I asked yesterday knowing you wouldn’t answer right away. If he was an “authoritarian” he wouldn’t be held accountable by the certain checks and balances we have in this country.
Authoritarian describes a system of rule in which power is concentrated in a leader or a small group, and political competition, civil liberties, and checks on that power are limited or absent.
In political science, an authoritarian regime typically has these features:
• A single party, a military, or a personal ruler holds decisive power and is not regularly accountable to voters through free, fair, competitive elections.
Just to add there have been several congressional votes to strip Trump of his authority to end this conflict. They failed and voted for Trump to keep his authority. So much for your “authoritarian” labels
Thanks for answering. I didn't say the U.S. is an authoritarian regime, I was talking about Trump. I already said there are checks to his power, he is constrained. My claim when I say that he is authoritarian has more to do with his personality, not what he
can do, not exactly. But again I say that many feel he has exceeded his constitutional powers - it can at least be debated. You contest the point and that's totally fine. The reason I included some quotes and alleged quotes was precisely to highlight the authoritarian impulse in him. It remains to be seen if in the future there are attempts to impeach him on the grounds of having exceeded his bestowed powers. Let's suppose he is unseated, just to play with the idea, will you then acknowledge he acted unconstitutionally? Probably not, and that's fine too.
I've already said in realpolitik you talk to your "enemies," you sometimes cooperate with them. However, I think his admiration of these figures is "real." Him admiring strength and unchecked power comes through in his speech all the time. Al Jolani was Al Qaeda leader fighting Americans in Iraq. What did Trump say about him? He said, "he has a
strong past" LOL. Putin is strong, Xi looks strong, Erdogan is strong and powerful. Other people don't describe them like this, they say they are dictators. Furthermore, as I've said numerous times also, I'm not exactly against authoritarianism, although I think it's probably a bad idea if Trump's power is unchecked.
It's ridiculous of you to claim I couldn't answer 'right away.' I've written all these things about his authoritarianism several times before, it didn't require any thinking or research. Everything in that post is just repeating myself. Now this reply I'm writing 5 minutes after waking up. Although I'm at home most of the time I still have other things to do and our time zones don't match. I could say you didn't answer right away either because you couldn't.
