alt Hacker News> Absolutely absurd that we’re at this point.
It's not really, this is the result of having a flawed democratic system.
What do Turkey, Philippines, Russia, Belarus, Hungary, Nicaragua, etc and now US have all in common?
They are ALL presidential or semi-presidential republics where a single person "rules" without needing to face opposition in a parliament nor even requiring support from its own party.
Winner-takes-all democracies, aren't democracies if only part of the electors is represented in the executive.
Presidential republics are super dangerous, they combine the perils of dictatorships with a cherry on the cake of being able to claim popular mandate.
Seriously, it's not a coincidence that the last parliamentary republic to turn into an authocracy has been Sri Lanka 50+ years ago.
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Hungary is a parliamentary republic, Orban is the Prime Minister. Turkey was parliamentary system until was changed in 2017 to presidential system with more power for Erdogan.
I agree about parliamentary systems being better, but they are still vulnerable. It doesn't matter if the electorate is in favor of strongman.
France has arguably the most presidential regime of the OECD, while it's not without faults it's not horrible either. Parliamentary regimes optimize for coalition stability which weakens them and forces to always take the path of least resistance, which isn't usually the best one.