Congressional Democrats in the United States have given the KORUS FTA the gas face [Reuters]:
U.S. House of Representatives Democratic leaders quashed White House hopes on Friday for quick renewal of “fast track” trade negotiating authority and said they cannot support trade pacts negotiated with South Korea and Colombia.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other senior Democrats [...]
As Charles Wright said, express yourself.
Looks like some folk in Hanbat have gotten together to create a community blog. If you live in the Daejeon area — or even if you don’t — be sure to check it out.
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Gadget geeks, rejoice — Motorola has begun sales of the next generation model of its ultra-slim Razr cell phone in Korea ahead of a global launch next month. Said Motorola Korea Inc., “We’re releasing our new phone in the Korean market first in recognition of tech-savvy and fashion-aware Korean consumers.” [HT to reader]
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A forthcoming science-fiction film by director Shim Hyung-rae will see monsters in Los Angles. The move will preview on July 23. One must note that the director will have his film released in the States for 1,500 theaters whereas “The Host” only had 70. Not bad at all.
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Need more business cards? Try printing them on peanuts. It’s cheap.
From next month, police will crack down on banners for “international marriages” using discriminatory language (like “Vietnamese women never run away”) and advertising vehicles using similar language. Violators will face up to a year in prison or fines up to 10 million won. [NoCut News, Korean].
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Its really disappointing to see people descending unintentionally into self parody. Various Korean business groups are petitioning for Korean businessmen accused of bribery and embezzlement get pardoned as part of the annual August 16 presidential mass pardon.
Lee Hyun-seok, a vice president of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) gives a “So funny you [...]
Korean bathrooms — the next Korean Wave? [SBS, Korean]
No more pyeong? No more inbun? [Korea Times] 500,000 won fines for violators? Surely, the MOCIE can’t be serious, can it?
With the signing of the Strategic Implementation Plan, Korea and the US will, in theory, complete construction of a new allied command structure by 2009:
“Through a deliberate process incorporating multiple theater-level exercises and evaluations, the JCS will achieve initial operational capability as the theater war fighting command by late 2009 and attain full operational [...]
If you’re Japanese, be warned — not only might foreign wives leak naval secrets [Japundit], but they’ll make your kids stink, too! [Debito.org]
In the KT, Tom Coyner talks about Korea’s reversed brain-drain, i.e., “The Return of the Gyopo.”
For those who are interested… and because blogs are nothing if not platforms from which to toot your own horn… I link to an interview with yours truly in the online edition of The Economist.
Thanks go to Brendan Greeley (who was quite the blogger himself) for running that.
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The Dong-A points out Korea Exchange Bank has a much better rate of promoting women than others, with them making up over 40% of management versus, say, 15% for competitor Kookmin Bank. The article I think is missing something. There is something peculiar about KEB over the past few years that may account for the [...]
Reportedly Hanjin, a Korean company, is building the largest ship in the world at its shipyard in Subic Bay, but some feel this is nothing more than another big-fish story:
“The Philippine media reported ‘the world’s biggest ship’ story based on a comment by President Arroyo with no further substantiation from Hanjin or elsewhere. It’s no [...]
Over at Gusts of Popular Feeling, Matt has linked to several old books on Korea available for viewing at Archive.com. Great stuff.
Of particular interest to our friends at Coming Anarchy is Problems of the Far East: Japan-Korea-China, by none other than George Nathaniel Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston.
How’s this for a book dedication:
To those [...]
Apparently the minimum wage in Korea is going up. The new wage is 3,770 won (about US$4.00), up 8.3%.
The other day a reader reminded me of the post I did on beef a while back. I estimated how long an average Korean would have to work for a kilogram of beef (it was over 5.5 [...]
Boy, that Ottoman Navy really got around, capturing the Icelandic (!) archipelago of Vestmannaeyjar in 1627 and the English island of Lundy in 1655.
Over at the Guardian’s blogs, Roy Greenslade notes the Korea Online Newspaper Association’s war on the portal sites:
Here’s an extraordinary development. Korean newspapers have decided to impose a seven-day restriction on web portals that promote their news content. It means that, after a week, net users won’t be able to search for news through the [...]
