The insolent child shows his rear

Looks like Kim Jong Il lit one of his nookular party poppers Sunday night, gleefully turning his rear end towards the UN Security Council, who were once again proven about as effective as a bunch of UN guys. This test, if proved, is proof that reasoning with a sick mind in unreasonable.

The odd little exchange of gunfire in the demilitarized zone was probably some kind of half-brained attempt to cast blame and might be used as the raison d’être by Mr. Il. This also had to hurt and could have been another reason. Just perhaps.

While some on the left might be tempted to use this as another pre-election club to smack over Bush's head, even they should see this for what it is. Our response needs to be unified as we look towards a possible solution, that is, if the word solution and North Korea can be uttered in the same sentence without provoking uncontrollable but slightly nervous laughter.

Basically we've got an insolent child here. The preferred method of dealing with an insolent child is to ignore until spanking is required, and we've been ignoring for quite awhile. The difference is of course in the toys. Surely Kim understands the MAD principle applies quite well to him, as anything fired will be returned in kind times 100. The danger is his acting as a proxy test range for Iran, a state in which the MAD principle doesn't work so well.

YEN YANG 10/09/06

My naive hope that the left wouldn't run off in lurid directions with this news is proving to be about as miserably wrong as thinking the right wouldn't bring up Clinton. Reminds me of a bunch of goofballs fighting over seats on a boat heading down the river towards Niagra Falls.

OPEN THOUGHTS 10/9/06

Bear with me while I think aloud. Feel free to correct if I'm wrong.

Let's see, Kim knows we can destroy him 100 times over, yet he continues to misbehave. He's pushing us to act--destroy his nuke facilities--which gives him a casus belli (as if he needs one) to invade the south. Getting the US into a massive war on the Korean peninsula is a real threat, which is why Bush spoke out today. Could we handle those commitments--another war on another front--without a draft?

Yes we could MADly respond to any provocation, but there's all that radioactive fallout to worry about. Besides, even Bushilter doesn't want to kill everyone in Pyongyang--getting rid of the little gargoyle would be fine.

We can have an exercise of what-if's, like what if the North invades South then China decides to launch on Taiwan? We can't nuke everybody. What if the Iranians then concurrently launch something against Israel?
That, my friends, would be a real version of World War III.

NATO says we're at a tipping point in Afghanistan, but it certainly seems the scope of that prognosis is not limited. But there are positives. We see rallies against Chavez in Caracas; Mullahs in Iran willing to die for the separation of Shia and state, and South Koreans marching in the streets against the north. We see Kurds speaking out against Saddam's malevolence in court. All is not lost.

Politically speaking this will make it harder for the dems to focus on Foley. Some may see Kim Jong's test as a gift to Bush, but surely there are more pages and sex scandals waiting in the wings as soon as this blows over.