On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century

by Timothy Snyder

In 2016, an American presidential candidate claimed on a Russian propaganda outlet that American “media has been unbelievably dishonest.” He banned many reporters from his rallies, and regularly elicited hatred of journalists from the public. Like the leaders of authoritarian regimes, he promised to suppress freedom of speech by laws that would prevent criticism. As president, he used the word lies to mean facts not to his liking, and called journalists enemies of the people (as Hitler and the Nazis had done). Where the Nazis said “Lügenpresse,” he said “Fake news.” That president was on friendlier terms with the internet, his source for erroneous information that he passed on to millions of people.

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