North Korea 'executes 80 people for watching foreign films'

[hue]

Source: THE INDEPENDENT


North Korea has publicly executed 80 people for watching foreign television programmes, a South Korean newspaper claimed today.

Seoul’s JoongAng Ilbo daily reported that the killings were carried out in seven separate cities on November 3, with an alleged 10,000 people forced to attend one group execution held in a sports stadium in the eastern port city Wonsan.

Citing a “single unidentified” individual as the source of the story, the newspaper said the majority of those executed had been charged with “watching illicit South Korean TV dramas and some with prostitution”.

The source is said to be familiar with North Korea’s internal affairs and had only very recently left the country. His story gained credibility when Daily NK – an online media agency run by North Korean defectors – said it had also heard the reports of mass executions taking place.

During the front page report, the JoongAng Ilbo reporter cites another defector group as saying it had warned of a forthcoming wave of executions several months ago.

Read more: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/north-korea-executes-80-people-for-watching-foreign-films-8932104.html

[laserhaas]

1. If this be true; I believe the names of the souls should be immortalized as Freedom Fighters

extraordinaire!

Having paid the ultimate price;
for doing nothing naughty or nice!

[Historic NY]

2. Isn't Kim dig dong or whatever..

a foreign film fan himself

[DetlefK]

3. You never heard about Kim Jong-Il's gargantuan VHS-collection?

I bet, Kim Jong-Un inherited them.

[NealK]

14. Stalin was a big fan of Hollywood movies.

Which of course were banned for the common people.

[freshwest]

61. Saddam Hussein was a fan of the Godfather series and Sopranos. Thought those were Amercian values.

Garbage in, garbage out.

[nomorenomore08]

121. Really? That explains a lot...

[freshwest]

122. It was part of the news stories as people were going to Iraq to hopefully stop war, showing how nice

and modern the people were there. That's when I saw it mentioned. Sort of a 'see, they're just like us' kind of thing. If only the hawks didn't get their way. The country may never recover. They said Saddam didn't understand why his former US allies had turned on him. If those movies and shows were what he thought the USA was really about, the way he behaved wasn't out of sync with it. But that isn't all the USA is about though...

[Blue_Tires]

74. Ironically, one of his alltime favorites was supposedly "The Grapes of Wrath"

[Posteritatis]

7. It's good to be king. (nt)

[applegrove]

57. That is what I thought.

[Ash_F]

84. You should take stories from unsourced SK papers with a grain of salt. /nt

[ronnie624]

4. Mmm hmm.

Whatever.

[snooper2]

6. I know right!

I don't know why other countries keep trying to put them down right when they are moved forward in all areas. They have some of the top scientists, architects and doctors in the World!

Pyongyang would be a tourist retreat if not for the damn sanctions!

[ronnie624]

8. "Citing a “single unidentified” individual as the source of the story"

No way would I hang my hat on that. This article is about as credible as any other similar 'news' story about N. Korea.

[Zorra]

11. Yeh. It's a shame when we have to be skeptical of many news stories because there is so much

pro-corporate, pro-capitalism, anti-socialism propaganda being disseminated by the wealthy 1% business/bankster oligarchs who own most of the major media sources on the planet.

The Rupert Murdoch Agenda.

[ronnie624]

15. A highly charged issue,

both politically as well as emotionally for some reason.

[EX500rider]

62. It's my understanding that...

.....they hand out kittens when the secret police find you doing a banned activity and the 200,000 or so in the prison camps mostly eat smores around the campfire and have singalongs.

[Marrah_G]

13. You don't believe it?

[ronnie624]

16. Not without corroboration from other sources. n/t

[Marrah_G]

17. There are lots of documentaries on the conditions in NK

This seems pretty much par for the course there.

[ronnie624]

18. Lots of "documentaries" with similar "sources", no doubt. n/t

[Marrah_G]

19. Okay, I can see this will go nowhere

Have a nice day.

[Ranchemp.]

26. I dare say, one of the few NK apologists,

could probably show pics of the actual executions and it wouldn't be believed by this one.

[Marrah_G]

28. Leaves me shaking my head

[ronnie624]

32. Life in N. Korea is, no doubt, oppressive and stultifying,

Last edited Mon Nov 11, 2013, 02:26 PM - Edit history (1)

and I would love to see an open, democratic system there. I just don't think the current method of political/economic coercion and military threats is the way to achieve it. The Clinton Administration was on the right track, with its policies of engagement.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2004/0405.kaplan.html

[Ranchemp.]

33. So the U.S. is to blame for NK not having an open, democratic system?

[ronnie624]

35. Yes. n/t

[geek tragedy]

36. How did you come to such an odd conclusion? nt

[Ranchemp.]

42. Just another apologist for NK,

the U.S. is to blame for everything wrong in this world.

[grantcart]

132. Kind of rings a Bell doesn't it.

[ronnie624]

44. By reading about the history of US involvement in Korea.

It didn't begin last week, you know.

Lots of people posting on this thread need to stop jabbering and start reading.

[geek tragedy]

45. Yes, we understand that war was necessary to prevent

the psycho government in North Korea from destroying the quality of life in the South like it has in the North.

The people in the South DO NOT WANT TO BE RULED BY THE PSYCHO NORTH KOREAN GOVERNMENT.

Reunification will be possible only with regime change in the North.

[ronnie624]

47. I think reunification would be much more likely without US belligerence. n/t

[geek tragedy]

48. Would the North Korean people rise up and overthrow the current regime

if the US were less 'belligerent' in your view?

[ronnie624]

51. If N. Koreans feel compelled to do so, it is their prerogative.

Sorry I can't give more complete answers. I'm hurrying in preparation to go to work.

[Ranchemp.]

50. Without U.S. belligerence?

OMFG, that is so stupid it's funny.

The only re-unification NK wants is on their terms, IOW, a bigger, more oppressive, brutal dictator run police state, the only thing that's holding that mad man in NK back is the presence of the U.S. military.
Ask the SK's if they want a NK style govt running their country.
The resounding answer would be NO, but for some reason, you seem to think that re-unification would be all smile and laughs, not a brutal takeover by that bat shit crazy man in Pyongyang.

[ronnie624]

54. You are completely wrong.

You don't even bother to learn anything about this topic.

[Ranchemp.]

56. I know a hell of alot more about this topic than you think I do.

and I completely reject your assertion that the U.S. is to blame.
You're about as believable as Eva Golinger.

[ronnie624]

49. What you are saying, in essence,

is that the complete destruction of Korea and the murder of millions of people was preferable to allowing a government that the US objected to.

I disagree with that sentiment.

[Ranchemp.]

53. Who started the war in 1950?

North Korea.
Who destroyed South Korea by invading?
North Korea.
Who invited air attacks on their country in response to their attack on South Korea?
North Korea.
Who has committed numerous terrorist attacks on South Korea since the signing of the Armistice?
North Korea.
Who has crossed the border and kidnapped hundreds, if not thousands, of South Korean citizens?
North Korea.

Hmmm, I'm beginning to see a pattern here.

[EX500rider]

66. But South Korean AND the UN objected..

.....rightly so.

[Ash_F]

85. You need to read more history

For decades, the SK junta was far more cruel and an totalitarian the North and this was supported by the US due to right wing financial interests. It was through decades of hard work, protest and loss of life(all made worse by US interjection) that SK managed to change the country into what it is today, much to the chagrin of the US right.

That said, the old right wing SK power families still wield a disproportionate amount of power.

[geek tragedy]

86. righhhhht.

The close US ally happens to be much wealthier, more democratic, more free, and healthier, and the North is the poorest and most oppressive nation in Asia, maybe the planet, but the US is the problem there.

Does not compute. If NK was better than SK, and SK had the additional burden of being an ally of the US, how do you explain their relative positions?

Also, the partition was engineered by Stalin, not the US.

Spare us the pro-DPRK propaganda--North Korea was founded as and has always been a ruthless dictatorship. To say that the south was "far more cruel and totalitarian" than the North is a lie, as that is physically impossible.

This just in: autocratic Communism is horrible.

[Ash_F]

88. To try give the US credit for what South Koreans have built is sickening

They got there by rebelling against US interests. Don't try to pretend the US were the good guys here.

This doesn't have anything to do with being "pro-DPRK"

You don't know what you are talking about. You can start here though.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=648777

[Ranchemp.]

89. The U.S. gets a lot of credit for the vibrant economy and democracy in S. Korea,

it was the U.S. military presence that has kept N. Korea on the other side of the 38th parallel all these years, giving the S. Koreans the time to build that democracy and economy.

Also, S. Korean access to U.S. markets on favorable terms immensely helped build that vibrant democracy and economy.

And that link to South Korea's Truth and Reconciliation Commission? I wouldn't hang my hat on that if I were you, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if this is being financed by the N. Koreans or sympathizers of the North.

[geek tragedy]

90. Not good guys, but your "USA is the root of all evil" analysis is laughable.

As is your line of bullshit re: "rebelling against US interests." The economic relationship between the US and South Korea has never been placed in doubt. Where would South Korea be without access to the US market?

Also, this does not strike me as much of a rebellion:

SEOUL, South Korea, March 7 — Officials here said today that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had ignored them in suggesting realignment of American forces in Korea and demanded that they stay where they are at least until resolution of the North Korean nuclear issue.

South Korea's newly installed defense minister, Cho Young Kil, said Washington "has never officially informed us of the movement of U.S. troops" and "the withdrawal issue was never raised by the U.S. government."

Indeed, said Mr. Cho, talking to members of South Korea's fractious National Assembly, American and South Korean officials "will not discuss any possibility of movement of U.S. troops before the nuclear issue is resolved."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/07/international/asia/08CND-KORE.html

[Ash_F]

91. You do realize a lot has happened in the last 70 years right?

SK has had multiple revolutions in that time period. Things did not settle until the late 80's. Between WW2 and then they spent most of that time fending off right wing %1 cronies, who were supported by America's own right wing 1%'ers

You care too much about this subject to be so poorly educated on it. So here is some further reading.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syngman_Rhee

[geek tragedy]

92. So why is North Korea so much poorer? Why is North Korea still as despotic as

the day it came into being?

Are you seriously denying that access to the US market has been important for South Korea's economic development since 1953?

According to your talking points:

1) South Korea was poorer, meaner, less free than the heroic North Korean state as of the 1950's
2) SK's relatoinship with the US was the worst thing to ever happen to it
3) North Korea had the advantage of not having a relationship with the US


But,

4) South Korea is much richer and has vastly more freedom than North Korea does.

Something doesn't add up.

[Ash_F]

93. Just read the articles. /nt

[geek tragedy]

94. I read the articles. They don't support your absurd fantasy that NK used to be less

authoritarian and less cruel than SK's government.

While SK does have a history of authoritarianism, it was NEVER as bad as North Korea's.

Never, ever, ever.

Not even in dispute.

Want proof--besides reading history books not published by Stalinist sources?

Try this: North Korea's regime is exactly the same as it was in the 1950's despite utterly failing its people in every possible capacity. There was no revolotion there because the totalitarian state was so ruthless and so utterly dominant in all facets of life that resistance has been impossible there.

You also continue to ignore the fact that South Korea's economy was built on exports to the US.

[Ash_F]

95. Well that's great that you made some steps to educate yourself.

Your are on your way to getting it. You need to spend some more time reading up on the lead up to the War. In the early days, the South had many revolutionaries, liberals students and academics, who attempted to resist the lord-peasant system that the right wing US and SK power-mongers had in store for them. They were brutally put down and yes it was unlike anything that happened in NK at the time. The atrocities were a major trigger for the war.

NK's regime is actually worse than it was in the 1950's, not the same. The country has moved towards right wing totalitarianism, while SK has moved ironically, and thankfully, to the left. Shifts like that happen in war and politics as time goes on. Consider that Republicans were the party that freed the slaves, and look at what they are now.

But don't confuse these shifts, however fortuitous for SK, with the notion that US has done the right thing for Koreans at any point in its sordid history with them. They did their best to beat down ordinary Koreans, time and time again in the favor big business and feudal lords, right up through the Reagan administration. By then it was the fifth or sixth revolt and most of the culprits had grown old or died. Their kin were diminished and lacked the energy and power to dominate(though they make up what remains of the far right today). Only after that was SK able to claw its way towards first world status.

Once Americans begin to accept what they had done wrong, they can stop making the same mistakes in the present. The major mistake at present would be letting the wealthy few dictate national policy while lapping up inane media soundbites from television intended to make them docile and pliable.

[geek tragedy]

96. "the atrocities were a major trigger for the war"

LMAO. Spinning the Korean War as a humanitarian intervention by the North is a new one from the apologists.

Also, Korea's economy has been explicitly export-based beginning in the 1960s. Its economic growth began then, not the 1980s. And, yes, access to the US consumer market was absolutely critical to that happening.

[Ash_F]

97. Instead of making up strawman to argue with...

..which does little to expand your mind, pick a up a history book and read. Don't you think it is a little silly to be so impassioned, yet be so unarmed? It's clear you've learned a lot about Korean history just from these few posts, but this will only go so far. You will need to seek it out yourself.

[geek tragedy]

98. No, I knew everything that has been discussed already.

I knew that partition happened because the Soviets and its then ally Kim Il Sung prevented the UN from establishing control above the 38th parallel.

I know that partition happened because the Soviets installed a Communist dictatorship rather than permitting free elections for the entire peninsula.

I know that the North Koreans invaded for purposes of conquest and uniting Korea under their dictatorial rule.

I also know that but for the United States, the people of South Korea would have been conquered by the north and would be eating grass like people in the North are.

And that South Korea's exports to the United States were crucial to its economic development.

And, yes, I know the South had a number of authoritarian thugs that ruled it up until the end of Reagan and that the US engaged in human rights abuses there.

But, I also recognize that this doesn't mean that the South would have been better off under the North's rule.

[Ash_F]

100. Someone that knows their history can tell when they are talking to someone who doesn't

What happened before the partition?

Korea would have been better off if there had been no civil war.

[geek tragedy]

101. Answer: World War 2 happened before the partition.

Yes, Korea would have been better off had the Soviet Union not tried to expand their empire to the peninsula.

[Ash_F]

102. Well that and the killing of students, liberals and leftists

Read about this man.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyuh_Woon-Hyung

[geek tragedy]

103. Irrelevant to the fact that the USSR refused to allow elections

in North Korea and installed the Dear Leader up there.

It takes quite a bit of self-delusion to think that having South Koreans worship the Kim dynasty would have lead to a better outcome.

[Ash_F]

104. Another Strawman.

This getting unproductive.

You need to stop looking at this through the scope of the US and USSR and their designs for Korea, but rather from the perspective of Koreans and how those superpowers' affected them.

I have opened some doors for you so hopefully you will continue your reading. Cheers.

[geek tragedy]

105. The choices were a unified Communist cult of personality dictatorship

or partition.

Yes, partition sucked, but better than the alternative.

You certainly had no trouble blaming the US for any and all bad things, but are curiously unwilling to attribute any blame to the Soviets/Communists.

[treestar]

112. Reading this exchange, you've managed to convince me that you're the one unarmed

You resort to your alleged greater knowledge without using it.

It's just bragging, not making a debate point. And we don't even know if your bragging is true.

[Ash_F]

125. Please point to one factually incorrect statement

The individual clearly did not know about the unelected right wing dictatorship, mass killings of moderates, liberals, students, teachers academics and labor unions and US governmental support of it before entering the discussion.

"And we don't even know..."

But you can know if you read and stop watching tv. I have provided some links to start you off. Another poster pointed to the South Korean truth and reconciliation commission, which I highly recommend you look into as well.

[EX500rider]

123. Well that's something we all agree on..

....although I suspect we are thinking of different people.


100. Someone that knows their history can tell when they are talking to someone who doesn't

[treestar]

134. Why not just debate rather than have a contest about who knows the most?

Unless we can see scores on an objective test, we really can't tell.

There is no end to the reading that could be done, but of what? Not all sources are objective, either.

Nobody on the planet would have time to read that large volume "work" of Kim IL Sung's.

[Ash_F]

135. Hahaha what a cop-out response!

I guess it is easier to consume television sound-bites and let those guide your opinions on foreign policy decisions.

One would think the findings of the South Koreans would carry some weight with you and a couple other posters in this thread, since you are supposedly so supportive of our allies, but whatever.

[Ranchemp.]

136. As opposed to your wholesale support of a brutal oppressive regime that is

the North Korean govt?

One would think that findings of Amnesty International would carry some weight with you and a couple of other posters in this thread, since you are supposedly so supportive of our enemies, but whatever.

[Ash_F]

137. Another strawman.

What's it like arguing with your visions?

[ronnie624]

106. As soon as the US began to occupy S. Korea in 1945,

It began oppressing leftist, and then initiated the civil conflict in Korea in 1948, by installing a right-wing military dictatorship in S. Korea, in violation of its agreement to allow reunification in 1950. With the aid of the US government, the S. Korean government began a brutal campaign against leftist, which included mass killings. When N. Korea invaded, the S. Korean government murdered as many as a hundred thousand people, to deprive the North manpower for its army. The US government participated directly in these atrocities. South Korea's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, has identified 138 instances in which the US was involved in mass killings.

It isn't possible for Korea to have "invaded" itself. N. Korea "invaded" S. Korea, primarily to engage a foreign occupier.

It is past time for the US to leave Korea and allow the nation to heal its wounds.

[Ranchemp.]

107. N. Korea invaded S. Korea primarily engage a foreign occupier?

Wrong, N. Korea invaded S. Korea to try to unify the two countries under N. Korean rule.
Quit trying to re-write history, you're doing a really bad job of it.

[ronnie624]

109. I don't disagree that the goal was reunification,

but first, they had to drive out the foreign invaders.

The movement in the north had the popular support of the entire nation, which was the motive for the extreme oppression of leftists in the south, and their subsequent mass slaughter by the US and its puppet dictatorship.

[Ranchemp.]

117. Now your sounding just like the former Pravda.

Foreign invaders? And just what were the Soviet's in the North at the time? Benevolent advisers?

Your just another apologist for the N. Korean dictatorship.

The movement in the north had the popular support of the entire nation, which was the motive for the extreme oppression of leftists in the south, and their subsequent mass slaughter by the US and its puppet dictatorship.

You sound just like the N.K.'s leadership, they use the same exact terminology when when describing the U.S. and South Korean govt.

Do you write for the N.K. news media?

[geek tragedy]

108. Amazing how apologists for the Kim dynasty

ignore the role of both the USSR and UN when spinning their fairy tales.

[ronnie624]

110. "Amazing" how "apologists" for ignorance

think they are advancing their point of view with demonstrably false ad hominem attacks, instead of addressing facts and logic.

[geek tragedy]

111. Your history is about as authentic

as Barack Obama's Kenyan birth certificate.

[ronnie624]

114. Take it up with S. Korea's Truth and Reconciliation Commission,

which has more credibility, in my mind, than the Western narrative.

[Ranchemp.]

118. Of course it does,

because you are a fan of brutal dictatorships.

[Ash_F]

138. Did you just confuse South Korea and North Korea?

You know the South Korean Truth and Reconciliation Commission was carried out by South Korea, right? Maybe you should not toss around insults if you can't even read properly.

[Ranchemp.]

140. I can read properly,

and I stand by my comment.

[Ash_F]

141. South Korea has been a free democracy since the late 1980's

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was in 2005

Your comment makes no sense, unless you think South Korea is still a brutal dictatorship. In which case...

[geek tragedy]

119. Do they pretend that the USSR didn't exist? nt

[EX500rider]

124. "N. Korea "invaded" S. Korea, primarily to engage a foreign occupier."

For some body so self described knowledgeable on the subject I would think you would have know that all US occupying forces pulled out of Korea by June of 1949. So, no-they didn't.

[Ranchemp.]

129. I honestly believe this person is a spokesman for the N. Korean govt.

I have never seen such propaganda except from the N. Korean govt. media organs.

[Ranchemp.]

87. OMG, more cruel and totalitarian than the North?

[WinkyDink]

38. Okay, THAT? Is plain old-fashioned stupid.

[Posteritatis]

41. Is there a training program for that kind of naivete, or does it just come naturally? (nt)

[EX500rider]

64. Wait...

....isn't the South Korean democratic system our fault too?

So we want a democracy for the South and a "communist" dynasty for the North?

[Ranchemp.]

69. I truly think this person would be happy with the Norks

imposing their brand of "democracy" on the South.

[Posteritatis]

71. Generally speaking, North Korea cheerleaders aren't big fans of democracy. (nt)

[EX500rider]

63. "I just don't think the current method of political/economic coercion/military threats is the way"

I agree and hopefully someday North Korea will quit doing those things.

[7962]

52. Amazing how, for some here, the default is to give NK the benefit of the doubt.

With all we know for a FACT that goes on there, we still have people who are willing to give them a break

[Marrah_G]

27. here are two very credible sources of info

http://www.hrw.org/world-report/2013/country-chapters/north-korea

[Ranchemp.]

31. I suggest you read what Amnesty International has to say about NK.

http://www.amnesty.org/en/region/north-korea

Makes for some interesting reading.

[aptal]

115. Actually just look for Vice's Documentaries on Youtube.

The source is the documentary itself where he goes to NK. There is also one where he goes and visits the NK labor camps in Russia. Pretty chilling IMO.

[ButterflyBlood]

75. threads like this are a great way to find additions to the ignore list

Congrats! You made this one quite easy.

[Arkana]

5. I don't get it. I thought Dear Leader loved that shit.

[Marrah_G]

21. The dear leader can do whatever he wants

The rest of the people cannot. If they watch foriegn tv they might start to think. They might start to question their government. They might start to want things the rest of the world has....like food, electricity, freedom, etc.

Everything in NK is focused on keeping the population blinded to the outside world and completely brainwashed.

[jmowreader]

60. Dear Leader would be pushing up daisies now...

except that any time one breaks through the ground, someone takes it home and eats it.

What Dear Leader (who also traveled frequently, another luxury forbidden to his subjects) did, doesn't govern what the rest of the country is allowed to do.

[SoapBox]

9. ...sick and perverted.

[ronnie624]

10. I Asked Noam Chomsky His Thoughts on the North Korea/US Situation:

Most (who know of him) would agree that Noam Chomsky is one of the greatest minds of our time. Besides being the "father" of modern linguistics, if you've ever seen him in interviews or debates, you'll know he's like a polymath of old. Science and philosophy, theory and practice, current events, history and the future. If you want to take him on, you'd better have an encyclopedic grasp of it all, because he does.

Which is why I contacted him. I've been seeing lots of heat from the media regarding North Korea, but (as usual) little light. Since Chomsky has a knack for clarifying these things, both from an analytic as well as moral perspective - and I hadn't seen anything from him on it - I sent him an email:

http://www.john-lindsey.net/2013/04/i-asked-noam-chomsky-his-thoughts-on.html#.UoD_vCf-L1U

[Ranchemp.]

22. Hmmmm,

wasn't it NK that attacked SK in 1950, thus inviting air attacks on their country? I noticed that Noam left that little tidbit out.
And hasn't it been NK that's infiltrated SK several times and committed terrorist attacks? Kidnapped SK citizens? Murdered American service personnel at the DMZ? Attempted to dig several tunnels under the SK/NK border? Severely oppressed their own citizens? Have several "re-education" camps, which are modeled after the infamous Soviet gulags?

Given all that, don't you think that this story is likely?

[Marrah_G]

29. And they don't just arrest the person who they claim committed the crime

They round up generations of the persons family.

[ronnie624]

34. The division of Korea was morally illegitimate.

It was done by the US government, with no input from any Koreans. In fact, it was opposed by virtually 100% of them.

The crimes you cite do not compare to what the US did to Korea, one of the most heinous crimes in the history of human civilization. The US government murdered millions of Koreans and utterly destroyed the country.

[Ranchemp.]

37. Right, uh huh, sure.

Why don't you take a poll of how many SK citizens would rather have NK in control of their country and see what they say?
The crimes I cite are a very small selection of the atrocities that NK has perpetrated on it's own citizens and on SK over the years.

One of the most heinous crimes in history? What about the genocide by Pol Pot? How about the millions of murders by Stalin of his own people? What about the Rape of Nanking by the Japanese? How about the Nazi's mass murder of the Jewish people in WWII? Or the mass murder of other ethnic groups by the Nazi's in WWII?
Ah, but those don't count because the U.S. wasn't responsible,right?

Heinous crime by the U.S. my patootie.

Your just another NK apologist who has, IMO, no credibility at all.

[geek tragedy]

39. Hannah Bell, is that you? nt

[EX500rider]

67. Was she the one who was all..

....."But look, they are smiling in all the pics" (about NK)

[geek tragedy]

68. Yep. Nt

[WinkyDink]

43. Hyundai, DaeWoo, LG, and Samsung would beg to differ.

[EX500rider]

73. "The division of Korea was morally illegitimate."

What are you talking about?
At the time it was a Japanese colony and the 38th parallel is where the US and Soviet forces agreed to meet.

"In 1945, the Soviet Union and the United States agreed on the surrender of Japanese forces in Korea in the aftermath of World War II, leaving Korea partitioned along the 38th parallel, with the north under Soviet occupation and the south under U.S. occupation. These circumstances soon became the basis for the division of Korea by the two superpowers, exacerbated by their inability to agree on the terms of Korean independence. The two Cold War rivals then established governments centered around their own respective ideologies, leading to Korea's division into two political entities: North Korea and South Korea."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korea

[greytdemocrat]

83. Dang.

And I was planning on booking a vaca there soon!!!

[WinkyDink]

40. Do you not understand the use of " "?

[ronnie624]

46. Clicking the link will lead to obvious conclusions.

as should highlighting the excerpt, thus.

[arikara]

55. Interesting

thanks. There is always so much more to a story than what msm puts out.

[EX500rider]

70. Chomsky in this case is full of sh*t..

..."the 1953 armistice, when everything above ground in the country had long ago been destroyed"

Really? We destroyed everything above ground in Korea? lol

UN forces dropped 386,037 tons of bombs on N Korea....

Germany got 1.5 million tons in WWII and Europe got 2.7 million tons total.

[Botany]

20. Kim Jung Un's fate might turn out like

... Nicolae Ceauşescu or Khadafi's the man had an ex girlfriend executed for some
petty crime.

[Marrah_G]

23. Probably not though

The difference is that the populace there is so incredibly brainwashed that they worship/fear him, his father and his grandfather as Gods. The population there has very little, if any knowledge of the outside world.

[maxsolomon]

24. China must withdraw it's patronage.

There will come a point where NK's utility to them (as a irritant to SK's economy) outweighs it's cost.

[Marrah_G]

30. True

They need to also STOP sending escapees back to NK to be executed.

[jessie04]

58. Dennis Rodman will deny it , i'm sure.

nt

[mimi85]

65. Great statement.

I think Rodman may have suffered some head injuries while playing basketball. Or more likely, he's just plain nuts.

[valerief]

59. What a brutal, brutal nation. nt

[penultimate]

72. Happens in Baltimore all the time.

[ronnie624]

76. 60 Years After The Korean War, The U.S. Must End Its Cold War Alliance With South Korea

There’s nothing mysterious about North Korea’s program. The advantages of being a nuclear power are many. Most obviously, nuclear weapons offer an effective deterrent. Serbia and Iraq demonstrate the danger of becoming an American target without nukes. Libya demonstrates the danger of becoming an American target after abandoning nukes.

As Henry Kissinger once reportedly observed, even paranoids have enemies. Pyongyang knows that the U.S. means it ill—President George W. Bush famously termed the DPRK a member of the “axis of evil” and said that he “loathed” Kim Jong-il, the current ruler’s father.

President Barack Obama has said less, but American policy remains largely unchanged. The U.S. maintains a defense guarantee with and nearly 30,000 troops in the ROK, has been tightening its alliance with Seoul, sent B-52s and B-2s to overfly the peninsula earlier this year, and conducts annual exercises with the ROK military.

This policy is not in America’s interest. Washington should disengage from the peninsula. That requires turning security for the South over to Seoul. Normalizing relations with North Korea while handing the nuclear issue to its neighbors. And leaving the two Koreas free to decide their future relationship.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/dougbandow/2013/07/15/60-years-after-the-korean-war-the-u-s-must-end-its-cold-war-alliance-with-south-korea/

[Ranchemp.]

77. That's got to be the most irresponsible opinion piece

I've seen in a while, the Norks would just love us to leave so they can "unite" the two countries under their "democratic" rule.
We are the ONLY reason the Norks haven't invaded and imposed it's brand of "democracy" on S. Korea.

[ronnie624]

78. Every analyst worth their salt, knows N. Korea does not want war.

You have no idea what the "Norks" would "love". Your opinions make it clear you understand nothing about this issue.

[Ranchemp.]

79. The Norks don't want war with the U.S.,

you forgot to add that tidbit, but if the U.S. left the peninsula, they would roll right into the South and impose the oppression on the South's citizens that they so lovingly impose on their own citizens.

[ronnie624]

80. N. Korea would be no match for S. Korea,

especially with US military aid, and they know this. Attacking S. Korea would be suicidal.

Your view depends on your ability to read the future, which you clearly cannot do. History shows a willingness to cooperate on N. Korea's part, in an atmosphere of less belligerence. The Clinton Administration's policies of engagement were making progress, until the Bush Administration ended them and began its hostile rhetoric. It was then that N. Korea withdrew from the NPT and began refining weapons grade nuclear material again. What the N. Korean government wants, is a non-aggression pledge from the US.

[Ranchemp.]

81. This coming from the same person who blames the U.S. for all the problems in Ven.?

Excuse me if I am highly skeptical of anyone who believes that the Norks won't roll into the South if U.S. forces left.

They've already shown an inclination to attack the South, sinking a South Korean Navy Corvette, shelling a South Korean Island with the resulting deaths of 2 civilians and 2 S. Korean Marines, so don't tell me that the North won't attack the South if we left.
Nobody can predict what those crazys in Pyongyang will do and I'd rather the U.S. not take the chance of depending on the stability of little Un.

The only way there's going to be true peace on the Korean Peninsula is when the bat shit crazy Kim Dynasty is forever gone, which isn't going to happen anytime soon.

[ronnie624]

82. South Korea's Truth and Reconciliation Commission,

is piecing together long suppressed accounts of mass killings early in the Korea War; executions of South Korean leftists and supposed sympathizers by their US-allied government, and killing of South Korean refugees by the US government.

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_international/korea_masskillings/index.html?SITE=AP

[Doctor_J]

120. hopefully it was the hustler or Casablanca

What if your last 90 minutes on earth were spent watching Stop Or My Mom Will Shoot?

[DonCoquixote]

126. If they were watchign Atlas Shrugged

they deserved what they got

[Douglas Carpenter]

128. even in America - watching foreign films leads to leads to liberal counterculture thinking and

contributes to the breakdown of traditional family values

[penultimate]

131. I agree, stuff like this happens all the time in the US. Just last week my grandma was sent to

prison for watching some movie with subtitles.

[Douglas Carpenter]

133. if not she should have been

[Posteritatis]

144. Oy. (nt)