In celebrated bastions of democracy, an unlikely club of 'dissimilar' leaders

In this holiday season, let’s do the lazy thing and see what another commentator wrote about the prime minister last summer. “His mission he says is to restore (his country’s) faith in itself, to battle...‘effete and desiccated and hopeless’ defeatism.” And yet, “To many, (he) is … the embodiment of the demise of public standards and the face of ... post-truth politics ... To his most vehement critics, he is … a charlatan who lied his way to the top, who endangers democracy … and who believes in nothing but his own advancement … He is leading his country through the most radical reshaping of its economy (and) electoral map …”
 
Our commentator noted: “His argument for patriotic optimism