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Thursday, June 12, 2008

Mad Koreans Mad About Mad Cows

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak won election by the largest margin in a Korean presidential election (in a truly free South Korean election, anyways). He was extremely popular with his conservative policies and promised to be tough on North Korea while friendly with the United States.

Towards the end of his first one hundred days President Lee announced he was going to resume American beef imports that were stopped when two cows, one American, were declared to be suffering from Mad Cow disease back in 2003. Then all hell broke loose. Massive protests are being held, Lee's popularity is now in the teens, and his entire cabinet has offered to resign. Dang.

At first science was the cause of concern (never mind according to the World Organization for Animal Health, the United States is currently recognized as a BSE-controlled country) but the well documented anti-American, pro-North Korean machine has taken over the protests and turn them into hate America rallies.

The protests have greatly harmed President Lee and any efforts to curb North Korea's mad drive as a rogue nation. What a bunch of bull.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

People dislike President Lee because he acts like an autocrat who has among other thing instituted a policy to force all Koreans to carry their "papers" with them at all times.
Then there is his exteme hot headedness when dealing with North Korea. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe in appeasing the North but he acts irrationally and George W-ey which among other things has caused North Korea to close its borders to South Koreans wishing to be reunited with relatives on the other side.
Then there is his blatant cozieing up with big business. Even his anti-corruption officials have been shown to be embroiled in corruption scandals.
And finally his rather chauvinistic Christianity which has him say things like "let the Buddhist temples in this country crumble down!"
And how does one even begin to explain how stupid and crazy an idea the Pan Korea Grand Waterway is? It will submerge the most important monuments of Korean history and destroy massive swathes of Korea'smountains, virgin forests, and destroy its streams and rivers.
The man has to go.

Catholicgauze said...

Ali,
Yeah, I can see how that can t-off a lot of people. I support Lee but see where you are coming from.