Meanwhile, on the DLP front…

Most readers here at the Hole are already more than familiar with the continuing sagas of the Uri and Grand National parties (although that will not prevent me from posting about them more later), but it is sometimes interesting to take a look at the extreme ends of the political spectrum.

Korea’s far right is relatively boring.  As this Newsweek piece (which I will post on next) points out, the Old Right Wing Guard is out.  It has been replaced by a Grand National Party that is, if not quite squeaky-clean, at least thoroughly democratic (even the impeachment was conducted within the rule of law) and thus unlikely to do anything really exciting.

The far left, represented here by the Democratic Labor Party, is much more interesting.  Kotaji, my favorite IKK socialist, has two pieces on the left’s ongoing attempts at fielding a unity candidate.

The first piece features two academics doing what academics do best; arguing passionately about a small subset of the political spectrum.

The second post is more interesting to me as it deals with what hoops a presidential candidate would have to go through to get the endorsement of the relatively moderate All Together faction of the DLP.  They have to meet three criteria (quoted from Kotaji’s translation of a statement issued by the group):

1. First, they must be opposed to neoliberalism. This excludes both Ch’ŏn Chŏngbae*, who has argued that “we should accept the positive aspects of neoliberalism,” and Kim Kŭnt’ae*, who has called the Korea-US FTA “positive” and argued only that “it should be finalised by the next government”.
2. Second, they must be opposed to war and support peace on the Korean peninsula. Just expressing support for the ‘Sunshine Policy’ – as a section of the rightwing Grand National Party do – is not enough. They must also be against US pressure on North Korea and above all they must be against the deployment of Korean troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon. DLP national assembly member No Hoech’an has also put forward opposition to the deployment of troops in Iraq as a core requirement for any potential unity candidate.As a result Kim Kŭnt’ae and Ch’ŏn Chŏngbae are once again excluded, as they voted for the deployment of troops to Iraq in 2004.
3. [T]he third criterion is that they cannot be a part of the mainstream political forces, whether it’s the GNP, Uri Party or one of their mutations. These are the very people who have based themselves on powerful vested interests and promoted neoliberal and pro-war policies.

So, who do they like?  The only guy mentioned by name was Im Jong-in, everyone’s favorite anti-SOFA demagogue, first rat off the Uri ship, and representative of my wife’s district (the horror).

The guy I see right now as the most likely unity candidate is Chung Dong-young, although he is only polling fourth, behind the GNPers and Sohn Hak-gyu.  Since he is against the ROKUSAFTA and is no longer a member of Uri, he may fit the bill.  However, if memory serves, he supported the Iraq deployment, which disqualifies him.

No, I suspect that the DLP will back its own horse (I’m guessing Roh Hoe-chan.) and the more moderate candidate on the left will have to accept that he will lose 5-8% of the vote to the radicals.

BTW, I still think Sohn Hak-kyu will go the way of Goh Kun by the end of summer.

*That’s Chun Jung-bae and Kim Geun-tae for the little squiggly doodad impaired.