It’s a super exciting weekend here in DC, in which we all get to play with tanks and guns and pretend we are GI Joe, led by our very manly Defense Secretary, Pete “Becky with the Good Hair” Hegseth and our even manlier Birthday Boy POTUS, Donald “Sephora Tween” Trump. After briefly considering attending the festivities dressed as a taco-eating drag queen, I will not be using the free, limited quantity passes I reserved and instead will attend my local No Kings protest.
Many observers have remarked on the parade’s strong dictator vibe, emblematic of a cult of personality Trump has cultivated for years. Having grown up under an African dictator—the literal gold standard of dictators—I will tell you the next stages of this process will include Trump’s picture in every home and business in America, a reverent nickname that is chanted by schoolchildren everywhere he goes, and a bejeweled scepter of some kind.
It’s all got me thinking that maybe I should form a personality cult. While actual dictatoring has always sounded like far too much work, getting a bunch of people, or even just a small circle, to worship you sounds somewhat appealing. True, even members of this community offering complimentary feedback kind of makes me uncomfortable (but sure beat the alternative!), I would be fine with everyone reinterpreting all the stupid stuff I say as some kind of brilliantly insightful commentary on the meaning of life. Or insisting my 13 minute/mile jogging pace is very fast. Or just laughing at all my jokes.
To this end, political scientist Brian Klaas has very helpfully written a how-to guide for building a cult of personality, and I think I’m doing pretty well working through this already.
Make yourself inescapable. I feel I excel at this, although certainly not in comparison to say
, who writes and broadcasts near daily and projects lasers everywhere, or many members of , which is at risk of accidentally becoming a 24 hours news channel (I am not complaining, just saying). But I am subjecting the world to my widespread social media presence, spouting my mouth off on any number of topics, making mid-quality videos, and putting amateurish art in an increasing number of homes and Congressional offices (more below). I am beginning to get sick of myself, which I think is a good sign. Still I am nowhere near the level of a professional like the former leader of Togo, Gnassingbé Eyadéma:[He] made his country’s civil servants purchase a “magic watch.” Every thirty seconds, the black face would change, revealing a portrait of the dictator in full military attire, complete with his name and rank.
I would never do something so ridiculous like that. I’m just asking you to preorder my book. Unlike Kim Jong Un’s multiple books, I actually wrote mine.
Cultivate a Superhuman Mystique. Escaping death seems to be key here, and Trump got to check this off his dictator bingo card with the assassination attempt last year. I have nothing that dramatic to offer, but I did survive 7 years—including the entirety of middle school-- in a boarding school, as well as a toe surgery performed by a safety-pin wielding teenager under zero anesthesia. Not to mention all the vacations I have been on with my children. I feel I have this covered.
Create a Pseudo Ideology. The purpose of this is to masquerade poor performance as the advancement of a movement or in service to a larger cause. So, for instance, Trump’s stupidity on trade=Putting America first. I’ve got this one on lock. My pseudo ideology is that intentional self-humiliation builds community and creates joy. It is a brilliant cover for the fact that I unintentionally humiliate myself on a daily basis.
Use Cult of Personality as a Loyalty Test. Here’s Klaas:
The ancient Greek philosopher Xenophon wrote of that inescapable problem of tyranny: “It is never possible for the tyrant [I will add—or the person raised in a boarding school] to trust that he is loved.” That creates an information problem for despots: if everyone pretends to love you, how can you figure out who’s telling the truth? …The cult of personality offers a solution…By giving individuals opportunities to debase themselves through repeating outlandish lies that are obviously untrue, dictators get a clear signal of zealotry.
This one is a problem for me, because, while I have nailed the underlying insecurity, I am in fact a terrible liar and have a tremendous amount of guilt and shame, and if you don’t believe me, you can ask any one of my polygraphers over my years in the CIA, to whom I voluntarily confessed every single remotely bad thing I have ever done in my life.
The good news is you can build a personality cult without being a horrible person. See Oprah, Bono, Taylor Swift, and any number of other celebrity types. The tricky thing is, once you fully buy into the personality cult mystique, you usually become a horrible person. Benevolent personality cult leaders always at least pretend to resist the idea that they have one and keep up at least a humble schtick. I feel I could pull that off, I’m really good at pretending to be humble. But you do also have to genuinely be ultra-talented though.
In sum, I feel like I have a decent shot at building a personality cult. My dog is already fully bought in, although it’s often difficult to discern who is in whose personality cult.
The last question I suppose is what I plan to do with my personality cult, and I feel my goals are pretty modest. I have no need of vast amounts of political power or wealth. But I would like to trade a small public’s adoration of me for these specific, achievable1 items that do not include any form of a parade:
A trad wife (minus the sex. I am not that kind of cult leader)
The eradication of mosquitos2
A generous travel budget
There are a few other things, but let’s not get too ambitious. Ambition=work=no thank you.
Today marks six months since I walked out the CIA for the last time. I have not looked back. I don’t know if I had a great idea of what to expect from my new life, but I don’t think I envisioned the amount of protesting and other activism I’ve ended up doing. I knew Trump 2.0 would be bad, but it’s been much worse than anticipated. I feel grateful to be free to do what I can to push back. And I am super grateful for the people I’ve befriended along the way. I feel like I am already a member of another “workplace” community, and a pretty damn good one.
This week, that included working on my art and delivering pieces to six Republican Senators who have voiced concern for the fate of Medicaid in this Bombastic Butt-ugly Budget-busting Bill (Marshall—KS, Collins—ME, Tillis—NC, Justice and Capito—WV, Cassidy—LA).
The best part is I inadvertently became a participant in Seersucker Day on the Hill with my choice of wardrobe and was repeatedly mistaken for a Senate staffer.


If YOU would like to make your own art, I made this How To video. Perhaps you could deliver one to your Representative’s local office. On second thought, I’ve decided to keep the message on the art less pointed/more generally patriotic (the Preamble is great), then write the more specific message on the back. That way, maybe it’s less confrontation/more likely to get them to connect a particular cause/position with something they at least purport to believe in. But I have no real idea what I’m doing. What do you think?
All joking aside, stay safe out there, folks. Things are getting progressively more risky as our wannabe dictator comes into his own.
Grace and peace, friends. Go well. Godspeed.
I am not including the wholesale defeat of MAGA because I think that might actually involve becoming a cult leader that does real work.
This is totally achievable by the way, people just won’t do it. As cult leader, I will convince people.
I’m pretty sure there’s a watch enthusiast at The Bulwark who would buy a Holly Berkley Fletcher dictator watch.
I would love for you to make cards or postcards of your Dear Senator picture. I'd definitely buy them and send them to every one of our Senators, including my Ohio state senators.