They can never go back. Their candidates must, by the very nature of extremism, get increasingly extreme.
“They can never go back. Their candidates must, by the very nature of extremism, get increasingly extreme.”
Until...
That was the big takeaway from Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom”. Rulers must get more brutal as they make choices that displease others, and those who want to get their way must climb to the top via more and more brutality. So the ultimate end is the likes of Stalin, et al.
And they have no compunction against killing their own people.