Hal Brown's Substack (fomerly Hal Brown's Blog)

October 21, 2025

I'm not the only one comparing Trump to other dictators, despots, and tyrants. Thom Hartmann lays it out today. I have a few things to add. By Hal M. Brown

I don’t know if this video I used Grok to make will work. Give it a try:

Frequently a few Substackers and others write about something that I wanted to write about, often better than I could, thus leaving me without much - or anything - to add. This was the case with Thom Hartmann this morning with a few things I wanted to say.

All I really could do was use Grok (for the first time, having previously used Perchance AI) to make my illustration. I got the idea from Hartmann’s AI illustration. In all modesty I think the image I used is more evocative than the one he used.

This is Thom Hartmann’s Substack:

I have one quibble with Thom’s introduction:

Trump and his people, with all their strut and swagger, want you to think he’s the most powerful man in America and will continue in power indefinitely. Don’t believe it.
The reason he’s rushing so hard and fast to spread his secret, masked police across American cities while mobilizing the military against civilians is precisely because he’s so extraordinarily weak.

Of course Trump, being mortal, won’t remain in power indefinitely. I’m 81 and nobody knows who will die first. However, one of us will and I hope it’s him. This doesn’t mean I will live to see him dethroned, or whatever term will describe his loss of power. It also doesn’t mean that an authoritarian America without Trump will suffer a defeat like the Nazis did following D-Day.

I agree with Thom that Trump is working as fast as possible to instill fear. I do not see him as extraordinarily weak. He has some weaknesses. Many of them are in his psychopathology. The primary non-psychological weakness is that just more than half the population is against his turning the country into an authoritarian oligarchy. Measured against that is the awesome strength that he has his with his command of the Federales, his Gestapo, his SS, who so far are willing to act as his enforcers.

Here’s more Hartmann:

Trump, in fact, is pretty much unique among both modern and historic figures who rode elective office to power and then turned their nations into dictatorships. Nonewere as weak as Trump is today when they succeeded in consolidating enough power to eliminate their challengers and lock down the populace. All had a massively larger base.

He goes on to give a brief history lesson about Putin, Orbán, Hitler, Mussolini, as well as Fujimori , who succeeded in destroying democracy in Peru, and Bukele who did the same in El Salvador.

I don’t know what Thom Hartmann is really feeling when he concludes as follows:

So, take heart. The No Kings marches proved both Trump’s widespread unpopularity and the fearlessness of an American public echoing over two centuries of our nation standing up to tinpot despots and wannabe dictators.
We Americans have never tolerated a king or a dictator, and we’re not about to start now.

Is he as pessimistic as I am but trying to keep our spirits up?

I don’t know. I plan to ask him when we see him in a second planned get-together in his Portland studio. This will be in the Spring. We have this opportunity thanks to a are donation we made to Free Speech TV.

Addendum:

Hartmann also had this published in the subscription RawStory+:

He concluded with another optimistic note which, I am sure, is meant to be inspitational.

Democracy is not defended by hashtags. It’s defended by hands, millions of them, building, voting, organizing, and refusing to quit when the cameras are gone.
The No Kings Day marches were righteous and inspiring. But history will not remember the crowd: it will remember what the crowd built.
If we want a nation of citizens and not subjects, we must do the slow, steady, unglamorous work of taking back our republic, one precinct, one institution, and one election at a time.
Volunteer for your local Democratic Party and become a precinct committeeperson. Join Indivisible. Run for local office and participate with local pro-democracy organizations. Show up.
That is the revolution worth marching for.

October 20, 2025

What's the difference between a king, a dictator, and a tyrant? I suggest the next national protest be renamed No Dictators, or better yet, No Tyrants.

This story has been given a lot of coverage. Here’s the HUPPOST story about it.

This should elicit a “well, duh, this ought to be obvious you brainwashed eejit” response and need no explanation.

This means you Megan McCain and everyone else saying this. Her’s what she tweeted with a few replies. (You can read all of them here.)

For the one person who may stumble on this Substack I searched the question “what’s the difference between a king and a dictator?” and this is what came up on the AI search assist:

If you’ve been reading my recent Substacks about the No Kings protests

here

you know I noted that Indivisible is offering both No Kings and No Dictators signs.

You also saw Ann and I with the custom made signs I ordered for the No Kings protests we went to.

I didn’t depict Donald Trump as Hitler. I just put orange hair on a drawing I found on a poster that said No Fascism and changed that to Hitler.

There are signs that make it clear the the Hitler referenced is Donald Trump. (They are simple to make thanks to the Hitler making the Charlie Chaplin toothbrush mustache infamous.)

None of this bullshitting would have happened if Indivisible hadn’t named their protests “No Kings.” I’d speculate that at the time of the first No Kings protest on Trump’s birthday, June 14th, there may have been discussion as to what to call it. Wikipeda says:

The No Kings protests, also known internationally as the No Dictators or No Tyrants protests, is a series of demonstrations, largely in the United States, against what the organizers describe as authoritarian policies of Donald Trump and corruption in his administration^.Protests took place on June 14, 2025 (labelled as No Kings Day by the participants), on the same day as the U.S. Army 250th Anniversary Parade and Trump’s 79th birthday. Further No Kings protests took place on October 18, 2025.

In countries with constitutional monarchies such as Canada and the United Kingdom, the alternate “Dictators” or “Tyrants” titles were favored over “Kings” to avoid confusion with anti-monarchic movements; Hawaii did the same to avoid confusion with a King Kamehameha Day parade held on the same day.

Looking back I certainly understand why the stronger “No Dictator” or “No Tyrant” name wasn’t used. Trump had not demonstrated fully implemented his ruthless and cruel dictatorial intentions. We can, with considerable justification, use the more evocative, though some may say, inflammatory, term “Hitlerian.”

My preference is that the next national protest not be called “No Kings.” I prefer “No Tyrants” over “No Dictators” primarily because it has been used less frequently. I find it a harsher sounding word as well. The term tyrant also fits a duly elected president who becomes tyrannical:

Dictator and tyrant are both terms used to describe individuals who hold absolute power and exercise it in an oppressive or authoritarian manner. However, there are subtle differences between the two. A dictator is typically someone who seizes power through force or manipulation and rules with absolute authority, often without any legal or constitutional basis. They tend to concentrate power in their own hands and suppress any opposition or dissent. On the other hand, a tyrant is someone who abuses their power and uses it to oppress and exploit the people they govern. While a dictator may have initially gained power through undemocratic means, a tyrant can also emerge within a democratic system, gradually eroding freedoms and rights. Ultimately, both dictators and tyrants are characterized by their disregard for the well-being and rights of their subjects. Reference with more explanation