The reason I agree with Martin's assessment is that Orban has survived two genuine elections after returning to power in 2010. There's no overwhelming need for him to go full Putin -- he's doing well enough as it is. He's also more experienced than any current European leader save Germany's Angela Merkel; surely he realizes that if he goes overboard, the opposition will eventually unite and, with the support of liberals in the EU, mount a more convincing bid against him. His skill lies in staving off that threat while grabbing as much power as he can; he uses a scalpel where Putin has long wielded an axe.
Leonid Bershidsky is a Bloomberg View columnist. He was the founding editor of the Russian business daily Vedomosti and founded the opinion website Slon.ru.
This column was provided by Bloomberg News.