Anju Links for 29 Feb 08

YOU DON’T SAY: Actual North Koreans don’t think the New York Phil’s visit will mean much.

“Most people…are busy trying to make ends meet and put food on the table, and what they truly need is rice and money, so they have little freedom to think about music . . . . Rather than sit around and listen to classical music, people have to spend that time to go out and pluck another bunch of weeds to sell or boil in their pot at home. Only members of the elite have the leisure to think about politics or this kind of cultural event.” [Radio Free Asia]

Still, it’s encouraging that not even the New York Times was fooled by this superficial gesture. That RFA story also has some interesting anecdotes on what North Koreans really think of America and the outside world, which you should take with the obvious caveats.

DEADLINE OR NO DEADLINE? Yesterday, it seemed that Secretary Rice was about to lay out a timetable and demand some structure for North Korea to disclose, disable, and disarm. Today, State is denying it.

JOHN McCAIN GETS NORTH KOREA RIGHT again, when asked about the New York Phil by Weekly Standard blogger Michael Goldfarb:

I have concerns, very grave concerns…the facility in Syria, according to published reports, had the earmarks of North Korean involvement. They continue some of the illicit activities around the world, and most offensively the abuse of the human rights of their own people. I wish some of the people who are barely surviving, if they’re surviving, in the largest remaining gulag in the world would have had the chance to see the philharmonic perform, rather than a chosen 1,400 or whatever it was…. [Weekly Standard Blog]

This is the second time I’ve seen someone ask McCain about North Korea, only to have McCain raise the human rights issue spontaneously. I know how unfashionable it is to believe a politician, but I think McCain approaches this issue with much more depth and conviction that Bush ever did, which may explain why Bush eventually caved. Let’s also give due credit to Barack Obama, too, but I’d like to hear more — that word again — substance about what he’d actually do to change conditions in North Korea. Really, I’d like to hear more specifics and substance from all two of the viable candidates.

FOUR WORDS — “SPECIAL ENVOY LARRY CRAIG:”

“I learned that it’s important to establish personal relations with leaders even though you may not agree with them — certain leaders. I’m not going to have a personal relationship with Kim Jong-il, and our relationships are such that that’s impossible.” [Chosun Ilbo]

You know, I’ve attended enough news conferences to know with mathematical certainty that only a South Korean journalist could have asked a question stupid enough to draw that response.

SOUTH KOREA MULLS joining the Proliferation Security Initiative.

MY KIND of Che poster. Little known fact: in the Lakota language, “che” means “penis.”

I DON’T CLAIM TO BE A MILITARY EXPERT, but every soldier or ex-soldier I’ve ever known who has fired the M-16 / M-4, and who has also fired the AK-47 / AKM / AKR / AK-74 (my personal favorite) has agreed that the Russian weapons are far more reliable. So when I hear that the Pentagon is spending good money to replace the Iraqi Army’s AK’s with M-16’s, my suspicious eye turns toward Colt Armalite’s lobbyists. In skilled hands, the U.S. weapons have negligible advantages in range and accuracy. My experience with both weapons during exercises at the National Training Center is that the M-16 jams in sandy conditions; the Romanian AK’s I usually used never jammed, even low-crawling through the sand with them. Replacing AK’s with M-16’s is such an obvious waste of money that it evokes the words fraud, waste, and abuse. Ultimately, it will make the Iraqi Army less combat effective.

PICTURES OF HOME: I’ve always been disappointed by how few good pictures of western South Dakota there are on the internet, but this morning, it occurred to me to look up the Web site of Johnny Sundby, whom I knew in several classes in junior high school. I never pegged him as the artistic kind then, but just look at his work. His site design isn’t half bad, either.