2007 Portends a Leaner, Meaner Left

As foreshadowed here previously, the Uri death watch is over.

Uri Party chairman Kim Geun-tae and former chairman Chung Dong-young in an emergency meeting on Thursday agreed to create a new party, to be called the People’s Party. In a thinly veiled warning to President Roh to keep his hands off, the two said it will be “autonomous and independent from outside political influence. That finalizes the two ex-Cabinet minister’s break with their former boss.

Uri will continue to exist, but as a ruling party or a major political force, it is dead. Its president, along with a handful of cabinet ministers and loyal parliamentarians, shelters in isolation in a metaphorical fuhrerbunker six stories beneath the Blue House.

In the end, it was the hand of Kim Geun-Tae, who will be known to history as the little piggy who danced for Kim Jong Il, and who was Comrade Chung’s archrival just a year ago, that struck the dagger into Roh’s back instead. Prediction: sometime in 2007, we’ll all be saying, et tu, Chung.

This new far-left party, representing the most nationalist, juche-enabling factions of Uri , arises just in time to collect the votes of the National Liberation Faction of the Democratic (Peoples’) Labor Party, just as the NLF is being rolled up as a North Korean front. And since the P.P. and the NLF draw upon nearly the same ideology and regional base — in North and South Cheolla provinces — one wonders if the Uri earthquake will also give the DLP a good, hard shake, too.

Anyway, as Andy Jackson no doubt understands, it’s nice to be able to say you called it, even if you could see the oncoming halogens miles away (I actually expected Uri to be “long gone” by the end of 2006, and I’m still amazed that they’ve held together as long as they have). Andy also points to a Korea Herald piece, noting that perhaps 80% of Uri members will join the new party, and that many of the members want to merge with the Democratic Party, or perhaps “other” parties.

On the positive side, good riddance. On the negative side, Comrade Chung, who makes an utterance of breathtaking stupidity ever time he takes Kim Jong Il’s erm, foot out of his mouth, is back. This also means that either South Korean politics has moved another notch toward Pyongyang, or that it’s more polarized than ever. A third possibility is that the left will face another slaughter in 2007 and render this entire shift mostly meaningless, but I doubt that, for several reasons.

First, Uri’s previous losses have been exaggerated by the mid-term effect, the tendency of ruling party supporters to be less energized about elections than opposition supporters. That’s particularly the case with Uri, whose young voters are less likely to vote, and whose unrealistically radical expections have gone unmet after Uri faced the realities of governing. And while opinion polls have shown a modest shift in attitudes away from Uri’s positions, these shifts have not been as pronounced as electoral results would indicate. Indeed, they mostly seem to reflect a general frustration at Uri’s incompetence and disillusionment by Uri’s own base.

Second, polls results showing GNP candidates with 30-point leads mainly reflect those candidates’ lopsided advantages in name recognition.

Third, the P.P. will rise (hehe) by running against Roh. I’ve also considered the possibility that the split from Roh is largely a ruse for just that purpose.

There is a fourth reason why the P.P. will recover considerable support, and it’s the timeless appeal of nationalism, particularly in Korea (ht). The P.P. leaders, Comrade Chung and (especially) Kim Geun Tae, show no sign of any ethical, political, or financial restraints to stop them from setting new lows in crass appeals to those sentiments, to include anti-Americanism and racial hatred. In 2007, expect the post-Roh Korean left to get meaner and more confident in the purience of such appeals, and that will be even more true in 2008 if it becomes an opposition party. By doing so, the P.P. will survive as a major political force, but not without saddling all of Korea with the consequences of more ugly manifestations of Korea at its worst.

In contrast, no Korean politician of national stature except Kim Moon Soo dares to forthrightly defend the value of an alliance with the United States or the historical and moral responsibilities of standing up for the rights of North Koreans. Thus will the GNP likely win the next election, even as it gradually yields the national debate on the issues at the heart of whether Korea will ever be one and free.