Rainbow Coalition

September 1, 2004 3:54 AM

The world's ten worst dictators -- this year anyway. Saddam, who was No. 3 Worst last year, has dropped off the list. Charles Taylor of Liberia (No. 4), also out of power and gone. Moammar Gadhafi (previously No. 8) and Belarus' Alexander Lukashenko (No. 10) also miss the new A list not because, according to the compilers, "they have improved but because other dictators have gotten worse."
posted by jfuller (20 comments total)

Good to see they aren't as starry eyed over China as the Olympics were last month...
posted by PenDevil at 3:58 AM on September 1, 2004

ok, so Castro is worse than Mugabe and GWB isn't on the list at all ;-)

Crap article - Is a proper breakdown about anywhere of how they came to their conclusions?
posted by twistedonion at 4:27 AM on September 1, 2004

> Crap article -

Hey, don't look down your nose at the Hindustani Times. Belfast is third-world too.

They blow up policeman, or so I have heard,
And blame it on Cromwell and William the Third


> Is a proper breakdown about anywhere of how they came to their conclusions?

from the linked article:

"the list, compiled by dictator-watcher David Wallechinsky in collaboration with Amnesty International, Freedom House, Human Rights Watch and Reporters Without Borders..."

If I can find a link to the original publication I'll post it but it won't be until later, since I'm just heading for work where I'm locked out of the scurrilous, subversive, pr0nographic blue by my employer's ever-vigilant netnanny.
posted by jfuller at 4:47 AM on September 1, 2004

Original?
posted by magullo at 4:48 AM on September 1, 2004

I want to hear the article read aloud by Casey Kasim.
posted by ParisParamus at 4:59 AM on September 1, 2004

Hehe.

Nice to see Saparmurat Niyazov of Turkmenistan in there - an ally in the War Against Terror™. I feel he'll be making a lot of airplay in the coming years.
posted by Blue Stone at 5:04 AM on September 1, 2004

And here's a rebuttal from China. Fair'n'balanced'r'us.
posted by jfuller at 5:07 AM on September 1, 2004

ok, so Castro is worse than Mugabe

The link above goes to the third and final page of the article. Here's page one. (Castro comes after Mugabe.)
posted by jpoulos at 5:59 AM on September 1, 2004

I was dissing the article, not the Hindustani Times - the article was quoting a British paper (the sun) no?

And I have even less time for that paper.

As for living in the third world - If owning a car, TV, DVD player, three computers, mobile phone etc etc etc and being on a below average salary makes me third world then so be it.

I agree with you about the blame thing (to a degree, everyone needs an enemy). Not wanting to hijack this thread but I was having a discussion with a friend about this... Is there any other nation of people whose national day celebrates a 300 odd year old war?
posted by twistedonion at 6:04 AM on September 1, 2004

Cheers for that other link magullo, reads much better. Couldn't understand how Castro could possibly be worse than Mugabe. Doh!
posted by twistedonion at 6:11 AM on September 1, 2004

Omar Al-Bashir (Sudan)- responsible for the 20-year civil war that that has claimed two million lives and rendered four million homeless. He also routinely bombs civilians, tortures and massacres the non-Muslims.

...

President Fidel Castro (Cuba)- has recently arrested 75 human-rights activists, journalists and academics, sentencing them to 19 years' jail on average.


Well, it seems that the definition of "worst" cuts a broad swath these days.

Still, the more people talk about this in any forum, the better. There are a lot of monstrous people in the world.
posted by mkultra at 7:00 AM on September 1, 2004

I think worst is really hard to quantify. For example:

Dictator A: killed 10,000 civilians between 1988 and 2004.
Dictator B: arrests and tortures thousands of people for speaking out against the government every year since 1920.
Dictator C: personally raped and killed 10 babies this year.
posted by crazy finger at 7:20 AM on September 1, 2004

Turkmenbashi is really going to have to work to play some catch up for next year's list. Number Two with a bullet!
posted by briank at 7:23 AM on September 1, 2004

More on Turkmenbashi:

He is infamous for declaring July 10 a public holiday in honour of melons - one of the country's main exports - and April 27, Horse Day. He has banned beards because of his suspicion of Islamic fundamentalists and ballet because he deems it unnecessary. Circuses are also prohibited.

He renamed January after himself, and April after his late mother, Gurbansoltanedzhe, who is also portrayed as Justice in a statue outside the Orwellian "Ministry of Fairness".

From here.
posted by johnny novak at 7:57 AM on September 1, 2004

Casey Kasim: Moving from Number 6 to Number 1, with a bullet...
posted by ParisParamus at 8:14 AM on September 1, 2004

Is there any other nation of people whose national day celebrates a 300 odd year old war?

Sorry, 200 is the best we and the French could do. Latin America is closing in on 200 as well...

Anyway, back to the article, I hardly see how Castro's arrest of 75 makes him top ten on the year, I mean jeez, there's got to be worse? How about Assad in Syria? What about Musharraf?
posted by Pollomacho at 9:28 AM on September 1, 2004

I don't thinked they're actually ranked (at least, I didn't see numbers on the article).

but ParisParamus, you made me laugh
posted by weston at 9:37 AM on September 1, 2004

I don't thinked they're actually ranked

Yeah, they are. The article says "The world's worst dictator as per rank:"
posted by the cuban at 10:23 AM on September 1, 2004

PP, you misspelled Kasem, and I know that's a dig on his public support of undemocratic Arab regimes, but still, Ryan Seacrest is doing the American Top 40 these days, and besides, David Letterman should be doing this as one of his Top 10s. That would be edgy comedy.

And, weston, if you start from the right page, they're listed the same on both the Parade list from February and the Sun/HT list.
posted by wendell at 10:33 AM on September 1, 2004

Ranking dictators isn't easy.

Here's a thought problem: nowadays, we can easily call Hitler a dictator, but only for the *totality* of his career, and in retrospect. Not knowing what you know now, how would you have rated Hitler in each of his years of power? Starting in 1933? 1934? etc.
If you think of 1938, when Germany annexed western Czechoslovakia, you might consider that just before Germany acted, both Poland and Hungary took chunks out of Czechoslovakia, too.

I would add that Hitler intentionally created confusing and overlapping authority in his subordinates, but personally limited what he tried to direct himself--unlike Stalin, who literally tried to run the entire Soviet Union "by memo" from his desk.
posted by kablam at 12:10 PM on September 1, 2004