The Lair

In my misspent childhood, I used to read Lucky Luke, the cowboy who could draw faster than his own shadow. In one comic, Lucky Luke and Jolly Jumper (his horse, of course of course) accompany a stagecoach. Unfortunately every single meal served by the stagecoach consists of two things. Bacon and beans. Beans and bacon. Bacon and beans ice cream. Bacon and beans flavoured pancake. The works. Bacon and beans. All day, every day.

Needless to state, that shit gets a bit old. And don’t even talk about the flatulence.

Like an interminable and constant diet of bacon and beans, there is an obsession nowadays with our boy Adolf. Peruse the rantings of the local citizen journo dramaqueens and the hysterical right-wingers and you will see non-ironic invocations of Godwin for pretty much everything. The mustachioed red shawl? Well, he’s Hitler, innit? The chief feline? Yep. He be Hitler too. The most depressing part is that these eejits write serious (and lengthy) comparisons on the theme. They even expect not to be mocked and ridiculed for their tenuous grasp of historical metaphor. It succeeds. Everyone nods their head sagely and comments about the appropriateness of the analogy. Before long, I fully expect dodgy parking attendants, crooked traffic cops and three wheeler dudes to be given their rightful place as worthies of the big H.

Coincide these puny pretenses at historical awareness online with the awakening of the TinyLittleFascist. Interject some truly horrific cases of mistaken dictator identity. (Aside for one-who-need-not-be-named: No. Tomatoes are not dictators. Nor are they fascists. No, not even holy tomatoes or those really red cherry tomatoes. sorry. Haute cuisine of any sort doesn’t qualify either.) Obviously, what is left for me is to build a few links and construct a pocket sized guide to other useful dictator specimens from history. If nothing else, then at least to make people appear more erudite and stop with the Hitler comparisons for everything from their pet political hate to the nasty neighbourhood Rottweiler.

Do I think the Hitler comparisons will stop just because I compiled a few alternatives? I doubt it. I just like to pretend delusional optimism from time to time.

The 30 or so worst blood lettings of the 20th century to begin. Because dictators don’t really need to spill lots of blood to prove their point, but it always helps. It also tends to make it easier to keep score. Clearly, countries with a largish population are somewhat at an advantage here.

In no particular order then, excluding the big H.

Mao Zedong - I can has communist nation nao?
Chiang Kai-Shek - he and Mao had their own little personal battle going on in the late 1940s.
Papa Iosef - Even the subsequent regimes in his USSR skated clear of him. General badass when he was alive. Killed everyone who looked at him funny, including his pet dog.
Dear Leader - kicked off the Korean war. Also killed everyone who looked at him funny, including his pet dog. Dietary habits unknown, but might have included the pet dog.
Idi Amin Dada - the big dadda of African genocide.
Benito Mussolini - fascist? It’s an Italian word.

Actually, screw it. Just go here for ideas. Single source? You no likey? Then just toodle right along to the Dictator Of The Month. Take your pick from the obscure to the downright famous, with scorecards and lots of linky goodness. There is one other thing though. The list of female dictators is surprisingly short. Almost non-existent. Visit this link for one attempt at a list. Not exactly successful, perhaps.

Anyone looking for new TLF relevant nicks, here you go. Or at the very least, some author might find this useful to pick a slightly more obscure class of dictator and genocidal maniac for his next comparison with a present political entity. I’m told that impressionable chicks swarm all over historically aware rabblerousers.

addendum: Micro Mini Marcos derailed my obsessively organized dictator guide by reminding me of the original pocket sized dictator himself. Something to ponder though, not all dictators were brutal bloodthirsty dog eating sorts. There is also Haile Selassie, the emperor of Ethiopia.

Itty Bitty Amin, at your service