Mercurius, I for one had certainly considered the scenario that you put forward. But when it comes down to it, it doesn’t matter, because we can’t tell if he’s pulled a bluff, so we have to treat it as the real thing.

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Kenny, you make a very good point. Our two-party ‘democracy’ is barely better than a dictatorship, for as long as the two parties are of just about the same ilk, see off competitors in the most disgusting manner (a la One Nation) and are of a mindset dominated by big business and the profit motive, and basically ignorant of sustainability issues or of what the majority of normal citizens want. What is so different about a Kim Jong Il type of regime and ours?? (oh alright, there are lots of differences (:>) )

Crikey, if the sort of democracy that the US espouses is so good, then why is the US so poor at all sorts of things – looking after its impoverished citizens, reducing profligacy in the face of climate change and other looming issues, going so awry in Vietnam and Iraq, etc, etc?

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Grey, you’re a bit rough:

“Mirko's anti-american and anti-rational screed is just another example of the pathetic education many people are receiving in our 'free' universities…”

Why can’t we all just consider what is put forward at face value and restrict responses to the core subject and to any issues that spin off from it in within the discussion?

Wayne,

I think we're descending into semantics. In any such debate, both sides can spend the rest of their lives pointing out evil and wrong acts performed by both sides. However, my argument is not that the US is some paragon of virtue which always acts in the best interests of the world. I am arguing that, overall, it is better to live in the US than in North Korea.

Yes, there are inequities in the US, but anyone in the US can get a job, earn a basic living, can say anything they want, can openly oppose the government, and can generally live life in any way they see fit, so long as they do not interfere with the freedom of others.

North Korea does not tolerate any criticism of the regime, does not allow any freedom of speech, does not allow freedom of religion, does not allow free trade between citizens, does not allow freedom of the press, does not allow it's citizens access to outside media, cannot even provide basic needs to a large section of the population (and even more galling, does not allow the population to help themselves!), and yet there continue to be people here who want to argue semantics, by pointing out that Rupert Murdoch has influence over governments or that people still live in poverty in the west.

Give me a break! There is a huge gap between 'influence' and dictatorship. The difference is that we can post in this blog and criticise anyone we want to criticise, but North Korean citizens cannot. I think that says it all. Once again, the problem with so much 'intellectual' debate on world politics is that it conveniently ignores reality, and prefers to play in a world of theories and moral absolutes.

Ludwig -

Because the problem's and differences are really to do with the underlying beliefs and worldviews of the people.

brilliant article, simple as that,keep up the good work :)

With North Korea, the West led by GWB, is aiming at a target really nothing to do with the prey they have had their sights on for the last five years - except that going by GWB’s reckoning NK belongs to his Axis of Evil.

The North Korean problem in origin does belong to the early Cold War era. It was an era in which America after WW2, using lessons from the mistakes of Post WW1 Versailles, initiated the wonderfully beneficial Marshall Plan resurrecting our former enemies Germany and Japan as well as other war-torn countries, really proving what the early Christian doctrine of forgiviness can achieve.

Further, with the rising presence of the Soviet Union, we backed America all the way, American movies of US wartime exploits, though somewhat overdone remaining tremendously popular. A new more deadly fear of nuclear war with the Soviet Union and of its getting ahead in the space race and its quickness of matching the US with exploding a hydrogen bomb, only increased our feelings for the need of dependence on America.

Apart from the present NK problem, which most social scientists might say, is largely the cause of unchanged thought-patterns still dominating NK reasoning, as well as partly with China, considering that China still supplies 3/4s of NK’s domestic upkeep as well as possibly part of the upkeep of one million men under arms.

Not that we should totally condemn China, even with a former Soviet high-ranker like Putin possibly going China’s way a little, as well as possibly also formerly non-aligned countries like India.

Non-alignment is an interesting term because in today’s problems, which besides North Korea, are mostly to do with the Middle East with Afghanistan only just to the north east - countries like China and indeed a revitalised Russia still with a Cold War nuclear stockpile, are certainly not truly pro-America.

Japan and South Korea, of course, are virtually trusted allies of America, their post-WW2 US engineered constitutions making sure of it.

Bushbred Part Two

Today’s White House problem can be certified by using GWB’s term - if you are not with us you are against us. As with the worn-out bull-roar of the British imperialist army sergeant-major - yours is not to reason why?

There are so many of our former allied military commanders lately so critical of the decisions that have been made since 9/11, which really only killed the same number of people who die in the average large passenger aircraft crash.

Cerainly we are still all shocked and sorry, while still deeply wishing that the attack was one by us on a big Middle-East Islamic mosque killing three thousand rather than three hundred.

Though maybe we are now getting too-much negative feed-back about American mistakes right back to our defeat in the Vietnam War, which Daniel Ellsberg was so vocal about with Tony Jones on Lateline, as Ellsberg was also caustic about, not only the present mess in Iraq, but the futility of ever trying to change Iran.

The most foolish thing ever done in the Middle East by the US, was to allow Israel to go nuclear, which in Realpolitik logic means that Iran needs to go nuclear to create a much needed power balance, as happened between India and Pakistan

The sorry part about it, is that not once have we heard about our John Howard saying a cross-word to his apparently bosom friend the US President. Even the 19th century colonial statesmen Howard tries so much to emulate, who had their occasional cross-words even to royalty going by history books. Even our Labor leaders have shown very little intestinal fortitude against American presidential policy. Possibly our only leader with a bit of gumption in this respect has been our Greenie leader, Bob Brown. Yet going by most of our Onliners, he’s bottom of the barrel