This seems to be my day for Qaddafi children — and you know it’s a weird kind of day if it’s for Qaddafi children. Earlier, I had a post about Hannibal — Hannibal Qaddafi, who has apparently been kidnapped in Lebanon. Hannibal is the one accustomed to doing the kidnapping, torturing, killing, etc. He has a long, long record.
On the homepage, our John Fund has an excellent article about Nicki Minaj, the rapper, who has just collected a big paycheck from the Angolan dictatorship. John also talks more broadly about pop stars and paychecks — paychecks from dictatorships. He dips a toe in Qaddafi waters.
And I’d like to swim a little more in them, by quoting from my book, if I may. I’m talking about Moammar’s son Mutassim:
We know a fair amount about him from one of his girlfriends, Talitha van Zon, a Dutchwoman who was a Playboy centerfold. Mutassim lived a life embodying a typical Qaddafi combination: luxury and glamour, brutality and power. In appearance, he was what you might call goonishly handsome, like most of the Qaddafi sons. Every Christmas, he would fly himself and an entourage to Saint Barts, the ritzy and enchanting island in the Caribbean. They partied raucously, through New Year’s. To entertain himself and his guests, Mutassim would hire the biggest pop stars of the day, including ones who went by just one name, such as Beyoncé and Usher. Among the two-named stars who performed was Mariah Carey.
The Dutch pin-up, Talitha, once asked Mutassim how much money he spent, not at Christmas, but in his life in general. He did some calculating in his head — and came up with the figure of $2 million a month.
I don’t think he was trying hard enough. Anyway, Mutassim came to a brutal end, murdered with his father in the war. But that’s another story — not as fun as Saint Barts.
Three Qaddafi-children posts in one day would be a little much, don’t you think?