President Donald Trump’s worldview essentially consists of dividing countries into two camps: those whose leaders flatter him or kowtow to his demands and those whose leaders balk at such subservience.

In this view, dictatorships — even avowed enemies of the United States — are fine, as long as they play the game. This is not new in American politics. It echoes the famous quote attributed to Franklin D. Roosevelt about Nicaragua’s military dictator, Anastasio Somoza Garcia, who ruled the country from 1936 until 1956 (when he was assassinated): “He may be a son of a b****, but he’s our son of a b****.”