October 12

Suppose that you are Nikita Khrushchev and you are trying the fill the shoes of Josef Stalin, your immediate predecessor. Stalin is a hard act to follow, what with the mass murders, ethnic cleansing, and all the other stuff, yada, yada, yada. On the 12th in 1960, Khrushchev, newly enthroned leader of the Soviet Union was invited to address the world at a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. The nominal purpose of the meeting was to discuss the Philippine assertion that the Soviet Union was really just the running dog lackey of the bourgeoisie and was pursuing a colonialist policy in Eastern Europe. Displaying all the grace and politesse expected of the leader of a country capable of incinerating the planet, Khrushchev made his point by taking off a shoe and pounding the lectern from which he addressed the world.