A creature of such magnificent maleficence, who rules less by his own considerable powers than by others' fear of him, feeds on cunning and hatred.
Last year, curiously, Washington was weaker as a Harlem drug king in Ridley Scott's American Gangster (his silky geniality deprived the role of magnificent maleficence) than he was .
Bin Laden, who is incommunicado anyway, isn't required to authorize such comparatively minor maleficence but merely to inspire it.