The Lincoln Project: God Made a Dictator

Jan 16, 2024 | God said “I need a man who failed in everything but theft and broken promises to live in a golden palace and convince the poor he serves their needs.” So God made Trump.

Execution of Mussolini, Il Duce

Mussolini's grizzly end.
CUSTERMEN.COM: During the last days of the war in Italy, Dictator Benito Mussolini attempted to escape the advancing Allied Army by hiding in a German convoy headed toward the Alps. Partisans stopped and searched the convoy at Dongo. They found him in the back of a truck wearing a private's overcoat over his striped general's pants. The partisans took him prisoner and he was later joined by his mistress, Clara Petacci, at Mezzegra. The council of partisan leaders, lead by the Communists, secretly decided to execute Mussolini and 15 leading Fascists in retaliation. They were executed on April 29, 1945, and their bodies were hung at an Esso gas station in the Piazzale Loreto in Milan. » | Undated

A salutary reminder of the cruel fate that can await cruel tyrants and dictators! –Mark

Biden calls Russia's Putin a 'war criminal' over invasion of Ukraine: White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden was speaking "from the heart." »

Expert on Dictators: President Donald Trump on a Path of Despotism | The Last Word | MSNBC (2017)

Degrading the rule of law? Appointing cronies, generals and his family? Brian Klaas’s new book "The Despot's Apprentice: Donald Trump's Attack on Democracy" says Trump's actions are the same as other despots around the world. Klaas joins Ari Melber.

Obama Speechwriter on Trump's "Healthy Regard for Dictators"

Ben Rhodes played a key role in crafting both the Iran deal and the historic thawing in relations between the US and Cuba - and was by Obama's side on all but one of his overseas trips. Here he gives his views on the world after Obama.

Rhodes was deputy foreign policy advisor and speechwriter for the Obama administration, joining the Obama campaign as a speechwriter when he was just 29 years old. Rhodes stayed on for the full eight years of his term, tasked with the role of interpreting and explaining Obama's vision for the world.

In a new book, he reveals that after the election of Donald Trump, Obama wondered whether his presidency came too early, for a world that wasn't ready.

Clinton Slams Trump for Praising Dictators, Despite Having Own Ties

After calling on Russia to help release Hillary Clinton's emails, Trump was quickly accused of quote 'treason' and encouraging espionage. But it's not just alleged ties between the billionaire and Russia that are worrying Americans. Barack Obama has also lashed out at the Republican candidate, accusing him of praising Saddam Hussein. But as RT's Gayane Chichakyan reports, Hillary Clinton's own foreign policy is no blank canvas.

Adolf Hitler: Germany Marks 80 Years Since Nazi Leader's Rise To Power
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Berlin today commemorates Adolf Hitler's rise to power 80 years ago, with exhibitions exploring what Chancellor Angela Merkel has called Germany's "everlasting responsibility" for crimes committed by the Nazis.

In a black-and-white photo, visitors can make out the Fuehrer saluting the crowd from the chancellery window on the evening of January 30, 1933, after earlier having been made chancellor and been charged by president Paul von Hindenburg with forming a new government.

The picture is on display at "Berlin 1933. On the Path to Dictatorship", due to be opened by Mrs Merkel in the German capital on Wednesday, on a site charged with history as the former headquarters of the Gestapo, the secret police of the Nazi regime.

It now houses The Topography of Terror [D], an open-air documentation centre whose exhibition will trace Hitler's first months in power through photos, newspapers and posters.

"The hour has come! We are at Wilhelmstrasse (the site of the chancellery at the time). Hitler is chancellor of the Reich. Like in a fairytale," wrote Joseph Goebbels, who was to become Nazi propaganda chief, in his diary on January 31, 1933.

Posters go on to show images of the Reichstag going up in flames the following month and then the first measures taken against the Jews on April 1, with the start of a boycott of Jewish shops, doctors and lawyers. » | Wednesday, January 30, 2013

SALZBURGER NACHRICHTEN: Vor 80 Jahren kam Hitler in Deutschland an die Macht: Adolf Hitlers Aufstieg zur absoluten Macht beginnt vor 80 Jahren: Am 30. Jänner 1933 wird der verkrachte Kunststudent aus dem oberösterreichischen Braunau und Anführer der Nationalsozialisten Reichskanzler in Berlin. » | Von Sn, Dpa | Mittwoch, 30. Januar 2013

SUEDDEUTSCHE.DE: Nazionalsozialismus: Wie Hitler an die Macht kam » | Mittwoch, 30. Januar 2013
N-TV MEDIATHEK: Der Weg in die Diktatur, Hitler und das Jahr 1933: Wie die Nazis Deutschland eroberten »

Queen Elizabeth Welcomes Royals for Luncheon
May 18 - Royals arrive at Windsor castle for lunch with Queen Elizabeth II as part of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations. Rough Cut (no reporter narration).


Related »

Protest at Buckingham Palace During Bahraini King's Visit
BBC: A protest has been held outside Buckingham Palace against the visit of the Bahraini King and a number of other foreign royals, who have lunched at Windsor Castle to celebrate the Queen's Diamond Jubilee.

The visit of King Hamad al-Khalifa of Bahrain has been criticised by human rights campaigners.

Peter Tatchell, one of around 40 protesters, told the BBC that it is "very wrong that the Queen has invited seven royal dictators to celebrate her Diamond Jubilee".

Buckingham Palace has said that the Foreign Office approved the invitation of King Hamad. (+ BBC video) » | Friday, May 18, 2012

Related »

BBC: In pictures: Monarchs at Windsor for Diamond Jubilee » | Friday, May 18, 2012

Colonel Gaddafi-bashing by George Galloway

Family Rule Is Under Siege, At Last
REUTERS – BLOGS – GREGG EASTERBROOK: Dictatorship is under siege throughout the Arab world: fingers are crossed that democracy will prevail. Something else is under siege, too — the notion of family rule. This is among the oldest, and most harmful, concepts in human society. Is it about to vanish at last?

For centuries, in some cases for millennia, regions and nations have been ruled by families — either formally as royalty, or de facto via warlords, khans and shoguns who in most cases inherited their positions. As recently as a century ago, families still ran most of Europe, all of Russia and Japan, while an assortment of warlord-like figures with inherited standing ran much of what’s now South America and the Middle East, and kings and emperors controlled the subcontinent and most of Africa.

Today family rule has been vanquished, or reduced to constitutional status, in most of the world. The big exceptions are Cuba, North Korea, the Middle East, and parts of Africa and Pakistan. The fall of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, following a 30-year warlord-style rule — and the unlikelihood that his sons will inherit control of the country, as Mubarak planned — represents a major subtraction from the remaining portion of the globe under family control.

Let’s hope the trend continues. Today China, India, the United States, Indonesia and Brazil, the world’s five largest nations, representing more than half of the global population, have abolished all forms of inherited rule. Much of the rest of the world has done or is doing the same. This is no guarantee of happiness, of course. Open systems can be chaotic (the United States), still lack personal freedom (China) or be poorly administered (Italy). But in the main, ending family rule has been good for societies that achieve this. Read on and comment >>> Gregg Easterbrook | Friday, February 18, 2011

Guest List for Libyan Strongman Moammar Khadafy's Party Includes Thugs, Dictators
Photo: New York Daily News
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS: All Col. Moammar Khadafy needs is an extended pinkie.

He certainly has real-life guests to rival the fictional villains assembled by Dr. Evil in the "Austin Powers" movies.

Where Dr. Evil has No. 2 and Frau Farbissina, the Libyan dictator has president-by-terror Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and president-by-genocide Omar al-Bashir of Sudan, who is under indictment for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur.

To top it off, the guest list at the celebration of Khadafy's 40th year in power includes the man known in Somalia as "the father of piracy," Mohammed Abdi Afweyne.

In attending the four-day extravaganza, Afweyne reportedly took a break from exacting ransom for a ship held hostage off the Somali coast.

In May, the supposedly reformed Khadafy said that such piracy is not piracy at all, but "self-defense" against "greedy Western nations."

"It is defending the Somalia children's food," Khadafy said.

Among the ships that Afweyne's pirates hijacked was a World Food Program freighter carrying 850 tons of rice bound for the starving in Somalia.

As this week's 40th anniversary celebration in Libya neared, Prince Andrew had originally RSVP'd in the affirmative. He bowed out following the furor over the hero's welcome given to freed Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.

Otherwise, the prince might have found himself sitting with a thug, a genocidal psychopath and a pirate kingpin while huge screens flashed photos of a bomber convicted of murdering 270 innocents.

The big photos of Libya's new national hero accompanied a performance by a New Zealand bagpipe band, complete with kilts. The bomber was freed by the Scottish justice secretary.

"The freeing of al-Megrahi was a highlight of the colonel's time in office and he wanted to honor Scotland for it," a Libyan official said. >>> Michael Daly | Thursday, September 03, 2009