Maniacal Dictator Funnies

This isn't the time to laugh at things like this. I know. Still…this, from a review essay about Khrushchev and Beria by Stephen Kotkin in the March 31 New Republic: "When Hubert Humphrey was dispatched to Moscow to divine the Soviet leader's intentions--good luck!--Khrushchev inquired about the senator's hometown and, hearing the answer, approached a wall-sized map, circled Minneapolis, and said he would spare that city when the rockets started flying."

Comments

[JD Weiner]

Well, Reagan didn't think the mike was live, or at least so the story goes. It wasn't exactly "Hey, you guys, get a load of this - we're about to start bombing you!" But the sense of humor is pretty similar.

[Gary Gunnels]

How's this any less of a joke than Reagan's quip about the USSR before his weekly radio address?