The Donald Trump–Kaiser Wilhelm Parallels Are Getting Scary

At this point, it is not exactly headline news that America is being “led” (if that is even the right word) by a bizarre and erratic president. Nine months into the Donald Trump administration, all those Republican foreign policy experts who warned he was “unfitted to the office” during the 2016 campaign have been proven right.

This situation may be something of a first for Americans (though some other presidents had their quirks), but plenty of other countries have had to deal with outlandish buffoons (or worse) who somehow made it to high office. Trump is frequently compared to former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, another glib, unscrupulous, lying, preening sexual predator who managed to keep getting elected even though his personal conduct was deplorable and his policies were a disaster. Strutting and corrupt popinjays like Benito Mussolini, Carlos Menem, and Jean-Bédel Bokassa of the Central African Republic come to mind as well, along with other dictators who constructed cults of personality about themselves and treated their countries as a personal possession.