I keep coming back to "all this for literally Donald Trump," but it fits. There's not some more competent aspiring autocrat who'd somehow "earn" or "win" this. This is how it has always gone: feckless/evil elites attaching themselves to the sociopath they believe will get them where they want to go.
Guys like that often have a buffoonish quality. Think of Mussolini or the typical, peacocking African general. Clownish. I don't think it's any more complicated than they appeal to dumb people.
