authoritarian
Iran's death sentence for rapper shows how far it'll go to squelch dissent
There’s no length Iran won’t go to in order to quash dissent. Murder included.
Kate Winslet's 'The Regime' crew forced off set for laughing at her sex scene
“We did have a couple of moments when things would happen that were so funny that people would have to be sent out," Kate Winslet said about her new HBO...
Musk misstep obscures a serious gripe on the ADL's tilt hard-left
Elon Musk stepped in it again over the weekend, elevating the hater-driven hashtag #BanTheADL because he’s peeved at how the Anti-Defamation League joined the lefty drive to kill Twitter’s advertising...
Chinese government to start paying citizens who report 'security violations'
Chinese citizens can soon obtain cash rewards of up to $15,000 for sending tips about "security violations" to the government.
The 17 bizarre things you didn’t know about North Korea
Here are some not-so-well-known facts about the most secretive state in the world, North Korea.
Belarusian sprinter used Google Translate to get help from Japanese cops
Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, 24, slammed her coaches last week for putting her in a relay she hadn’t trained for.
Another Belarus athlete says she won't return to the country out of fear
Former Olympian Yana Maksimava has become the second athlete from Belarus to say they do not want to return to their homeland out fear the country's authoritarian regime will kill...
Belarusian athlete will seek asylum in this country after criticizing regime
Belarusian Olympian Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, will seek asylum in Poland after she refused an order to return home -- claiming she wouldn’t be “safe” in the authoritarian country.
Authoritarianism advances as world battles the pandemic
COVID-19 has absorbed the world’s energies and isolated countries from one another, which may have accelerated the creep of authoritarianism and extremism across the globe, some researchers and activists believe.
Liberal authoritarians like John Brennan are real threat to democracy
Every time former CIA Director John Brennan appears on cable news to warn about some new “insidious threat to democracy,” I am reminded again that he deserves to be in...
2020's 10 most buried stories and other commentary
Media watch: 2020’s 10 Most Buried Stories At RealClearPolitics, retired editor Frank Miele — who used to help choose AP’s top 10 stories of the year — is so fed...
Refugees from tyranny agree: Authoritarian threat in America now is from the left
Left-wing hysterics with major media platforms have for years been shrieking that President Trump is about to install a fascist dictatorship any minute. Meanwhile, unheard immigrants from the Soviet bloc...
Chechen ruler pays thousands to kids who write poems that praise his family
Flattery will get you everywhere in Chechnya -- where the country's brutal, dictatorial ruler is paying thousands of dollars to kids who write poems praising his family, the BBC reports....
Why Twitter flagged Trump and other commentary
Election watch: Why Twitter Flagged Trump In slamming Twitter for fact-checking President Trump, many have ignored the key questions, Liz Peek argues at The Hill: “Why this issue? Why now?”...
Ted Cruz: Social-distancing restrictions are fine -- petty authoritarianism is not
State and local officials across the country, most of the left, are using the crisis to unleash their inner authoritarians; their command-and-control instincts have been on full display.
Beware premature ‘victory’ and other commentary
From the left: Beware Premature ‘Victory’ “Over the past week or so, the direst possible futures for the coronavirus pandemic have seemingly receded” — but “it would be wildly premature...
Bernie Sanders' telling fetish for giving authoritarians credit they don't deserve
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the front-runner for the Democratic nomination for president, is praised by his admirers for being consistent. He’s been saying the same things for 40 years, they...
China's new 'social credit system' is a dystopian nightmare
Imagine calling a friend. Only instead of hearing a ring tone you hear a police siren, and then a voice intoning, “Be careful in your dealings with this person.” Would...
The biggest threat to democracy now comes from the center
"Across Europe and North America, centrists are the least supportive of democracy, the least committed to its institutions and the most supportive of authoritarianism.” So wrote political researcher David Adler...
GOP senator needs guarantee Trump won’t be ‘authoritarian’
Conservative GOP Sen. Mike Lee said he will support Donald Trump — provided he gets a guarantee that the presumptive GOP presidential nominee isn't going to be “authoritarian.” “I would...