Pardon, but where is "here?" Just curious....We have had our problems with NK here mainly with drug smuggling...
Pardon, but where is "here?" Just curious.
i think the constant, desperate state of the NK populace indicates that the NK leaders have little regard for actually being leaders of the people. i think putting pressure on NK via China is the only way to "solve" the issue (not that I have any sort of vast insight into the political affairs on the korean peninsula).
A military conflict is very much a lose-lose situation. There is no good outcome to be had there.
Yup, China is the only one who could defuse the situation peacefully. I really don't understand why they continue to support NK. It just seems to me that NK has become a major headache even for them.
Don't worry, our president is engaging in some one-on-one diplomacy.
(if you think that's fake, well, just check his twitter)
I'm sure retired Lieutenant General Jan-Marc Jouas is no longer involved in an pertinent military information.
Your thread title is also a misnomer.
Don't worry, our president is engaging in some one-on-one diplomacy.
(if you think that's fake, well, just check his twitter)
There is an old saying, "he who sits by the pot eats" and it doesn't matter if it is communist, capitalist, socialist, etc. form of governmentUntil we see a nation-state organize into communism under a true representative democracy, the only examples of communism we have been dictatorships or at least highly authoritarian, unless you want to include organizations like kibbutzim or Hutterite colonies. But those are voluntary associations, not nation-states. Most people just don't seem to want a life in which they can't have anything significant of their own, and won't enter into such a thing voluntarily.
There was a time when a lot of people really believed that whatever its faults the Soviet Union was on the way to creating a society free of exploitaton and class distinctions. Everybody knows better now.
Almost 30 years have passed since Milovan Djilas, one-time Tito intimate and veteran Yugoslav Communist, shocked the world by writing a book, "The New Class," in which he charged that a new feudalism had arisen in communist countries. The new ruling class, he said, was a self-aggrandizing oligarchy made up of the communist political and managerial elite.
The disillusioned Djilas' premise, though big news at the time, is generally accepted nowadays inside and outside the Soviet Union. Everybody knows that--despite all their talk of creating an egalitarian, classless society--communists are no different from other people when it comes to feathering their own nests. Them that has get.
However, the existence of an organized system of privilege was not openly discussed in the Soviet Union until it broke into the open at the recent congress of the Soviet Communist Party.
Formally, disparities in pay are very narrow. Politburo members collect paychecks that are not much larger than those for skilled workers. But, in fact , party leaders and functionaries--as well as leading writers, artists and technocrats--enjoy perks and privileges beyond the wildest dreams of the average Ivan.
Members of the so-called nomenklatura , numbering perhaps a million, have special holiday retreats, access to special medical facilities and--most resented by ordinary Russians--access to special stores that sell imported and Soviet-made goods that are simply not available in the regular stores. Many also have cars and chauffeurs.
As a practical matter, the privileges are hereditary, since children of the elite have an inside track on admission to the top universities--graduation from which guarantees them good jobs and a place on the nomenklatura list.
The first hint that change just might be in the air came in December, when poet Evgenii Evtushenko made a speech to the Writers Congress denouncing the coupons for special shops "that every delegate to this congress has in his pocket, as I do in mine." This portion of his remarks, however, was not published in the Soviet Union.
Then, just a few days before the party congress opened, Pravda published letters complaining about special privileges for party officials. The most notable letter was signed by one N. Nikolaev, identified as a party member since 1940.
"We can no longer close our eyes," he said, "to the fact that party, government, trade-union and managerial . . . officials sometimes deepen existing inequalities through their use of special canteens, special shops and special hospitals."
Nikolaev said that he had no objection to high salaries for people in responsible jobs. But, in his words, "Let the boss go with everybody else to an ordinary store, and stand in line like everyone else. And then perhaps those lines that we're all sick and tired of will be eliminated more quickly."
Since Pravda is the official voice of the Kremlin, it was fair to assume that the newspaper was delivering a message from party leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev. Subsequent events, however, were puzzling.
Politburo member Geidar Aliev denied in a news conference that members of the party elite enjoyed special advantages. But in the next breath he said that the question of whether such privileges should be eliminated "is still under discussion."
Yup, China is the only one who could defuse the situation peacefully. I really don't understand why they continue to support NK. It just seems to me that NK has become a major headache even for them.
Best reply ever....could belong in several threads here.
Best reply ever....could belong in several threads here.
Glad to see that possible borderline pedophilia/underage relationships are funny.
Glad to see that possible borderline pedophilia/underage relationships are funny.
Glad to see that possible borderline pedophilia/underage relationships are funny.
That's my take. N Korea is the boogieman. It's a reefer madness kind of deal. It gets the shallow thinkers all frothed up about starting another war, cuz they's looking at us funny. Cuz we's skeered!
N Korea can't attack because they'd be annihilated. China won't back them if they do & might even act against them.
We can't attack because our S Korean allies want no part of it & because the Chinese have to support N Korea if we do.
Kim's nuclear weapons change none of that. They can't use them because a single SSBN can put 24 MIRV'd Tridents up their ass in a matter of minutes.
So, you believe Kim is self interested and would not risk his life provoking war eh? So tell me, has anyone ever committed suicide? What is the purpose of provoking the west with Nukes?