In the sense that repression is better than genocidal chaos, yes.
It seems almost like it was some sort of “pax Romana”. No one liked the Romans (editorial license?), they controlled everything, but at least you had some protection and safety…when they left, the Dark Ages started and things were far worse.
Right, but the genocidal chaos came about because the Yugoslav government engaged in the repression, and because they didn’t do things to help solve he nationalities question, but instead just mandated that it was something that must not be talked about, the naggressive nationalinism and ethnic hatred got linked in people’s minds with opposition to the Communist regime.
It’s the same reason neo-nazism is so much stronger in eastern Germany than western Germany. A lot of East Germans figured, “Well, if the government is so opposed to it, it can’t be that bad.”
I don’t think Tito had much to boast about in terms of genocide and chaos. Rummel goes on to identify the top nine killers:
(1) Joseph Stalin, 43 million dead, 1929-'53;
(2) Mao Tse-tung, 38 million, 1923-'76;
(3) Adolf Hitler, 21 million, 1933-'45;
(4) Chiang Kai-shek, 10 million, 1921-'48;
(5) Vladimir Lenin, 4 million, 1917-'24;
(6) Tojo Hideki (Japan), 4 million, 1941-'45;
(7) Pol Pot, 2.4 million, 1968-'87;
(8) Yahya Khan (Pakistan), 1.5 million, 1971; **
(9) Josip Broz, better known as Marshal Tito (Yugoslavia), 1.2 million, 1941-'80.**.
And third overall as a percentage of the populace murdered.
Regards,
Shodan
First be careful, I’ve been called a Nazi in this board just for making the same argument about Hitler.
Second had Mussolini allied himself with Great Britain and France Hitler would have blasted him out of the map in 1940, at least IMHO. Still, it´s a great idea for a what if thread.
I’ve never heard him referred to as a “Dictator” by any meanstream American news source.
I think the Sikhs might have some problem with that claim:
Face facts. The colonies were not hellholes. They had a prosperous economy and a strong and educated native political leadership that was ready to step up and run a country - and they developed all of that under British rule. If the British actually had been a tyranny, then the American Revolution would have failed because Parliament would have squashed any opposition long before 1776. Do you think the Tsar would have allowed the Continental Congress to meet and debate independance?
Yes.
Bill Gates has become rich enough that he could very easily wield his influence in such a way as to be a putative shadow government. We’re just lucky he chooses not to do so.
This is my biggest problem with today’s regulation-free, no-rules, market-is-God business climate: if we lived in a comic book world, Bill Gates would be an evil arch criminal who would take over the world for his own nefarious reasons. No single human being should have that much power; again, we’re just lucky he doesn’t realize that.
You misread Rummel. It was the Ustasha regime not the Tito regime that he listed as third place.
Sultan of Brunei springs to mind.
No personal tax, Free education, free house on marriage ( for Bruneians)
King Arthur
And, of course, almost no civil rights, but I guess that comes with the dictatorship part.
Yeah, I think that comes mainly from the blogosphere.
True -still, Tito is in the top ten overall. Not particularly benevolent
Regards,
Shodan
You kill a thousand political prisoners here. Wipe out a village there. Over the course of a few decades it add up.
I think you’re wildly overestimating Gates’s practical wealth. His entire net worth is roughly equivalent to what the United States Department of Agriculture spends in a good five months, and of course, he can’t actually use his entire net worth.
Microsoft is a very famous company and looms large to regular internet users and computer-savvy people, but it’s a pimple on the ass of international commerce. Last year Fortune magazine ranked it the world’s 136th largest company, which is pretty impressive - they’re certainly bigger than your local dry cleaner - but they’re pikers next to Wal-Mart or a big oil company. In fact, they’re not even the biggest IT-related firm; to my honest amazement, IBM is much bigger.
Or the banks. The USA has pumped more bailout money into the banks than Microsoft will make in gross revenue in the next ten years; AIG alone has gotten about three years of MS gross revenue.
No individual can influence a big industrialized country’s government. What is scary is that a class of individuals most certainly can, and we call them “Bankers.” They’ve screwed the common man, and how. But it took a lot of them working together to do it.
I have heard him called a quasi dictator on fox news, mostly on things such as glenn beck and oreilly. I concede that they arent exactly “hard” news. Also i have not heard anything on the news that speaks of him anything other than in poor terms. Indicating that he is a dictator in all but name.
So my intial post was not accurate in terms, the thread said dictators, i went with dictator. So to clarify my original question, whats wrong with Hugo Chavez? is it fair to be considered quasi dictator, or spoken about in that vein when the majority of voters are happy with your choices.
I am sorry if i was unclear:smack:
With Chavez up until this year’s referendum (what he’s doing in the aftermath is a whole another story) as with Indira Gandhi, there is the issue that you can run a repressive or illiberal government yet NOT be a “dictator” as the term is modernly understood. Mrs. Gandhi (neé Nehru) was freely elected, defeated to become opposition and elected again, and even the state of emergency in the 70s was decreed constitutionally and it led to her defeat at the polls, which was respected. She was (and her successors in the Nehru-Gandhi clan have been) more akin to what we’d call a “political boss” than a dictator. FWIW, IMO so was Mr. Chavez up until relatively recently: a populist demagogue who gained and expanded his power by gaming the system, but *the system itself **was **still * “free” – as late as last year his party was losing local elections; for the first few years of his rule he was able to run unchecked because the opposition was dysfunctional, rather than actively repressed; and yes, majority of the voters approved of his policies of cracking down on the institutions of the Old Establishment (big media, foreign corporations). NOW he’s taking a turn towards overt authoritarianism and entrenching himself in power by force if necessary, so he may yet become a “dictator”. (In which case, the dwellers of the Caracas slums will still likely think of him as quite “benevolent”, while the people whose newspaper or TV station he impounded will say I told you so…)
Yes. Setting aside BrainGlutton’s comments on Haussman’s improvements to Paris under Napoleon III’s supervision, his terrible military record in the failed coups against the Restoration government of Louis-Philippe led him against using force. He repeatedly appealed instead to popularist ideals of the working class and invoked his bloodline to get him where he wanted to be.
Still, when he overthrew the Second Republic in his capacity as its Prince-President he wasn’t afraid of locking up his political opponents in jail, and he relied upon army units to achieve that.
(And of course his military incompetance led to the Franco-Prussian War, where he was deposed.)