When crazy evil meets evil-crazy

I remember once talking to a friend of mine one summer about doing something great with your life. The problem, she reasoned, is that you must possess great capacity of character to become a leader. You must then be superior even among leaders to not become a failure on a grand scale. Take, for example, Ethelred the Unready. Ethelred - or Gay Lord Ethelred as his friends probably call him, some mockingly, some just anaware of what connotations the word "gay" would have in a thousand years - was the king of England. Granted, at that time England was the Dark Age's version of Somolia, but still, being king of the place is quite a feat, right? And just because of a few blunders, all we know about this guy is that he wasn't ready for something.

So, why would any person think that he could become a king whose incompetence is not the stuff of legends, much less a successful evil genius at odds with the world? The answer, my friends, is that the bar is set really, really low. In many cases, being an esteemed leader required you to A) be your father's son and B) not die. This, of course, leads us to our evil leader of the day - Kim Jong-il of North Korea.

Kim Jong-il at an evil genius convention

Whereas many of the entries here will deal with evil dictators and geniuses who have the potential of taking over the world, or at least drilling a hole to the other side of it, this entry will deal with a current world leader who has the potential of not existing. The current world opinion on Kim Jong-il is that he may or may not be alive. How irreplaceable of a leader can you be if the global community can't tell for sure that you didn't die five years ago? Much like the kings of old whose sole contribution to their nation was filling a gap in a line of succession, Kim Jong-il owes his very relevance to his father's success in establishing a functioning state and a strong personality cult. Unlike those kings, who at least managed to keep their countries intact without a big ol' pile of nukes, Kim Jong-il is still in power largely because he has threatened to launch a missile at anything that moves.

A pile of nukes

So, to conclude, Kim Jong-il is a man with a means but no plan. We should, therefore, be on the lookout for a man who actually does have a plan. They will form a formidable team indeed, and must be stopped at all costs. In our educated, wordly, and well researched opinion, this man will be...

Dick Cheney.

Dick Cheney, Christmas morning

Current vice president and soon-to-be-slightly-less-powerful evil genius. Enjoys fucking you over and then reaping the profits. Will soon be looking for a new leader with whom to take over the role of invisible, evil leprechaun who sits on your shoulder and urges you to burn things. Former chairman of the board for Halliburton, the most evil company in existence. His only regret from his time in office is not having killed someone with his bare hands while on national television. Partnered with Kim Jong-il, these two will bring terror to the world, mark my words. So, while we will not induct these two into our exclusive guild just yet, a space has been reserved for the future pairing of Kim-Cheney.