From Istanbul, last July, Donald Trump praised China’s leader Xi Jinping … for his authoritarianism.
“Trump added: ‘Well, he runs 1.4 billion people with an iron fist. Smart, brilliant, everything perfect. There’s nobody in Hollywood like this guy.’
“During his four years in the White House, Trump was also known for praising such leaders as Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un….”
I’m no libertarian. I’m a classical liberal.
Which means that I’m for small government. And unalienable rights.
That used to be the core definition of conservative. A Washington Post columnist once called me the second most conservative man in the world (for my gold standard advocacy).
I seem to be among the last remnant of those OG conservatives who still bitterly cling to limited government. If America offers to make me its dictator … maybe I will reconsider. Until then, nyet comrade.
Despite its arduousness, I might become pro-dictator too … if I could get to be the dictator! So, I get why Donald Trump, who loves taking charge and giving orders (as do I!), would praise dictators.
Of course, Donald Trump merrily denies any intention to become a dictator … except to play Dictator for a Day on his first day in office to seal the border and drill baby drill. I believe him.
Donald Trump is a committed bon vivant. Being a dictator is a never-ending, grueling job. One should not expect anyone of his fun-loving disposition to willingly undertake that.
The tide of liberal republicanism goes out and authoritarianism resurges, mainly in the former imperial metropoles. Prominent among them: Mainland China (the Qing dynasty, overthrown by my honorary great-godfather Sun Yat-sen in 1911), Russia (the Czars, a title derived from Caesars, overthrown by the Bolsheviks in 1917), Hungary (co-host of the Austro-Hungarian empire, dissolved in 1918) and the Turkey (the Ottoman Empire, toppled by Mustafa Ataturk in 1924).
Yet now there are demand signals for authoritarianism even in the United States of America. What gives?
Several hundred years ago, there was a big argument between John Locke, an architect of classical liberalism, and Thomas Hobbes (no relation to the stuffed tiger), champion of absolute power vested in the ruler.
Locke, per the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
“Among Locke’s political works he is most famous for The Second Treatise of Government in which he argues that sovereignty resides in the people and explains the nature of legitimate government in terms of natural rights and the social contract. He is also famous for calling for the separation of Church and State in his Letter Concerning Toleration. Much of Locke’s work is characterized by opposition to authoritarianism.”
“The 17th Century English philosopher Thomas Hobbes,” also per the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
“is now widely regarded as one of a handful of truly great political philosophers, whose masterwork Leviathan rivals in significance the political writings of Plato, Aristotle, Locke, Rousseau, Kant, and Rawls. Hobbes is famous for his early and elaborate development of what has come to be known as “social contract theory”, the method of justifying political principles or arrangements by appeal to the agreement that would be made among suitably situated rational, free, and equal persons. He is infamous for having used the social contract method to arrive at the astonishing conclusion that we ought to submit to the authority of an absolute — undivided and unlimited — sovereign power.”
Hobbes assumed that the organic social incentives would guide absolute rulers toward being benevolent dictators. So … what’s not to love about authoritarianism?
As it happens, quite a lot. Let’s recognize the persistent yearning among the rank-and-file — the preterite — for a “strong man” to serve as champion.
Yet let us reflect upon the advice of the first prophet and last judge, Samuel, to Israel. He warned against anointing a king:
“Samuel … said, “These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: … He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves.”
History proved Hobbes wrong. The dictators who replaced the emperors mostly turned out to be genocidal maniacs brutally impoverishing their people and their nations.
Despite Donald Trump’s praise for a leader who “runs 1.4 billion people with an iron fist. Smart, brilliant, everything perfect” failures of authoritarians are legion.
Love Trump as much as you like. I get it.
Yet … let’s learn from Judge Samuel.
And from history.
Ralph Benko, co-author of "The Capitalist Manifesto" and chairman and co-founder of "The Capitalist League," is the founder of The Prosperity Caucus and is an original Kemp-era member of the Supply-Side revolution that propelled the Dow from 814 to its current heights and world GDP from $11T to $94T. Read Ralph Benko's reports — More Here.
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