I was excited this morning when I heard that Bill Clinton traveled solo to North Korea to meet with "so ronry" Kim Jong Il in an attempt to secure the release of Euna Kim and Laura Ling, the two American journalists sentenced to 12 years in a North Korean hard labor prison camp following their March arrest for "illegally entering North Korea" and "committing hostile acts." I had followed the case kind of obsessively owing to my secret fear that someday I will be arrested and imprisoned in a scary country that we have few diplomatic ties with... which is far fetched at best, given that I rarely leave the greater-North American area. Also, North Korea gives me the creeps. So I was heartened to see that someone was sent... although the Obama administration denies that Bill was "sent," or came bearing any messages from said administration.
Whatever. It worked and the two journalists are actually on their way home on the plane with Clinton and some fine looking Secret Service agents. They looked all right -- there was some footage of them walking toward the plane and boarding with President Clinton, and one of them (I think it was Laura Ling) smiled slightly as she declined one of his aide's offers to carry her bags.
Obviously I fall into the camp of people who believe it's better to send someone important to kiss Jong Il's ronry little ass and offer up a fake apology to secure the release of wrongly imprisoned American citizens, rather than not dealing with "these people" and letting our citizens rot in prison.
3 comments:
Again I say - the man looks like an angry Polly Pocket!
And he really needs to stop teasing his hair up just to try and add an extra inch to his height.
~Angelika
As time has proven, the deal was in place and now the NK's expect something for their "generosity". Delighted as I am that the ladies have been released, I cannot help a touch of cynicism @ Bill's involvement. They say he only went after being guaranteed success... Hey, as long the play did succeed, yes? Who's to complain at this point?
I'm not sure it matters what we "promised" to N.K. It's not like we're under any obligation to deliver. I would caution our citizens from getting into trouble there in future if we renege on whatever we promised them, but other than that...
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