If all you've got is full political power and control over propaganda networks, your won't get the USSR. You'll get Hungary between 2010 and 2026. It works well, but in the critical moments when things start going wrong you need to kill people to maintain power, or else your nascent autocracy collapses as quick as Orban's.
I'm no fun of Stalin, but this meme about 20+ million victims needs to be purged.
"The scholarly consensus affirms that archival materials declassified in 1991 contain irrefutable data far superior to sources used prior to 1991, such as statements from emigres and other informants.
Before the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the archival revelations, some historians estimated that the numbers killed by Stalin's regime were 20 million or higher. After the Soviet Union dissolved, evidence from the Soviet archives was declassified and researchers were allowed to study it. This contained official records of 799,455 executions (1921–1953), around 1.5 to 1.7 million deaths in the Gulag, some 390,000[ deaths during the dekulakization forced resettlement, and up to 400,000 deaths of persons deported during the 1940s, with a total of about 3.3 million officially recorded victims in these categories. According to historian Stephen Wheatcroft, approximately 1 million of these deaths were "purposive" while the rest happened through neglect and irresponsibility. The deaths of at least 5.5 to 6.5 million persons in the Soviet famine of 1932–1933 are sometimes included with the victims of the Stalin era." [0]
Would it be? I'd argue the current US administration is entirely propped up by television. Hell, the president seems to "rule" based on what Fox News said last night.
A slightly different and no more charitable perspective is that the people pulling the president's strings are the same people pulling Fox News's strings.
Let's see, during Stalin's Rule 18 million people went through forced labor camps and roughly 10% died, around 1.8 million
Let's add around 5 million for man made famine, and probably a 2 million for arbitrary executions and deportations, while many estimate the full death count as between 15-20 million
As far I can understand the top range of estimates for CECOT, which is a non American facility, are that 500 died, of around imprisoned 20,000 inmates. So the scale is a bit... different
I think the issue here is that contrary to popular belief, not every wrong thing is the same