Yes, “the underestimation of the bad actor”, a phrase I heard yesterday from New York University Professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat. She is, as you may know, an expert on totalitarian regimes, and author of the terrific and informative book Strongman. The question she was asked was: what are some of the typical things that happen in democratic countries which have turned to some sort of one-man rule? Her answer is the title of this post. And her further explanation was that underestimating the strength, intent or drive (my words) of the potential strongman has been fatal to defending against him.

With all that is going on, it was disheartening yesterday to see the result of a new CBS poll showing that Trump has a 53% approval rating. That is disheartening for two reasons. One is that 53% is a big number, and two, because he didn’t win the election by this large of a percentage. On the other hand, it seems to me that the pollsters worded some of the questions to give a distorted result.

For example, I would have answered yes to the following questions: Is Trump tough? Is Trump energetic? Is Trump focused? Is Trump effective?

Of course, I would have answered yes to those questions if they were asked about Mussolini, Hitler or Stalin.

Trump has scored high on his deportation program. Most Americans approve. But, from what I see in the brief description of the survey I have read, while the deportation program gets high marks, the establishment of “camps” to hold those being deported does not. Yet, even with this question, I wonder. The recipients probably don’t know that, in spite of Trump’s braggadoccio (my word), his deportation numbers are comparable to/lower than Biden’s or Obama’s.

Similarly, there are internal contradictions in the polling results. 54% of Americans like the way Trump is handling Gaza, but only 14% think America should take over and redevelop the Strip.

And, although results are 53% positive overall, 66% think he is not doing enough to reduce prices, only 44% are for tariffs on Mexico, 40% for tariffs on Europe, and 38% for tariffs on Canada. As to DOGE and Musk, I saw results split by party. 74% of Republicans think Musk should have at least some influence on government “operations and spending”, while 70% of Democrats think he should have “not much” or (49%) none.

You can see all the results online. There are several more categories and gradations, but there was also one major omission (at least), in that there were no questions asked about Ukraine or Russia. And none about Trump’s cabinet nominees.

While news is flying about fast and furiously, there may have been a few things that you have missed. Did you know that Trump has issued an Executive Order requiting federal agencies to immediately stop ordering or providing paper straws? And that he wants a national plastic straw development plan put together for the entire country?

And do you know that, clearly for political reasons and nothing else, he has ordered the District Attorney in New York to drop all charges against NYC Mayor Adams? Has nothing to do with guilt or innocence (not even a pretense that it does), but because Trump views Adams as a potential aide leading to his control over his hometown.

And what about American businesses who pay bribes to firms or governments overseas in return for favors? Now, he has made it clear that the Department of Justice is not to bring any prosecutions under those laws. How can Americans become first if we can’t use bribes to throw around our economic weight?

We will see how Trump will react to an increasing number of losses in court. Whether he will obey the courts, ignore the courts, or come up with tricky workarounds. We will see when Republican legislators will finally break with him, if ever. We will see if the Democrats can get their messaging in line, and whether they can come up with the right messengers. We will see a lot.

In the meantime, try to get a copy of Ben-Ghiat’s Strongmen, or Madeleine Albright’s Fascism, Jared Diamond’s Upheaval, or Masha Gessen’s Surviving Autocracy, and see how much you recognize in what they say.