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Comment by nickysielicki | Hacker News Reader

> Orbán, the EU’s most autocratic leader […] lost by a decisive margin in Sunday’s vote, amid the highest turnout in Hungary’s democratic history.

What a ridiculous sentence. He’s an autocrat, but he’s out of power after losing a democratic election. Which is it?

Words have meaning.

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It was election, but Hungarian democracy is severely lacking and barely a democracy. A miracle happened, because too many people were too pissed at Orban. That does not make the country non autocratic, it means miracle happened and now new guys has all that power.

haha, a miracle happened, people voted someone out, but its NOT a democracy.

why is it so needed to try paint it as not a democracy when it has CLEARLY proven that it is such

Mostly because I know more about Hungarian system then you. It is was not clearly proven as such. The system is still heavily favoring one party. Just because you can flip who is on top of all stars align and 80% of voters come in mostly does not make it functional democracy worth the name. Orban was able to stay in power so long, because anything less then that would mean he gets all that power again. Opposition media and parties in the country were destroyed long time ago. Judiciary is routinely abused.

Simple as that. Yes, it was pro-democracy, anti-Russia, pro-EU vote. That does not mean Hungary changed over time. It means it has one last chance at reform. If it does not reform, there will be no way to flip it in elections the next time.

And yes, American conservative fans of Orban know all of that - Rubio, Vance, Rod Dreher, Peterson. They loved and admired the arrangement and want to emulate it.

"one last chance to reform", i dont buy it. these things happen, and will happen again. people have been predicting doom for thousands of years, but this time its truly the last!

The favorite can lose a rigged race by accident, but that wouldn't prove it's a fair race.

Yes they do. A kindergardener can lead their kindergarden in an autocratic style. That means they (=auto) decide (=cratos) things and don't e.g. ask others (=demos) in a democratic sense.

Then they can still end up being fired. Autocratic is a style of leadership, and nowhere in the definition does it say autocrats can't be removed from their position of power. Sure, it is hard to remove autocrats once they have consolidated power, but that doesn't mean they are not autocrats before they did.

Whst you do is like calling a fire only a fire if it burns down a house. But that would be too late you know?

I think there's quite a difference between calling someone an autocrat vs an autocratic leader, the latter being more of a characterization of how they are leading, which is I imagine why those words were chosen.

How does an autocratic leader lose an election, can Xi lose an election?

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