strongman

These glaring differences aside, Trump does seem to admire Xi’s strongman image.

The person setting all this in motion is a Harkonnen, a name associated in the movie “Dune”-iverse with violent strongman rulership and all-purpose villainy.

To scholars of authoritarianism, asserting a high degree of personal control over the military is typical of global strongmen in the mold of Syria’s Bashar Assad or Russian President Vladimir Putin.

But even a strongman may discover that there are limits to what he can do.

Even strongmen, such as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, lost ground in an election that many experts assumed would be a rousing coronation.