Donald Trump’s inner dictator starts to stir

It is of course nonsense to describe Donald Trump as a fascist or a dictator, as his opponents like to do. And yet… well, he does sometimes rather invite it. 

There was his inaugural address in which he dusted off the ‘America first doctrine’ – as used by the isolationist, anti-Semitic group that urged the US to appease Nazi Germany. Then there is his interventionist strong-arming of companies to keep jobs in America. And on Saturday he stood at the CIA headquarters, in front of a wall commemorating the organisation’s fallen heroes, and boasted of the number of times he has appeared on the cover of Time magazine.

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Now comes a proclamation declaring the day of his inauguration as ‘National Day of Patriotic Devotion’. It was apparently one of the first things he signed after entering the Oval Office on Friday.