Rocky acts as if one's out to be a political authoritarian (7)
I believe the answer is:
fascist
'a political authoritarian' is the definition.
'rocky acts as if one's out' is the wordplay.
'rocky' is an anagram indicator.
'one' becomes 'a' (a thing is one thing).
'out' suggests deleting specific letters.
'acts'+'as'+'if'='actsasif'
'actsasif' with 'a' taken away is 'ctsasif'.
'ctsasif' is an anagram of 'FASCIST'.
'to be' is the link.
(Other definitions for fascist that I've seen before include "on the right wing" , "Right-wing extremist" , "Neo-Nazi" , "Right-wing authoritarian" , "Extreme right-winger" .)