Two men of influence — the conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and the politician Boris Johnson — now face media bans and/or ridicule for what they saw as speaking their minds. Both, though quite different in background, manner and actions, are pioneers in the new politics.
In the United States, Jones claims censorship after his podcasts and posts were removed by Facebook, Apple, YouTube and Spotify. In the United Kingdom, former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is under investigation by his Conservative Party for likening Muslim women wearing burqas to letter boxes and bank robbers.
Jones and Johnson work within, indeed work to create and further, the themes and dramas of contemporary populism. Their clout derives from a contemporary form of the centuries-old merging of media and political power.