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It's Good to be a Dictator (But It's Better to be a King)

And Trump wants to be a king.

Carlyn Beccia
8 min readFeb 25, 2025
It’s Good to be a Dictator (But It’s Better to be a King). And Trump wants to be king.
Henry VIII, Hans Holbein the Younger, 1540 | Public Domain | Trump’s official portrait — Library of Congress | Public Domain

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Donald Trump's latest love affair? Himself, of course. But more specifically, himself as a king.

Trump recently posted on his Truth Social, "LONG LIVE THE KING!" and then repeated his boast on The White House account with an AI-generated image of himself wearing a smug grin and crown perched atop his combover.

Ironically, the same base that collectively shrugged at fascism fell into apoplectic fits over Trump branding himself a king. One future supplicant responded, "i'm a republican who voted trump, but no one man is a king. that's the ideals of our nation, no kings."

The plebs have spoken. A king? No, no, no — they wanted a strongman, a fighter, an authoritarian, not some powdered-orange monarch cosplaying Your Majesty. Ideological consistency is for nerds.

Consequently, many pundits have called Trump a dictator, but a dictator consolidates power by coup or state capture, often suppressing opposition brutally. (See Stalin, Hitler, and Mussolini.)

Trump is trying and failing spectacularly there. Judges have laughed at his…

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Carlyn Beccia
Carlyn Beccia

Written by Carlyn Beccia

Award-winning author of 13 books. My latest: 10 AT 10: The Surprising Childhoods of 10 Remarkable People, MONSTROUS: The Lore, Gore, & Science. CarlynBeccia.com

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