Through an opinion article in the Dutch Daily NRC (August 3, 2018) written by Ian Burama, editor in Chief of the New York Review of Books, I found the original as it was published on July 9, 2018 in the Review of Books. It is attached to this entry. I quote:
"What was unimaginable only a few years ago – a US president insulting democratic allies and praising dictators, or calling the free press “enemies of the people,” or locking up refugees and taking away their children – has become almost normal now. When will it be too late to sound the alarm? What was unimaginable only a few years ago – a US president insulting democratic allies and praising dictators, or calling the free press “enemies of the people,” or locking up refugees and taking away their children – has become almost normal now. When will it be too late to sound the alarm?"
Comparisons are always controversial but some basics are less so. They are well known: Humiliate people; turn them into an evil category and ridicule what they are doing. Dictators who abhorr the truth, try to abolish it. Fake News is such a term. Beware. Tactics like the ones used by populists of the Trump kind are a danger to the survival of democracy.