I haven't read former ambassador Mark Palmer's new book, Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World's Last Dictators by 2025, which has the two-edged honor of being touted by U.S. Department of State.
Ousting dictators is, of course, a Good Thing. Palmer's reference to the "world's last dictators," however, seems a bit grandiosely ambitious.
On the other hand, Palmer's book — from a simple, demographic standpoint — may not be ambitious enough. Consider the respective ages of some of the world's most notorious dictators by the year 2025:
Kim Jong Il: 83
Ali Khamenei: 86
Moammar Gadhafi: 83
*Islam Karimov: 97
*Sapramurat Niyazov: 85
Fidel Castro: 99
Robert Mugabe: 101
Only the good die young, but it'd still be surprising if all of these guys were still around by 2025.
There are a few younger folks to consider, of course — in 2025, *Ilham Aliyev will be 64, and Bashar Assad will be only 59. I'm curious to read Palmer's plan for ousting them.
Curious, but worried. "Abolish evil" is a laudable goal that tends to morph into "kill all the bad people," which in turn often becomes "kill all of those people" and, well, that sort of thing worries me.
* U.S. allies in the GWOT
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