It’s an old, old trick of autocratic rule,” Idaho said. “Alia knows it well. Good subjects must feel guilty. The guilt begins as a feeling of failure. The good autocrat provides many opportunities for failure in the populace.

Over the last 30 years, the forces of autocracy have revived all across the globe. Its hallmarks are familiar ones: contempt for the rule of law, contempt for democratic freedom, contempt for the truth itself.

...Populism tends to look good from a distance, but close up it can be frightening.

It's okay. Everybody's survival looks a little bit like death sometimes.

The experience knows
that the rule of an autocrat cannot last long.

Awakening late to the pandemic, authoritarian or authoritarian-minded leaders have turned it into an opportunity both to shore up their power and to conceal their stunning ineptitude. To fail to see through their manufactured , as many in the media are doing, can only further endanger the long-term moral and political health of their societies.

The speed with which armies collapse, bureaucracies abdicate, and social structures dissolve once the autocrat is removed frequently surprises American Policy makers.

Authoritarianism begins when we can no longer tell the difference between the true and the appealing. At the same time, the cynic who decides that there is no truth at all is the citizen who welcomes the tyrant.

Believe me; democracy in action can be an unpretty sight.

Democracy is beautiful in theory; in practice it is a fallacy. You in America will see that some day.

For 23 years, the country was led by a lowlife who managed to ‘blow dust in the eyes’ of a significant part of the population. Now he is the last island of legitimacy and stability of the state. But the country will not be able to withstand another six years of this cowardly bum in power.