Well, I think its worth remarking on it when people start saying 'Mohammed would do this and that if he were here'.
Who knows what some self-proclaimed prophet from ancient times would do here in the 21st century. We can speculate and guess, that's all.
Well, most people I hear saying things like that are ones with a shallow knowledge of the stuff Mohammad actually did, and it's less a comment about the necessity to frame Mohammad's actions in a historical context and not draw from them and more an argument from the kinds of Muslims who carry "if you kill one it's as if you killed the whole of mankind" and other such phrases on their sleeves and nothing else.
If we plucked Mohammad straight from his age and dropped him here today and tasked him with starting over, it's kind of a ridiculous scenario to even entertain, but we can at least safely assume that he'd have to do a whole lot of things differently if he expected to get any success.
I do actually think the answer you're looking for is in CF's comment, which is that when Mohammad was in a disadvantaged position, he would do little more than mutter and shake his fist, but when he had power, he used it to silence critics the old fashioned way.