Posted on 11/11/2008 12:43:03 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
A revolving gold statue, pink champagne and a "Pleasure Brigade" of nubile retainers all feature in Times Money's list of history's most decadent dictators. While their people suffered, these men - and sometimes their wives and children - agonised over how best to spend their ill-gotten gains...
1. Kim Jong-il, "Dear Leader" of North Korea since 1994. The son of the communist state's "Great Leader", Kim Jong-il has super-expensive tastes, with 17 palaces and collections of hundreds of cars and about 20,000 video tapes. On one state visit to Russia, he reportedly had live lobsters airlifted daily to his armoured private train. He is believed to spend around $650,000 a year on Hennessy VSOP cognac and maintains an entourage of young lovelies known as the "Pleasure Brigade"
Car-buying spree for Kim Jong Il
2. Ferdinand Marcos, President of the Philippines, 1965 - 1986. The Second World War freedom-fighter turned kleptocrat secreted billions of dollars in overseas accounts. His wife Imelda, however, was the big spender, leaving 888 handbags and 1060 pairs of shoes in the Malacanang presidential palace when the family fled mob justice after Marcos was deposed. Her pricier purchases included the $51 million Crown Building and $61 million Herald Centre in New York and art by Michelangelo and Botticelli
Marcos: a headache that won't go away
3. Nicolae Ceausescu, President of Romania, 1967 - 1989. The "Genius of the Carpathians" was congratulated (by telegram) by Salvador Dali on his excesses, which included his use of a kingly sceptre. Despite an official salary of just $3,000, he found the cash for 15 palaces, a superb car collection, yachts, fine art and bespoke suits. Tens of thousands of homes were demolished to make space for his 1,100-room, 480-chandelier Palace of the Parliament in the capital, Bucharest
(Excerpt) Read more at timesbusiness.typepad.com ...
bttt
The Top Ten Dictators? Mussy, Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, Caligua, Disney, Emmanuel, Lucifer, Stalin, and Ronald McD
Saparmurat Niyazov, President of Turkmenistan, 1990 - 2006. The President for Life and "Turkmenbashi", or Father of all Turkmen, was at the centre of an awesome cult of personality. His vanity projects included a £6 million revolving gold-plated statue of himself in the country's capital, Ashgabat. He shifted around £3 billion to overseas accounts, renamed the month of January (after himself), banned beards and ordered that his musings be displayed alongside the Koran in mosques.
Where is Obama’s little fat friend in Venezuela?
Baby Doc Duvallier?
I forgot Baby Doc - should be on the list too.
ping
If we care to get a little historical, some of the Roman and Chinese emperors could give any of these guys a run for the money.
The list is interesting in its omissions: Mao, Hitler, Mussolini, Hugo Chavez, Castro, Pol Pot, the Ayatollah,& I forget the name of that bastard in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe, the thug other thugs in the area emulate, the thug who ravages the area while world watches and yawns.
It is notable by the omissions. Hitler, Pol Pot, not decadent enough to make the list? The others? Interestingly, their ommissions include some big genocidal-maniacs. As though decadence, not mass killings, is the notable quality. They're all decadent, but some are stopped before they can finish and succeed in their complete ravaging of their country.
Jean-Bedal Bokassa
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