One of the #Resistance’s favorite conspiracy theories is that Donald Trump is so warm to Russian President Vladimir Putin because Putin has kompromat on Trump, such as a “pee tape.” There’s a far simpler explanation, though, for Trump’s nice words and fond feelings towards Putin: Trump likes and admires dictatorial strongmen.
Trump showed that oppressor-love again Wednesday night when he was asked about North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, who runs his country as a concentration camp, who murders his rivals (including relatives), and who regularly threatens peaceful countries with nuclear war. Isn’t he a “killer” who conducts political “executions,” Fox News host Bret Baier asked?
“Yeah, but so have a lot of other people … done some really bad things,” Trump responded, defending the head of the world’s most oppressive tyranny today.
But it was far worse. Trump just before that explained, “he’s a tough guy. He took over a tough country.” Trump then, it seems, justified Kim’s tendency to have people murdered on the grounds that that was necessary in order for him to take over North Korea. “I mean, that’s one in 10,000 that can do that. So he’s a very smart guy.”
It’s possible to see this as mere mechanical description of Kim’s leadership ability, and not as admiration. That would be a stretch even if these were Trump’s only comments like that. But as part of a pattern of praising strongmen for being strongmen, it’s obvious.
Trump regularly praises Putin as “a strong leader” who has “great control over his country.” He has praised the tactics of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, who has quite a few kills on his record. Even when Trump makes decent points about U.S. foreign intervention — such as pointing out that our regime-change wars in Libya and Iraq were mistakes — he does it in odd terms, saying “we would be so much better off if we had Saddam Hussein and if we had [Moammar] Gadhafi in charge” of Iraq and Libya, presumably.
This praise for brutal leaders who do whatever necessary to exercise control of their countries reflects other things we know about Trump. I’ve called his mindset the “dog park” mindset. Shows of strength earn respect from him. Shows of weakness earn derision. Recall that his criticism of Canada’s Justin Trudeau was how “meek” he was. Recall how Trump won the GOP debates: by acting like an overbearing blustering boor. He would talk over other candidates not to say anything — he usually had nothing to say — but to simply establish that he, Donald Trump, had the right to talk, and the others did not. He would “counterpunch” with irrelevant criticisms just to make the other guy feel pain for messing with him.
So does Trump’s dogpark, might-makes-right talk matter?
Yes, for a few reasons.
First, the dogpark behavior by our president coarsens our culture, by setting an uncivilized example and habituating our people to boorishness.
Second, the praise emboldens the foreign strongmen in their brutality. Even the leader of the U.S., which normally lectures everyone on human rights, acknowledges that my brutality is necessary.
Finally, and maybe most importantly, this strongman streak is showing up in how Trump runs the government. Look at this creepy mural in a detention center for immigrant children.
Starting to get some handout photos from our tour with @HHSGov.
Here’s the Trump mural I mentioned to @chrislhayes inside the shelter for incarcerated child migrants.
Also their beds and the towels they shower with. pic.twitter.com/EPEQ1VGAAF
— Jacob Soboroff (@jacobsoboroff) June 14, 2018
And take a step back: He’s launched a massive detention center for immigrant children as part of “zero tolerance policy” towards illegal immigrants.
Now Trump’s not going to become Putin or Duterte, much less Kim. He doesn’t have the power to execute drug dealers. We have federalism, a rule of law, a Constitution, all of which constrain Trump.
Still this talk is bad. The president’s rhetoric has an effect on his supporters. To the extent he talks up strongman methods in this country, he shapes the character of the American people, and not in a way befitting a free people. Thanks to this trait of Trump, alone, we could be a far worse country when Trump leaves office than we were when he entered.
