In a Saturday piece for The Intercept , columnist Murtaza Hussain argued that Donald Trump led like a “virtual dictator” who played the character of an “anti-corruption crusader” throughout his presidency.
“Although uninspiring and weak as a politician, a job that he scarcely seemed interested in anyway, Trump delivered on his persona as a virtual dictator — to either be adulated or, on the part of his liberal opponents, defeated,” he wrote.
Conversely, the reporter claimed Trump’s opponents on the other side of the political spectrum created a “counternarrative” that drew from the rhetoric seen in recent resistance movements to totalitarianism.
“On both sides, the reality was significantly less dramatic than the stories being told. An actual fascist dictator cannot be beaten by simply being voted out.”
The purported exaggeration of Trump’s authoritarian power was previously noted by journalist Glenn Greenwald , who claimed the president has not come close to the moral evil perpetrated by George W. Bush and Barack Obama. In particular, Greenwald pointed to Bush’s Iraq War and the Obama administration’s aggressive stance on press freedom.
According to Hussain, Trump understood the “psychological needs” of the American public, who he suggested desire excitement amid the boredom of modern society. In the absence of an ability to provide good governance, the reporter said the head of state began to focus on a “constant rhetorical embellishment of reality” that appeased the public’s “insatiable hunger for extreme psychological experiences.”
The columnist doesn’t believe Trump is the only one who feeds the American narrative. With President-elect Joe Biden set to take Trump’s place, Hussain claimed the Democrat will shift the narrative back to where it was prior to Trump’s 2016 win.
“To put it another way, the channel is being changed from The Apprentice back to The West Wing ,” he said.
While the head of state might be on his way out of the White House, he reportedly has his sights set on a Trump television network that would keep him in the limelight. In an op-ed for NBC News , Robyn Autry, chair of the Sociology Department at Wesleyan University, argued that the creation of such a channel could allow the president to harness his many fans and continue pushing the narratives that have defined his presidency and post-election time in the Oval Office.
Autry opined that Trump’s presidency was focused more on creating a spectacle akin to a reality television show and pointed to his frequent connection with fans on social media and in-person events as evidence of such.
