It has to be Ed Wood - Glen or Glenda, Plan 9 From Outer Space and that pink cardigan, really…
Oh, sorry. If we are scoring on deaths Pol Pot actually killed the highest percentage of available population of any dictator, doing away with over 20% of his nation’s population.
Wasn’t Edi Amin a cannibal, or did I dream that he was eating me last night?
Caligula was the stupidest dictator that I can think of.
I’m going with Tamerlane, too. The man made deserts. He took a relatively productive (if not exactly lush) area, and turned it into a depopulated desert. As just one of his atrocities.
Don’t know if he counts as a dictator, but I would include Kaiser Wilhelm. Without him maybe no WWI, WWII, no communist paridise in Russia, China, N Korea. You could make a case for all those body counts could trace to willies inept decision in July-Aug 1914.
Add the introduction of modern chemical weapons, the establishment of the first modern Secret Police forces, and the creation of modern espionage.
Also, THIS.
Wouldn’t the worst dictator be the one who was the nicest, killed the fewest citizens, and enacted the most sweeping law reforms?
Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, hands down. I’ll post more details, but I wanted to get down this answer first.
Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus
First off he is a farmer. Then he had to be *told * he was the dictator.
He freakin’ retired. He never turned his rival politicans into Cincinnati Chilli, or made love to his horse in the middle of Senate sessions, or anything. I believe I heard that he stuck some social changes in their somewhere too. What a horrible dictator.
Idi Amin may or may not have been a cannibal, but I vote for him for reasons of his twisted evil.
Read somewhere he used to masturbate while watching children being dismembered live. Wish I had a cite… actually, wish it weren’t true, more than that…
I’m not a big fan of Kasier Wilhelm, but isn’t that a tad much to be laying at his feet alone? There were a lot of parties(Russia, Austria, Serbia, England, France) at the time responsible for WW1 and Wilhelm was just one fo them.
Wouldn’t Bismarck be also more at fault than Kaiser Willy? (Who most certainly was bipolar).
One of my professors was from Russia, and told me that when Stalin died, people were upset not so much because they liked Stalin, but because every other country was afraid of him, and thus they felt safe.
Except Bismarck was competant. Wilhelm II was an idiot.
Not to mention that with the power grabbing that followed and preceeded Stalin’s reign, there was a good deal of uncertainty, then. Stalin was many things, but he was dependable, and Russians in general have a real fear of chaos. Even today, look at how many polls still have signifigant percentages of people wanting a return to a stronger gov’t.
And I’m also going to say that Kaiser Wilhelm is not solely responsible for the clusterfuck that was WWI. And if you plan to blame him for the conditions that lead to Hitler’s rise to power and WWII, how can you ignore that the Treaty of Paris was such a humiliating and punative peace that it virtually guaranteed a renewed conflict in the future. The Allies were so determined to make Germany accept all blame for the war, and the offer such crushing punative measures they fostered an environment of hatred and bitterness that Hitler used so well to rise to power.
Dictator does not necessarily imply killing, death, and being a terrible person. In fact, the dictator that helped his (or her) country the most would be the best dictator. Being a dictator simply means being an absolute ruler. Theoretically at least, this person should be able to do lots of good things for a country and be very effective. Unfortunately, this is obviously not the case very often - if ever. The worst dictator, I would take to mean the dictator that did the worst job of dictating a country by most likely taking what was a productive/prospering nation and running it into the ground - either through killing it’s citizens, or otherwise.
I don’t know who this would be though. I have very limited knowledge in this area - especially compared to the people who have already replied. So far though, this William Walker character that Captain Amazing mentioned gets my vote based on the description of him.
I’m going with Pol Pot. The man basically declared war on his own country and tried to destroy it. Most dictators at least restrict themselves to killing their supposed enemies.
[never mind me]
My mother. She couldn’t even get me to clean my room or eat my greens.
[/never mind me]
Most dictators, especially the expansionist and modern totalitarian ones, do just that–run a country into the ground. Perhaps it’s not their intent, but that’s the typical outcome.
You are right, I was just thinkning he was in position to stop it, before it started. He could of pressured Austria for a diplomatic solution more palatable to the all parties. After reading a couple of Tuchmans books, (Guns of August, Proud Tower) and Dreadnought by Massie, it seemed Willie was itchen to pull the trigger. If say Jimmy Carter was Kaiser instead? Although the French were also interested in revenge for Sedan.
Just thank the good Lord that helicopters hadn’t been invented back in 1914.