Bill Maher had dinner with President Trump over the weekend. He had a fine time with him. Maher went on his show to tell his audience he is going to be bring the hard truth: President Trump is a fun hang at a private dinner.
In an opinion piece, Leon Krauze for the Washington Post lists examples of people visiting dictators and strongmen, and coming away charmed:
Herbert Matthews of the New York Times traveled to the Cuban mountains to interview Fidel Castro, then a little-known guerrilla leader. The reporter came back enthralled. “The personality of the man is overpowering,” Matthews wrote.
Joseph Stalin was remembered by close comrades such as Nikita Khrushchev as a man who could be jovial in private settings, telling jokes and singing Georgian folk songs late into the night — just before ordering purges that would cost thousands of lives.
Richard M. Nixon and Henry A. Kissinger were both startled during their historic 1972 visit to China: Mao joked with them, played with words and made them feel at ease — a deliberate mask concealing one of history’s most devastating authoritarian records.
Maher was charmed by him. I can't imagine Charlie Chaplin having dinner with Adolf Hitler and then being over the moon because Hitler autographed a movie poster of The Great Dictator