about life you will waste all your power trying to solve the wrong problems correct and we should start life we should approach the world with a more generous view of human beings and human institutions that yes some human beings are corrupt there are problems some sometimes people lie but this is not the the basic situation of humanity
