More Crushing of Dissent

The South Korean government issues an arrest warrant for a policeman who posted anti-Roh messages on the Web. Then they fire him. Would the Korean right do this if it were in power? Given the authoritarian instincts they showed during the Roh impeachment fiasco, I’d say “yes,” but for the most part, they aren’t in power, and after all, Uri is the party that claims to be different from the others because it’s open and free.

Now, I can understand the guy being disciplined for goofing off on the Internet excessively at work. I would also suggest that firing is pretty excessive, unless (1) his work reflected it, or (2) it was child porn or some other illegal activity. So here’s my question–what would they have done to him if he were cat-blogging instead? Does anyone out there think that in a society as Internet-addicted as Korea, merely goofing off on the net would ordinarily merit termination? Not according to Mrs. WonsanGhetto, who spent eight years as a software engineer at a big company.