The Wikileaks cable about Robert Mugabe sounds eerily familiar.

Robert Mugabe In an unduly optimistic 2007 cable titled "The End Is Nigh," Christopher Dell -- then America's ambassador in Harare, Zimbabwe -- predicted the dictator's imminent downfall. "To give the devil his due, he is a brilliant tactitian [sic]," says Dell.

"However, he is fundamentally hampered by several factors: his ego and belief in his own infallibility; his obsessive focus on the past as a justification for everything in the present and future; his deep ignorance on economic issues (coupled with the belief that his 18 doctorates give him the authority to suspend the laws of economics, including supply and demand)."