Stoopid Idea of the Week

A talentless buffoon named Peter Carlson wants to share his epiphany with us:

I’ve got a better idea: Obama should invite Kim to the United States and let him wander around for a couple of weeks, sipping cocktails with capitalists, visiting a home economics class in Iowa and mingling with Hollywood stars.

Fifty years ago, in similar circumstances, that’s what President Dwight D. Eisenhower did. And it worked, sort of. [Peter Carlson, Washington Post]

An equally sensible idea would be to reform a pedophile by inviting him to a strip club instead of maximum security.  Clearly, someone who lives in this house will not envy our standards of living; someone who keeps this movie collection will not be transformed by exposure to the liberalizing influence of our culture; and someone who keeps his people this isolated will not be forced into perestroika when he loses the next Great Kitchen Debate (as if North Koreans would be allowed to watch it all live on CNN).

There are two ways to read Mr. Carlson’s piece — as a serious proposal, or as a feeble mockery meant to trivialize the very real horror that Kim Jong Il has made of North Korea.  Whichever interpretation you choose, Carlson reveals no thought, reasoning, or writing skill that merits ink in the Washington Post.