Find the autocrat: Part 2

The mainstream media have a new favorite word: autocrat (used maybe even more frequently than their other new favorite term: alt-right).

This morning Bloomberg ran as the lead article on its website a piece entitled Modern Democracy Has Plenty of Trump Precedents by one Joshua Kurlantzick. The article argues that Donald Trump is an autocrat (this judgment seems a tad premature since he was elected less than a month ago and has not yet taken office) and compares him to other well-known autocrats around the world.

Mr Kurlantzick starts out:

According to the monitoring group Freedom House, democracy has been on the decline worldwide since the late 2000s, with the rise of elected autocrats — legitimately elected leaders who then undermine democratic institutions and culture — a major reason for freedom’s ebb. ... [These autocrats are] indeed deeply devoted to themselves and their images, making their administrations reliant on their own personal influence. And in office, they usually conform less to policy orthodoxies than politicians with traditional backgrounds.

I cannot think of a better example of someone who undermined democratic institutions, made his administration reliant on his own personal influence, and did not conform to policy orthodoxies than President Obama, who in the last 4 years has attempted to rule unilaterally, through "the pen and the phone," using executive orders and international agreements not submitted to the Senate for ratification, and encouraging his party to employ such unorthodox and undemocratic maneuvers as the reconciliation process and the nuclear option to ram through his legislative agenda and judicial nominees.

Mr Kurlantzick then proceeds to critique the way autocrats use the media:

What else do the elected autocrats have in common? They usually win elections in part by dominating the media, sometimes by buying media outlets or having allies who do so.

Mr Kurlantzick must have in mind the way Hillary Clinton's campaign sought to win the recent election by manipulating the media, for example, by having her plant in CNN, Donna Brazile, supply her with questions that CNN moderators were going to ask during a subsequent debate.

Then, Mr Kurlantzick discusses how autocrats corrupt the civil service:

In office, elected autocrats try to slowly suffocate the civil service, military bureaucracy, and other government networks that are supposed to be apolitical and which normally provide continuity across presidential administrations. They substitute clientelism for professionalism.

Here, Mr Kurlantzick must have in mind the kind of transformation that takes place when an apolitical civil service agency like the IRS is turned into a weapon to target conservative groups.

Mr Kurlantzick concludes with some fantasies from his own imagination:

It’s not hard to imagine that, as president, Trump would vocally attack judges who decided against his administration or try to stack the U.S. Department of Justice with allies whose primary qualification is loyalty.

(In other words, Bloomberg treats as news things that this guy "imagines." How embarrassing.)

Mr Kurlantzick, when you talk about attacking judges, do you have in mind the kind of attack that President Obama made on the Supreme Court when he criticized the Citizens United decision during his State of the Union address (causing Justice Alito to shake his head and mutter "Not true!")? And, when it comes to stacking the Justice Department "with allies whose primary qualification is loyalty," have you ever heard of Eric Holder, Mr Kurlantzick?

In other words, Mr Kurlantzick, if you are looking for autocrats who undermine democracy and do not abide by the rule of law, maybe a better place to start is with the Democrat Party, and President Obama and Mrs Clinton, than with Donald Trump.