January 13, 2004
Johnnie Walker: the Official Alcoholic Beverage of Despots and Their Offspring Worldwide! References are presented in declining order of Johnnie Walker swankiness.
- (From "Uday Loved Indian Curry, Scotch") Below the bedroom, Uday's staff kept a collection of Cuban cigars [... and] bottles of Johnnie Walker Blue Label. Supposedly, Saddam also enjoys the Johnnie Walker.
- In an excerpt in this month's Atlantic Magazine from the book by Kim Jong Il's former personal chef, Kenji Fujimoto, he writes that Johnnie Walker Swing [a label not available in the U.S.] was KJI's whiskey of choice.
- According to this Slate piece, Nicu Ceausescu, the youngest son of former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, who was convicted by a military tribunal in 1990 to 20 years in prison for instigating aggravated murder, "had a fondness for Johnnie Walker Black."
- (From the October 2000 Daily Californian article "Retired Army General Greeted With Noise") [General Wesley] Clark's brief history lesson of the alliance ironically took a lighter tone when he began describing [former Yugoslavian President Slobodan] Milosevic. [...] "He said to me 'How soon will (NATO troops) be here?,'" Clark said. "'I know these Europeans, they will take many weeks (to send soldiers).'"
Milosevic maintained that it would be a while before alliance troops arrived in Serbia, while Clark insisted that they would be there very soon. Milosevic bet Clark a bottle of scotch that the troops would not be there within a week, Clark said. When the troops arrived within a few days, Clark said a few weeks later, he "received the smallest bottle of Johnnie Walker you've ever seen!"
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