Scott Burgeson has posted some very thoughtful commentary on the protests going on downtown.
It’s a long piece, and should be read in its entirety. Just to give you a sample:
Tonight I walked to City Hall at around 7:30pm and was disgusted by what I saw. A group at Ch’onggye Plaza was protesting human rights abuses in China, but all of 5 people were stopping to listen to a speech that was being made. Nearby, on the corner by Seoul Finance Center, another group was protesting against global warming and advocating green living and vegetarianism, but again nobody was even listening. Then I went to City Hall, and it was flooded by people listening to a monk give a speech about the need to renegotiate the beef deal. I’m sorry, but why is a vegetarian monk promoting eating beef at all? Shouldn’t he be calling for outright cancellation?
I left after a few minutes and spoke with the anti-global warming people once again. They had a large-screen TV showing how cows produce methane gas which in turn increases global warming. I spoke with the nice halmoni there for a while and asked her what she thought of the beef issue. At first she said she didn’t care because she was a vegetarian, but then after some prodding, she said, “Those people have low consciousness” and went on to talk about how traditionally Koreans didn’t even eat much meat, and that the cattle industry in both the US and Korea was harming the environment in serious ways. I agree with her completely. She ended by saying, “Those people don’t seem to really understand what’s going on in the world we live in. All I want to do is give some information about the Earth.” Too bad nobody really cared about what she had to say, because they were all too busy protesting their right to cram their faces with “safe” beef at City Hall.
Well, if they are really as radical as they fancy themselves to be, they should simply announce that they will stop eating beef entirely and start actually giving a fuck about the environment for a change. I mean, I cannot even begin to imagine how much trash has been generated by two months of daily protests comprising millions of people.
I must say that while 2MB certainly sucks, this movement is starting to seem more and more morally bankrupt the closer I look at it.
Like I said, it’s a long post, and must be read in its entirety.
While we’re here, another guy who has been doing some really nice work posting on the protests is Gord at gordsellar.com. Be sure to read through his stuff — some definite food for thought.
97 Comments
gordsellAr.com
I am a Korean who’s been practicing vegetarianism for the past few years and also participated in a few candle light protests during the last two months. As you may already know, the current protests are not just about beef anymore but about 2MB government in general, so participating in those protests doesn’t necessarily mean you advocate eating meat whether it’s Korean or American.
If anything, I feel that the past two months’ candlelight protests against 2MB gave Korean vegetarians a chance to have their voice heard to other people, and allowed non-vegetarian people to care about what they eat and think about vegetarianism at least once. I’ve noticed at least three different groups promoting vegetarianism and participating the protests, and there have been a greater number of articles written about vegetarianism recently in Korean media.
There was one funny cartoon in Hankyoreh 21, although I am aware that this site’s host is not quite fond of the magazine..
http://h21.hani.co.kr/section-.....15055.html
anybody going tonite? this rain has dampened my desire to go
#3 Me, too. I’m staying home. I feel a little guilty, though.
Great cartoon, 방문자, thanks for linking to it.
Ironic thing is, I was quoted on its cover earlier this year:
http://www.rjkoehler.com/2008/.....-in-korea/
Well, gordsellar’s post was hell of long
I definitely concur with: “But as for the guys you describe throwing themselves into the police line, well, my thinking is, if they are indeed doing anything that could be construed as assault — and it sounds like they are — they should be promptly tasered (tased?), cuffed, and carted away for their “chicken cage bus tour” and short stay in police detention. This is far preferable to allowing them to assault cops until the cops finally retaliate.”
But Korean society doesn’t work that way, as I’m sure he knows. It isn’t an issue of too much or little police force (the riot cops aren’t even police to begin with), it’s an issue of clearly defined law and enforcement, which is absent here.
This is an immature democracy, and I don’t mean that in a “snide” way, as he characterized the comments over here at the Hole. The weaknesses here are in the Assembly, where regional divisions and corruption make for legislative gridlock; in the political parties, which are based on shallow and ever-changing alliances for short-term gains; and in the presidency, which often uses “rule by law.” Along with this is the dominance of the chaebol over society, overly militant unions and the ideological perversions of many of the “civic groups.”
S.K. has made great progress democratically but these seemingly endless, hydra-headed protests are a big step backward. If anything needs protesting in Korea it’s the lack of a moderate political party that’s truly responsive to all regions of the country.
Scott Burgeson’s essay is excellent, for it demonstrates that the left has some honorable, objective, truth-telling individuals.
What Burgeson describes is what I realized in Berkeley back in the early 80s. There’s a hardcore left that intentionally provokes the police out of a desire to inflame passions, distort issues, and — in the hardcore view — foment revolutionary ‘consciousness’. The Berkeley hardcore left gathered in the read of the protests and threw stones over the protesters at the police — such was its ‘method’ of raising radical consciousness!
Good work, Mr. Burgeson, in telling it like it is.
Jeffery Hodges
* * *
방문자,
Disingenuous to say the least. I think a great deal of the dissatisfaction with LMB is directly related to the pinko smear campaign and their distribution of false information.
I went, saw nothing, drove around the area looking for anything like a protest, then left. I went around 6. Did I miss something?
And yes, an essay I can agree with, as I think it’s reasonable and reflects what I’ve seen in the “moral bankruptcy” of Korean protesters, which I’ve been writing about for more than a year, and a lot recently.
It’s funny, though, that on my blog, KB has been nothing but almost defensive of the protesters, and slamming me for slamming the violence of a certain minority of the protesters, and the way I basically came to the same conclusion that he had come to here: that the protesters’ had lost the moral high ground and degenerated into not much more than sheer holliganism, and that the pancaking of so many divergent issues had diffused the “movement” into meaninglessness.
So why the sudden flip-flop? KB jumps down my throat on my blog for calling the protesters “violent” two weeks ago, but now he’s all calling them out? Whence the change of view?
To the first Korean poster.
Granted Lee made some mistakes communicating the beef deal and other blunders during the last 3 months. But really, do you honestly think that he deserves this attempt of overthrow of the government through civil disobedience?
Not that he had much of a chance or any time (if you call couple months a long time) to correct his ways, do you honestly think that a government needs to be overthrown like this after few months on the job?
If his policies are bad, why aren’t the opposition in the National Assembly practicing democracy, debating his policies? If the opposition party don’t like the guy, why don’t they just start the impeachment process, instead of acting like morons and leading the never ending protests that’s causing foreign investors to flee and giving Korea irrepairable harm with its reputation as a republic of protests?
The Goat,
To be honest, as a vegetarian I do not really care as much about the intricacies of the current U.S. beef import issue as do most people, yet I am seriously concerned about 2MB government’s social and economic policies and future plans, just like any other resident of South Korea as those directly impacts my daily lives.
While I don’t know how the demographics of the current protests will appear to non-Korean speakers, the current protests consist of many different groups with different agendas. As a gay person I usually join the people with the rainbow flag (it’s more fun) and we don’t really talk much about beef issue but we do carry signs and do chants about the revised anti-discrimination law (the originally included sexual orientation part is now gone) or his social and economic policies. I think that other minority groups who joined the protests (I’ve seen groups consisting of people with disabilities, foreign laborers, anarchists, etc) would probably not just talk about beef either.
watching kbs now, it looks huge
what a waste of energy, there are so many other causes they should be bitching about but this is crazy
so far nothing about the counter demonstrations
I’ve just come back from the Nork/Nono protest and I must say I was impressed with what I saw. Despite the police coming in and making a line between the mostly older Nono crowd and the candlelight kids around 6ish, the only disturbances came from the latter. Some mad monk in a pink plastic raincoat decided to give the benefit of his accumulated wisdom to some adjoshis amongst whom I was standing, and they promptly advised him to perform a biologically impossible act whilst on the way to the DPRK. A few other candlers also piped up but were largely ignored.
The Kyopo bloke who spoke in English was eloquent and made a stirring speech, translated into Korean. Many of the older people there were polite and engaged me in discussion through my limited Korean and their limited English. In all an impressive turnout of a couple of hundred, which is remarkable given that conservative types and those who are pro free trade generally don’t come out en masse, even more so in foul weather!
One last thing I was surprised to see a group of lads in their military uniforms, obviously out of the service due to their fruity hair dos, on the other side of the police line with 2MB 가 signs. Given that they are part of a military tradition that has kept the North at bay for so long and overseen the transition to a rule based on human rights, why wouldn’t they have come and joined us to protest what is going on up there?
PPS, got interviewed by the Times, looking forward to seeing my name in print on Monday!
Chosun has the story on the counter demonstrators, and MBC briefly showed one 20 second clip of a North Korean defector protesting the protest.
This one is huge because all the leftist elements in Korean society have joined hands — everyone from religious groups, to trade/teacher unions, to UDP/LDP opposition parties, to anti-American civic groups — one big huge bash up party. Even Amnesty International has come and is watching for government human rights abuses. The Amnesty rep is interviewing 14 Koreans who claim they are victims of human rights violations. I wouldn’t be surprised if Korea will now be condemned by Amnesty International as a serious human rights abuser along with Iran, China, and North Korea. What tools, those suckers at Amnesty.
One of the problems I see is a serious lack of overseas coverage on Korea. Other than foreigner blogs like these, most of the overseas coverages on Korea are superficial and they usually quote Koreans. Imagine if the Americans acted this way — there would have been swift world wide reactions, criticisms, and ridicule. Unfortunately, Korea is off the radar.
So what choices do Koreans have to gather alternative opinions? Conservative medias are demonized so they aren’t taken seriously. The entire Korean media is taken over by leftist nationalism. If there are no legitimate critical voices coming from anywhere outside of Korea, I’m not surprised why Koreans are so readily fooled into believing lies served up by anyone with alternative motives. Korea is one of the most advanced countries when it comes to being broadband wired. But ironically, Korea is also an island of isolation from rest of the world.
Means nothing without specific examples. Furthermore, I don’t think he made much of a secret of his plans during the election campaign.
This is nothing more than a hatchet job put on by the pinkos who find themselves on the wrong side of a majority government (for the first time in 10 years).
On the participation of Buddhists, it seems pretty obvious that under a pronounced Evangelical administration, and with the entrance of the Korean Catholic Church into the fray, Buddhists are feeling the heat to portray their nationalism. See National officials try to calm top Buddhists in the JoongAng Daily.
You can’t hold Buddhists to a higher standard than Christians. They too are susceptible to political currents. They are an institution like the Church that must navigate religious doctrine with popular sentiment and political trends. Furthermore, in Korea they’ve been struggling to counter declining adherents, and what better way than to appeal to a popular cause. (Monks in Korea have long been active in nationalist movements, going back to the Imjin War of the 16th century. Non-violent my ass.)
There is a difference, however, between the institution and the individual monks and nuns that are a part of it. Korean Buddhism is incredibly fluid, open to interpretation. Monks and nuns continuously navigate between what is doctrinally correct and what is right to them. Eating meat is prohibited in the sutras, but then again right and wrong is a dualistic view of the world that goes against Zen thought.
I thought I briefly mentioned about the revision of the anti-discrimination law as an example.
Anyway, I won’t bother with someone who uses the term ‘pinko’ anymore.
Have fun, anyways
“I thought I briefly mentioned about the revision of the anti-discrimination law as an example.”
Oh come on. 99.99 percent of those beef zombies couldn’t care less about the anti discrimination bill. Some of the things that come out of those organizing the protest are some of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever heard.
They continue to spout lies about US beef and the police. And the lap dogs are lapping it up like no other fools.
Scott Burgeson’s conclusions re: protest organizers deliberately inciting and exploiting violence seem to be borne out by this development: Protesters tell religious groups to leave: The “People’s Conference against Mad Cow Disease” has told the Catholic priests’ association and other religious groups that recently joined the movement to take a hike.
From #7…If anything needs protesting in Korea it’s the lack of a moderate political party that’s truly responsive to all regions of the country.
I would change that to refer to the whole effing planet, not just Korea. Why are only the extreme ends of the swing of the pendulum of stupidity being heard/represented/elected??
About eight years ago, someone I worked with told me (analogy coming)that when an area became too populated with frogs not getting predated, the frogs got all homo and murderous and such.I believe humanity is in for some trouble unless we can moderate somehow.Probably not good for shareholder value, though.
No, but clearly, you’ll bother with people who talk like it’s still 1987.
cm: The Hankyoreh has some interesting quotes from the field:
Can’t fault them for not being honest about what they want, I guess.
Got to give LMB credit — just 100 days in, and he’s even worse than Chun Doo-hwan.
Nice to see the pols there, too:
http://news.naver.com/main/rea.....0001964784
Was wondering what Kim Geun-tae was doing nowadays.
At the same time, the chief organizers (if you can call them that) have issued a five-point list of demands that will never be agreed upon:
http://news.naver.com/main/hot.....0002161072
I just hope tonight ends peacefully, people get tired of it all and things return to something resembling normal.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but other than lifting the ban on US beefs imports, LMB hasn’t actually implemented any of the ideas the protesters and the public are complaining about, namely, the canal project, the privatization of the health care, and whatever else is on the list. Has LMB made any public statements regarding these unpopular ideas?
Au contraire, Buddhism, like Catholicism, has been steadily gaining adherents for the past decade+, in each case at a steadily increasing rate, while the Korean protestant denominations have been experiencing a steadily rising incidence of defections.
OK, we got the “V for Vendetta” thing going:
http://www.cbs.co.kr/Nocut/Show.asp?IDX=872737
And she’s dressed like a nun:
http://news.naver.com/main/hot.....0002161082
Oh, wait, she is a nun. My bad
#14 aaronm
Was also there at the nonodemo and was very disappointed with the turnout — after it was announced with such fanfare. The media said there was going to be 30,000 and as you can attest it was about 500. But that is the media’s fault — and the guy giving overly optimistic press releases. The teachers that were supposed to show up??? Think I saw only about 5 — of the 100 that was supposed to show.
But am I disappointed? No. I went for personal reasons as I support the idea of a counterpoint in a discussion. I support an exercise in democracy — not only the one-way version that has been going on on the other side.
BTW those military clad folks are the Hanchongryeon “storm troopers/peace marshalls” that are there to coordinate the trouble. I arrived at 5:30 and they were hanging out as a group down near the 7-11 — I assume because they thought 30,000 were going to show up. When only 500 old folks — and I never saw the 300 “bodyguards” — appeared, it was apparent that their job was nill. To taunt the group, they formed up on the opposite street with signs that talked about a new beginning of non-violence. Nice touch.
Only one incident when a rabble rouser in a pink raincoat (not a monk) was chased out of the group’s area — but then returned with his own group. The police put an end to any confrontation by simply blocking them off immediately before they could cross the road. The police finally boxed the whole area with buses at the front — and had police at the rear.
Left at 7:30 because it appeared that they weren’t going to do much more.
However, though I still don’t believe in protesting protests, I do believe in exercising their rights under the democracy that the other side so loudly professes…but is so ready to trample.
If they do this again, I hope they choose another venue as this place was not a good choice. If they do, my presence will be there but as always I’ll be in the background…
I predict Korea will unite under Japan-hate for an exit to this mess. Works all the time.
at 25: I met baeksu at the demo tonight, and we saw the vendetta people.
they didn’t know that V was an anarchist, nor that the “V” flag they were waving was an inverted and modified anarchy symbol. Scott was pretty disappointed. It was a cool visual, but they didn’t understand what they were saying by putting on that mask, and waving that flag.
In the meantime, I spotted a group doing a dance I’ve decided to call the CandleGirl. I made a video of it (at my site). I think it’s gonna be bigger than the Tell Me dance, but that’s just me.
This is a very dangerous precedence for the future of Korea. If somebody or some group doesn’t like some policy or the government, anyone can just mobilize and hold the government and the nation at hostage. This has been going on far too long, and this beef protest is the biggest of them all. The protesters are misrepresenting Democracy by shouting slogans of democracy but refusing to practice it. They’ve shut down the government, refusing to debate in the confines of the rule of law, and the only way to satisfy them is for Lee to step down.
I wish such publications like Businessweek, Financial Times, Fortune, New York Times, ABC/NBC/CBS/CNN could all write articles ridiculing Korean protests, picking apart one by one all the arguments for protesting.
And once all those articles get translated back to Korean, I think that’s the only way average Koreans can wake up and put a stop to this mass lunacy. Humiliation in the eye of the world is the only way for Koreans to just accepting what they are taught and just following the masses.
Either that, or Lee should step down and resign. His leadership has been resoundingly rejected and his presidency for the rest of the 5 years remaining is questionable. His policies will be seriously hamstrung by threats of protests from hundreds of various interest groups who are watching like hawks. Lee should resign for the sake of Korea, and so that Conservatives will not be blamed for the coming economic collapse.
Let the left wing loonies run the country into the ground. Korea is a lost case. Let’em have what they want. Let them put their man in the office who will put a stop to the US beef and who will stop the FTA. Let the US retaliate and put high tariffs on Samsung and Hyundai. Let the US withdraw the USFK. Let all foreign investors leave South Korea. Let them be the laughing stock of Asia. Let their man join South Korea under the leadership of Dear Leader in the north.
That’s what they want, let them have it.
“LMB hasn’t actually implemented any of the ideas the protesters and the public are complaining about, namely, the canal project, the privatization of the health care, and whatever else is on the list.”
As it has been pointed out again and again, those were his policies that were well known before he got elected. People voted for him, fully knowing those were his intentions. Why is it all of a sudden, a problem big enough to be a mass protest material virging on public rebellion aiming toward overthrow of the 3 month old government?
The canal project is dead, he said he would not do it if the citizens don’t want it.
Good piece by Burgeson. Wish I had been that prescient about the protest organizers when I was his age. As regards the beef consumption issue itself, however, I’m not sure that refusing to eat beef, or even turning vegetarian, is the answer. The simple fact is that the pure number of the human race, coupled with rising standards of living, has impacted upon the planet. It may not be the only impact (if one accepts active volcanoes under the Arctic, increased sunspot activity, tectonic shifts in the earth’s crust, etc, as contributing to global warming), but it has definitely resulted in far more mouths to be fed. Years ago, an Aussie mate of mine raised on a cattle property, commented that the first thing people in developing nations did when they got a bit more money was to spent it on protein; i.e. pork, beef, chicken, or fish. The first three, as well as fish farming, all have associated pollution and land imprint problems. Increased fishing can lead to the depletion and extinction of stocks. So dropping beef in Korea will only focus that part of the problem elsewhere, even if it is dog meat. Vegetarianism is great, but again, the world’s increased population requires increasingly massive grain, fruit, vegetable, and tuber production techniques, which likewise leaves its imprint upon the earth, especially as regards forests and water resources. Those will continue to disappear as long as the human coefficient keeps multiplying into ever greater numbers.
Lirelou is right that vegetarianism isn’t the answer. Livestock have a place on a sustainable farm, and some habitats are better suited for grazing than for growing large-scale crops. More than a billion people consume enough calories to survive and bear children but not enough to thrive. Besides cattle feedlot operations (cows are less efficient at converting grain to meat than pigs and chickens), the biggest waste of agricultural resources is grain grown for human consumption. Most of it is processed into final products - cereals, breads, pastas, and snacks - that are basically empty calories, for any added vitamins and nutrients are synthetic and not well-absorbed by the body. White rice? Might as well eat potato chips or even a cookie. They both have lower glycemic indices and glycemic loads and taste better, too.
Does the expat and kyopo commentators realize that their commentary regarding the candlelight protests, like the protests itself is getting old?
So what if the Koreans don’t like US beef and 2MB and want to express those two issues on the streets of Seoul. Who are we to say what the Koreans should and shouldn’t say and do?
Besides, the protestors haven’t attacked the US embassy and the waegookins who are for one reason or another passing through the crowd.
It’s a Korean matter. Let’s leave it at that.
Andy,
Correct you are. As an American living in America (thankfully, these days), I consider the protests a totally Korean matter. I also consider the Korean government backing out of a promise on the FTA to be very much a bilateral matter, and the anti-Americanism fueling the protests to be a very American matter.
That is, America is all too used to and comfortable with everyone around the world smearing it.
Well said.
Koreans want to slander Koreans, that’s a Korean matter.
Koreans want to slander the U.S., we’ll say whatever we damn well please about it, no matter that it upsets the delicate sensibilities of Australian kyopos.
No, it’s not a Korean matter. Korea is exporting goods to the US freely, and the US is not. Selling beef alone is a pain in the arse.
Also, those who are leading the protests are the ones responsible for the violent anti-US protests in 2002 (Remember Misun and Hyosun?).
dogbert, I’m not an Aussie of Korean descent.
Besides if Koreans do slander the US, it is obvious that Americans can and will do whatever they damn please. Nothing wrong with that. Same thing if Americans slander Koreans. Works both ways, mate.
Its amazing just how long the media will keep the topic on protests even though they are completely dead and not to mention there are record amounts of US beef being sold as we speak.
People speak louder with their wallets. Hopefully someone will turn the attention onto the liberals who are pulling the strings behind the protests.
Andy, if you’re not comfortable with netizens of various nationalities and ethnicities commenting on topics related to Korea, then you’ll probably want to quit reading this blog.
Andy wants to stifle our freedom of speech.
Get out the candles!!
cm — As a point of personal benefit, I agree. Lawyers find times of intense economic stress to be great moneymaking opportunities. Bring it on!
Oops, wait a minute: This time, unlike 1998, Korea’s economic collapse won’t come against a backdrop of an unprecedented American economic expansion. It’s hard times in the United States right now, and things look as if they may turn positively grim. If (increasingly it appears when) Obama gets elected, dumb economic policies could throw the US and world economies into depression.
In 2009-2010, Korea’s economic difficulty won’t be buffered by the opportunity to earn windfall won-denominated profits from export sales (because consumption is going to take a dive in Korea’s export markets), nor will there be much interest from private-equity funds with a bunch of money sloshing around. That liquidity is drying up, plus Korea’s lying elite has already worn out its credibility with these folks.
In the finance sector, the FSC says, again and again and again and again “No discrimination against foreign capital”. Korea’s financial elite have to keep repeating this statement because it is a lie. We can see it is a lie every day that the FSC tries to run out the clock on the Korea Exchange Bank sale to HSBC, so that a domestic bank can scoop up KEB. The Lone Star trial(s) and the paroxysm of outrage once foreign investors tried to take their lawful profits in accordance with tax treaties illustrated this for us quite clearly for years now.
Actions speak louder than words. Instead of saying “no discrimination against foreign capital,” while the foreign investors whose money you want sit quietly and stifle snickers, how about actually doing it?
Kim — Good point. For example, how many mobile phones does Korea export to the United States each year? Any guesses? It must be a lot, because Korea’s total worldwide export volume for mobile phones for the first half of 2008 was reported by the Ministry of Knowledge Economy to be US$16.6 billion — up 33% from the year before.
How many mobile phones does Korea import from the United States? If you said zero, you’d be correct. The Korean market, uniquely in the world, has next to zero foreign presence (Motorola’s here, but they bought a local phone maker in 1999, and besides they intend to quit the phone business) — no Nokia, no Sony-Ericsson, no RIM Blackberry (until next month, and then only on a limited exception designed to cripple their general appeal).
Nokia manufactures 40 million handsets a year here in Korea, in Changwon, but cannot sell their phones thanks to the perfidy of the Ministry of Information and Communications. Local wisdom tries to sell us the line that Nokia fails to read the unique Korean consumer preferences, but come on now — number 1 every else, but can’t get off the ground in Korea?
There is another American company which sells mobile phones. I hear it’s quite famous, and Korean consumers want the phones, yet they cannot be introduced here although they’ll be on sale in 70+ other countries. Why should America continue to tolerate a situation where American products cannot be sold in Korea? For a question closer to the hearts of Democrats and Lou Dobbs viewers everywhere, why should Detroit autoworkers lose their jobs while hundreds of thousands of Korean cars are exported to the US?
I see a very chill wind blowing in Korea’s direction — withdrawal of US forces, protectionism in America, and paralysis of the Korean government. As I live here and will do so for the foreseeable future, as I have for nearly my entire adult life, I’m afraid.
Rob et al. I, too, saw the V for Vendetta kids on the way home from the Nono demo. What struck me, as it seems to have done Rob and KB, was the inappropriate usage of the symbolism. Ok, they might have been kind of right given that the movie was a tome against a tyrranical government, but the means the government in that movie used, lies based on misinformation and a manufacturing of consent is something they failed to pick up on.
#26, KK, “BTW those military clad folks are the Hanchongryeon “storm troopers/peace marshalls” that are there to coordinate the trouble.”
If what you say is true, then that organization is more ominous than I thought. Having been associated with the student Marxist left when I was at uni, I could never have imagined introducing paramilitary symbolism into the mix, it just wouldn’t have been tolerated. Combine that with their rabid KJI-love and uber-nationalistic overtones and they come out looking like Korea’s answer to the Nazi Party, complete with their own Brownshirts/Hitler Jugend.
Brendon, I am down with almost everything you say. I am particularly disturbed by the way elements of the citizenry as well as certain politicians seem to be toying with Korean politics as well as their economy, myopically believing that their experiment in social behavior will be annulled by the good it all does for their particular egos, all the while ignoring the storm clouds threatening to break over their self-infatuated domes.
What I find interesting coming from a person as obviously knowlegeable as yourself is this; “If Obama gets elected, dumb economic policies could throw the US and the world economies into depression.” This coming from a backdrop of what economic soundness? How well are US and global economies doing presently? Why is there already an aura of forboding in markets worldwide? You seem to be placing the lion’s share of a situation that is certainly biased towards a rather dismall destination on the economic policies of a man who has yet to be elected or inacted a single program in that capacity presently. Aren’t you forgetting something?
‘korea’s coming economic collapse’
that’s what you’re hoping for, isn’t it? sad part is, we’ve seen folks like you pronounce korea dead time and time again only to be wrong time and time again. ever notice that?
not that i disagree that korea is headed for hard times; afterall, things here in the states are getting tough, i mean really tough. if it’s tough here, it will be even tougher over there.
‘Combine that with their rabid KJI-love and uber-nationalistic overtones and they come out looking like Korea’s answer to the Nazi Party, complete with their own Brownshirts/Hitler Jugend.’
you ought to know, no? when do you think the koreans will implement their final solution? this comparison with nazis just makes you look petty and ridiculous.
Some thoughts…
Personally, I’ve given up on trying to “reform” Korea.
We all pretty much agree that Korea is a total head case but but…then again, George Carlin has got some hillarious raps on how America the beautiful has been turned into a giant shopping mall in which all people do is consume themselves to death. The fact that nobody in the US has died of vCJD is irrelevent when everybody’s eating themselves into comas anyway…
Stopping the import of US beef won’t bankrupt US beef industry or reverse Korea’s steady decline. Both countries are headed south as China ascends and the stubborn refusal of both nations to make the changes needed to meet the new order of things is pushing America past its prime while dashing Korea’s hopes of ever having a prime.
Gas-guzzling, over-consuming America and pre-scientific, self-loathing Korea are both looking a lot like anachronisms right now.
Because Korea is just too obscure for the protests to be media worthy on American television, Korea will miss its opportunity to be shocked into reality by a US trade war. And America will keep making Free Trade Agreements and turn into a 3rd world nation.
The next cold war might just be a clash of two new titans - China and India.
True to the Communist prediction that The East will bury the West, Capitalism is defeating America. The lack of it is killing Korea.
Unless the current trends change…the US and Korea are both self destructing. While anti-globalism is killing Korea, globalism is killing the US. Both are just on two losing ends of the same bad equation.
These are just musings. There’s bound to be an element of truth somewhere in them if you look real hard.
#Pawi…
“you ought to know, no? when do you think the koreans will implement their final solution? this comparison with nazis just makes you look petty and ridiculous.”
Maybe we could have them open a Hof or do a cosmetics commercial? Probably just a bunch of kids there to have fun though, right?
I have the (final) solution at hand! A dedication von mich fur dich!
http://kr.youtube.com/watch?v=UDB9oCgVHGw
Happy weekend.
Maddlew — There are many who believe that the Great Depression was exacerbated by Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s government intervention. I am one of those people. As FDR is a hero to the Democrats for his statist economic policies (to the Republicans, for putting the American boot up Hitler and Tojo’s asses), the ascension of Barack Obama — an undeniable leftist — is an ill omen. You may disagree; I guess we’ll find out soon enough.
I am sure that as we pick through the wreckage, people will forget that it was Bill Clinton who repealed one of the best ideas from the Depression — the Glass-Steagall Act, in 1999. This, too, will be laid at the feet of the hapless George W. Bush.
The Capital Markets Consolidation Act, by the way, essentially is a repeal of Korea’s own Glass-Steagall analogue. Ten years after the act which sealed the American banking crisis, Korea is marching off the same cliff of “consolidated financial services”, with the added fun of the chaebol slavering to steal our deposits. I, for one, am looking forward to my new -2% savings account at Hyundai Motor Bank.
How did I know you’d go back to Clinton?
You can’t just say “hapless” and dismiss George from the equation as if, “Well, we elected him. We knew how dumb he was to begin with and therefore we should have made allowances.”
What, is he some kind of stupid force of nature? We’re spending how many hundreds of billions of dollars on a fruitless war while giving tax rebates? I’m sure you’ll come back with some formula that will make this all sound incidental but if you can tell me how we’re going to pay for this all perhaps this feeling of nausea I share with millions of others will go away.
Mizar5 — The ascension of China is not at all inevitable, as it is in part dependent upon continued access to cheap oil for transportation of goods from factories in China to markets in the US and Europe. Once cheap energy (perhaps together with quality and safety concerns) no longer makes it more favorable from a cost perspective to locate factories in China, at the end of a loooooong supply chain, than to make things closer to where they are consumed foreign manufacture will start to pull out and China’s growth becomes dependent on consumption in its own, internal markets.
Note this development is also bad for Korea. Korea shares with China the distance problem, plus the quality problem, and — thanks to its insanely truculent labor unions — is much farther along toward the wrong side of the cost problem. Korea’s own domestic market is much too small for its level of industry, which is unhealthily dependent on manufacturing for export (the services sector here is woefully underdeveloped). Not to mention how dependent Korea is upon imports for many of its production factors. This points to a lot of manufacturing jobs being lost here. On the plus side, now we get to implement juche.
If more-expensive oil is here to stay, there will be a lot of adjustments to make. And Korea, right now, seems not too flexible.
Gee whiz. I’m starting to bum myself out. Anybody want to buy a 43-pyong apartment close to Kwanghwamun?
Maddlew — Two short points:
The war is not fruitless. The fruits will take time to reveal themselves, but forcing regime change in Iraq and planting democracy in the Middle East will ultimately be seen as brilliant.
Reductions in tax rates lead to increased receipts. This has been proven conclusively. Those little rebate checks? Not so much, but in the big picture they’re ticky-tack. Take a look at the PerotCharts website to see where the real tsunami lurks.
Spending on the war in Iraq, and the Department of Defense in general, is smart use of America’s wealth. Continuing to squander our money on Section 8 housing, Medicaid and Medicare (and nationalizing what’s left of the healthcare sector), and massive expansions of unsustainable social entitlements whilst looting the Social Security trust fund is not. You want to kick George, kick him for that.
Except that as bad as W has been in allowing the Congress to continue with runaway social spending, Obama will be much, much worse.
cm:
I agree whole-heartedly with almost all of your posts, though don’t think Lee should resign.
Please, Americans, do not let Carr fool you.
No one denies economic theory that open trade is good on aggregate, and that protectionism and government intervention have the effect of dampening GDP growth.
You do not face the prospect, in this or any other election, between socialism and capitalism. Your country is too stable for that. You had 8 years of Clinton, and still no universal health care. You had 8 years of Bush, and still no prayer in schools, and women still get abortions in the US. You had 8 years of responsible fiscal management under a democrat. You had 8 years with a Republican who spends like a sailor.
America is a big ship, it takes a lot of momentum to change its course. In the past decades, y’all have debated a lot about abortion, guns, prayer, health care and many other topics, but in the end, not much changes.
The really big event, namely, the 9/11 attack, was unforseeable. Your country’s reaction to it did not follow ‘capitalist vs socialist’ ideology. Rather, it was handled idiotically, by an idiot.
That’s why you should vote for the smart guy. The other stuff is just talking points. Your Congress is a talking forum. Change is slow. Very slow.
End Part I.
Now, back to trade.
The Iraq debacle is not going to be viewed by history as a brilliant feat of sociopolitical engineering.
Rather, it will be viewed as providing incredible stimulus for a massive transfer of wealth and power from America to the resouce-rich developing world.
The distraction of Iraq, the loss of US credibility and leadership that accompanied the misadventure, and the huge windfall that it gave to Iran, Russia, the Gulf Coast, Venezuela and Nigeria, have added to the already massive transfer of wealth to China (which lends the US about $800 billion per year to fund its war effort).
This has meant that the US simply doesn’t have the juice to tell the rest of the world what to do, how to do it and when to do it anymore. Your president has made your enemies rich, and put your nation in their debt.
At the same time, your creation of political dynasties and failure to understand that it just may not be possible to ‘create’ a democracy from thin air, has cost you a lot of cred.
And then there’s finance. Any defense of the western economic model is now weak, with the rapacious excesse of the subprime afflicting mainly the western countries. At least this year, you are in no position to lecture others about how to run and regulate an economy.
Bottom line: Bush gave away a lot of America’s power. Now you have to work with the rest of the world, acknowleding their new power. Another reason to elect the smart guy.
End Part II.
CNN and Reuters reported that about 50,000 protesters showed up yesterday–from what I read here, it was only a fraction of that. Odd.
Kudos to CM for #11, that’s a level-headed summation of what’s happening in Korea, unfortunately.
Mr. Carr has seriously bummed me out with what I think is a pretty good assessment of where Korea is headed. Adding to what he said about the fallout from the KEB affair:
“Foreign fund managers have told the FT they are holding off making large investments in South Korea until some certainty returns to the regulatory environment.
Net foreign direct investment turned negative in the first quarter for the first time in two years, with $670m (£340m, €430m) being withdrawn from Korea, according to the central bank. Business executives in Seoul express concern that Korea is heading in the wrong direction and is becoming increasingly protectionist. “Korea is snatching defeat from the jaws of victory,” says one foreign banker, asking not to be named.”
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/f054.....07658.html
Anyway, some people in the U.S. are aware of the protests:
http://www.dailyherald.com/sto.....7&src=
Check out some of the comments, it sounds like Marmot’s Hole!
Sonagi, who said I was “uncomfortable” with comments relating to Korea? What I meant was that we expats don’t exactly have a high moral ground in terms of the US beef issue and thus shouldn’t be saying that the Korean protestors are wrong and so on.
OF course Sonagi, if your arrogance tells you to keep on dissing the Korean protestors, well be my guest.
Perhaps, but if you could, please decide on a single ID to use on this blog. Between andy, mins0306, and “Bob” (as you attempted to use last night), some might view this as using sock puppets.
Thank you for your cooperation.
andy and mins0306 are different ID’s for one and the same person?
Off topic
#2 - I’m not, but if you’re going to be a vegetarian, Korea is the place. There are some great vegetables dishes here. I’ve never enjoyed vegetables as much as I do these days (with apologies to Brendon’s Chicken Fried Bacon).
I believe both Brendon Carr and Linkd make valid points. It’s good to see this kind of exchange.
One of the things I often need to explain is that the US and Europe have tenedencies with regard to the philosophy of govt that run in opposite directions. Germans tend to expect the govt to take care of them from cradle to grave while Americans tend to believe that the individual must accept responsibility for his own fate. Tie this ubercapitalism into the time required to turn around the big ship of state and you have a situation in which it is difficult to get reforms rolling - unless there is a strong profit motive.
I think Obama realizes this, which is why he has been realistic in recognizing that the healthcare industry must be play integral role in working toward the goal of universal health care. In this sense, he is a true moderate, and precisely what is needed.
Parenthetically, my cousin is a NJ metalworker who has been unemployed since January. Unemployment benefits have been extended, however, and he has continued to receive those benefits as he waits for the Union job list to move. I find it odd that he expresses such conservative views, referring to CNN as Communist News Network when he is a grateful recipient of socialist govt. programs. This is the cognitive disconnect of American conservatism.
Uhh… Robert. I did try to use “Bob” last night as an experiment. I wanted to see if it was possible to change my moniker. Of course it didn’t work out as well as I hoped.
But I’m not mins0306.
I think you’re using the IP address as your proof, but you need to be careful with that. With ADSL service, some service provider “group” several individual users into a single IP address when things are sent out, so it would seem that well….you get the idea.
I’m not a techie, just passing on something that I heard from a friend who works for a certain Korean ISP.
The claim was made on one of the weekly political/commentary programs by one of the participants that he was told by the Obama org that healthcare indeed was going to be job 1 in an obama administration and that the ball would be run by Billary. That certainly worked well last time.
http://www.rjkoehler.com/2008/.....ent-166872
I put that up last week, Sperwer, because I thought it was an interesting hypothesis that, in order to maintain support on mainstreet America for globalization and free trade (a conservative ‘good’), it may be necessary to provide mainstreet Americans with a more extensive social safety net, especially health care (a liberal ‘good’).
@64, problem is that there are not many modern countries aside from the EU. And the countries that are modern do not open their markets ie Japan and to an extent S.K.
Your hypothesis is just about the most nonsensical idea i’ve heard in a while.
Linkd:
Yeah, that was a good post, and something certainly needs to be done about health care in the US; for starters people need to start controlling their eating habits. Another avenue that needs to be explored very seriously is to stop pretending that what’s going on actually amounts to free trade, and to enforce a very strict regimen of reciprocity w/ our trading “partners”, e.g., take Korea (and the American consumers who ostensibly benefit from the presence of Korean goods) off Uncle Sam’s tit. In the long run, the consumers will do fine, since the slack can be made up elsewhere - even domestically, if necessary; and the supposed loss of the ostensible benefits of an even unilateral free trade position can be ameliorated by the sheer size and diversity of the US’s internal market plus those of countries that are genuinely committed to the idea and principles of free trade, i.e., not Korea.
Ok some of you dont even know what the point of globalization is.
The whole point is specialization which produces more in the end and lowers prices, relatively speaking.
You judge globalization based on the aggregate trade not on a per country basis.
Korea is inline with the proponents of globalization hence all the FTA’s. Neo-liberals dont want an FTA for whatever reason and the people have shown that they do not represent Korea.
Feel free to bring Japan into the equation although I’m sure you wont. As usual your post as nothing to do the topic, evident by your lack of knowledge, but more about venting your personal issues.
#65
Nonsensical it is definitely not. Just take a look at any credible book on international trade and you’ll see that trade does create job insecurities (at least in the short term) and it’s the government’s job to deal with them (lest you think unemployment is just fine). And the theory of “comparative advantage”, which is behind the idea of trade being good, has nothing to do with countries being “modern” (I guess you mean “developed”) or not.
The FTA is supposed to take down trade barriers bilaterally, so with the FTA, you have “free trade”. Without the FTA, there is no “free trade”. That’s the deal.
This just in: another ’stacked’ sighting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciLllSAcF-8
Yeah, it’s a bit OT, but the whole thread has wandered off, as they are wont to do, and since it entered this territory, here we are.
I’m quite happy to add Japan to the mix.
And I think it’s you who’s missed the point, which is that globalization and free trade are supposed to work in the aggregate for the benefit of individual economic actors, but often are distorted by countries which manipulate the rules of the game to obtain preferential treatment for (some of) their own nationals. No one is pure in this regard, but some players are egregiously out of bounds, and Korea and Japan are among them. In the past, extraneous factors dictated that they be given wide latitude. Those conditions no longer apply.
#67
Looks like you’ve never hear of “comparative advantage” since you obviously believe that it’s “absolute advantage” that’s behind the whole idea of “globalization”.
Well, that explains his use of “we.”
Now,
andy bob mins0306?andy, it’s a little early to start flinging ad hominems.Let’s leave Japan out of this, shall we? Before we start discussing about WWII or colonialism again. And the Japanese being unthankful, deceitful, moronic, etc…the usual stuff that some like to vent here.
Sure Squatch, but one need not go there to make out a case for the Japanese having constructed a remarkably closed economy post Pacific War
Sperwer:
Old images die hard, I agree, but Japan has gone through trade wars and multiple WTO suits in the 1980s and 90s, so I’m not sure “Fortress Japan” still holds as it once did. I’d bet the situation is quite different now, and be careful in comparing with Korea.
One example: Korea is 70% or so dependent on trade with regards to its GDP, whereas Japan’s figure is 20-30% (which is comparable to other developed countries). Korea probably has more to lose if it foils the US-FTA, whereas effects to the U.S. will probably be subtle.
Geez. One of the regular Marmot’s Hole Bloggers is using not one but two sock puppets?
At any rate, while I don’t agree with Mizar5’s predictions of imminent American decline and Chinese supremacy, I do agree with his view of how the mad cow dynamic will play out in the context of the U.S.-Korea bilateral relations. South Korea, in spite of the delusions of its denizens, is simply not important enough for the U.S. to notice to the extent where it will be provoked to do something. So South Korea can continue to restrict its markets as it’s done since the days of Park Chung Hee and spew lunatic anti-American rhetoric.
And then at certain point it will become another Argentina and even fewer people will care about it.
I think people should also take note on the “good” effect trade provides to consumers. This is apparent in the U.S.: the stores are filled with consumer goods and it’s much cheaper compared to say, Canada and of course, Japan. If I recall right, Korean cars are more expensive to buy in Korea than the U.S., and only recently has Korea opened its market to foreign cars. The result is that Koreans can only buy Korean cars and they were paying more than Americans to buy them. From a consumer standpoint, that’s not so “good”. In Japan, people buy Japanese cars because they’re the cheapest ones around. If you have enough money in Japan, you buy German cars.
Japan paid a heavy price for its protectionism with 10 years of stagnation.
@71, apparently thats you. What i referred to is comparative advantage not absolute.
@68, free trade does not create job insecurities if there is such a term. Last time i checked the US unemployment rate was still stable and at their proper levels.
This must be the newest idea out of the wikipedia factory, the FTA creates unemployment, while at the same time boosting the economy. Who knew?
By the way what you are complaining about isn’t free trade but i’ll bet that you dont even know that.
@78, Japanese pay cheaper prices than what they would normally due to their protectionism due to the government subsidies the Japanese automakers receive.
The Japanese buy Japanese out of the collectivist identity.
Maybe you should reverse that number? The Japanese economy is the one with over 50% of the GDP dependent on trade, SK is smaller at around 30%.
One of the reasons for Japan’s stagnating growth is their dependence on trade. For cars alone, over 50% of them are exported.
So when the Yen started rising in value at an enormous rate their economy stopped growing.
This a part of the bigger picture with Japan’s protectionism in general backfiring on them.
Its amazing how I rarely see authentic criticism instead i see anonymous posters who consistently try to transpose Japan’s problems onto Korea.
I assure you if you actually knew anything, were actually educated you’d realize that the export dependency of Korea is overblown and is merely propaganda in trying to stem the growth of our multi-nationals, especially when our multi-national corporations are driving the Japanese out and overtaking them as #1.
Stacked is a really smart guy. Probably in the top 1% of Koreans in terms of intelligence.
It’s too bad Lee Myung-bak has not tapped him for a cabinet position — I hear there are several open.
Dogbert is an American nerd. Rejected in society, ridiculed in high school. Now he’s here crying that life isn’t fair.
Go cry somewhere else.
Ouch!
Can’t even compliment a guy around here.
Sperwer at #66, that is indeed the rationalization of the giant healthcare