I do not usually comment on the news either here in the UK or from around the world; there are far more vox-pop analyses of the news than anybody can usefully digest and I do not usually propose adding my tuppence worth into the ring, however there are two stories, one which has been simmering for a while and one recently released which I feel I must comment on.
The first is the laughable attempt by North Korea to posture itself into a corner from which it will have no alternative but to back down. While one can sympathise with the new leader, after all any new dictator has to posture to a greater extent than their predecessor and Kim Jong Un is no exception, one has to temper the posturing and sabre rattling with a modicum, the merest soupçon, of realism and common sense.
Does North Korea seriously believe that China will come to its aid, as they did in the 50s; for all that North Korea thinks that it expounds the same political philosophy as China. Reality check, people, it does not! China is now too far down the 'beholden to western capitalism' road to turn back now and they are probably 10 or 20 years away from economic hegemony. Would they seriously think of jeopardising that for the sake of a potential war which would simply see a 5mm shift in the border one way or another, assuming North Korea is not annihilated in the process.
When all is said and done, the position is not the same as in the 1950s. The US, all of the military hype notwithstanding, is in a far better position to strike tactically without necessarily endangering combat troops than at any time since the second world war and the prospect of any kind of strategic war would surely do more damage than the North Koreans would be able to bear. It is difficult to imagine that China (or Russia or even Iran) would risk anything other than minor tactical support for North Korea in the event one or other of the sides involved should find, fabricate, a reason to go to war.
There seems to be little reason for the North Koreans not to try to emulate the Chinese; China has demonstrated that a certain degree of pragmatism can pay substantial dividends in the medium to long term without destabilising the internal powerbases, at least in the short term. I suspect that it will be a while yet before China marches down the same road as the Russians and allows the oligarchs to wield so much power.
There is only one minor snag with all of this; Kim just might be as barmy as everyone says, and thinks, he is. In which case, Heaven help us all for there is little you can do when the lunatics are in charge of the asylum!
The second piece of news I came across today was the report that the state of North Carolina has a bill before the legislature which seeks to have a state-mandated religion in defiance of the First Amendment. I am not sure what the purpose of this bill is except to waste some time and try to screw a few more expenses out of the state government. Even if it is passed by the state, both houses I believe are controlled by the Republicans, it will get overturned in the federal supreme court in about as much time as it takes to stamp a cockroach underfoot.
I do not live in North Carolina, I do not even live in the USA, so it makes not a blind, practical difference to me whether the state enacts a bill to demand that people are only allowed to worship 'the curly-wurly' or that everyone there must pray to the great God 'Snickers bar' three times a day while facing Raleigh. What I do get concerned about is how such tosh is viewed around the world by nations that might think that such a law or bill should be applied to their own jurisdiction; it does sort of cut the moral high ground from under the US's feet when supposedly sane senators or whatever can even think about proposing such a bill.
When the USA was first formulated, it was important to allow the states some independence to govern themselves but to over-ride state law with Federal law to (a) protect the fundamentals of the written constitution and the amendments and (b) to make a bulwark against secession. Since the divorce between the political arm and the religious arm(s) are explicitly stated in the First Amendment, it seems that the only course open to the bozos in Raleigh (nice English name that!) is to propose an amendment to the Amendment or to secede; I wonder if the rest of America would even notice a secession. At the very least it would raise the national IQ average by a significant margin.
No comments:
Post a Comment