Perhaps the old leftwing coalition of moralist progressives and Democratic Christian groups was just a more explosive mixture than anything we have today.

FORBES: Obama and the Populists

Leftwing politicians including the opposition Socialist party have called for Lombard to stand down, after a 51-year-old France Telecom employee committed suicide last week.

CNN: France Telecom replaces deputy chief amid suicide storm

Back then, populism was an odd mix of progressivism and Christianity and leftwing grassroots deeply wound to both organized labor and the teetotaler movement.

FORBES: Obama and the Populists

There are leftwing parties in India, but the country has trended toward free market capitalism for two decades and is not likely to reverse course.

FORBES: America Will Survive ObamaCare

Storytelling in politics is important, as the populists themselves knew back when there was such a thing as a leftwing populist movement in America.

FORBES: Elizabeth Warren and the Liberal Narrative

This past weekend showed that the leftwing Social Democrats and Greens are gaining influence in what has become the most powerful decision making nation in the European Union.

FORBES: Merkel's Defeat and the EU Sovereign Debt Crisis

Leftwing protesters - who almost certainly voted for him in December's landslide poll victory - yelled abuse at the President and his wife as they walked through the capital, Brasilia, towards Congress.

BBC: Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva

Only a month ago, the only argument among nearly all journalists, pundits and leftwing politicians was whether the U.S. economy would stop at a recession or tumble all the way down the tubes to a 1930s-style depression.

FORBES: Hero Friday: Contrarians

But the risk remains that Pier Luigi Bersani, leader of the Democrats, would be unable to preserve his party's unity if, as Mr Monti has indicated, the price of such a coalition would be to ditch his more leftwing allies.

CNN: Berlusconi in pact with rightwing League