Comments on: Dear Mrs. Clinton: Pyongyang Will Not Be Triangulated

By: KCJ

KCJ — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 13:22:07 +0000

Blessings on Rabbi Cooper, he sees what is evident to anyone with a working conscience.

NK’s bellicosity had better be mere sabre rattling. A fight with CFC is suicide for the Juche regime. And that is how cults behave when the leader realizes the jig is up.

A few more balloons and the damage might be irreparable. “Look, Toto! Its just a man behind the curtain operating an illusion!”

“Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain; I am the great and powerful Oz!”

Oh yeah. It’s coming.

By: Irene

Irene — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 19:19:08 +0000

Thank you for this post and Rabbi Abraham Cooper’s confirmation that, “by exclusively pursuing the nuclear tail around the six-party table, we have also contributed to the horrible suffering of those in the death camps” – his comments were poignant and powerful.

I agree that our silence in response to the 200,000 to 300,000 hapless victims in North Korean concentration camps is perhaps Pyongyangâ€™s greatest victory to date and is the “conerstone” of our unconscionable “foreign policy” which can be summarized in 12 simple words:
“We want them to dispose of fearsome weapons â€• they want our silence”.

The long-awaited “tear down this wall moment” would be a welcome “change” to this silence. It remains to be seen whether usinkorea’s worries turn out to be true.

By: usinkorea

usinkorea — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 18:03:31 +0000

My slight worry with Clinton as Sec of State is that she will continuously have her mind on 2012 or possibly 2008.

I don’t think it will be good for US foreign policy to have such a key cabinet member always thinking about how to position herself for a run at the presidency. Especially one that had a rather bitter contest in the recent presidential race like she and Obama had. It might be different, say, if you had two power players who were long-time associates and friends, and it was clear one of them was senior and the other junior and the one was clearly going to follow in the footsteps of the other. Kind of like what happens with vice presidents. But Hillary and Obama aint that.

I wondered why Obama would name her for State given their positions. Did he really need her to support him that much at the time in the campaign?

I read a couple of people recently saying that Obama is clearly trying to isolate Hillary in State through shifting control of foreign policy to the intelligence agency and special envoys. That he was going to run foreign policy more through the White House directly and avoid State. That makes more sense out of his willingness to name Hillary to the post –

– but it probably doesn’t give much hope for well-thought out, coordinated foreign policy at a time when we really need it to be effective.