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Variety in the News: Two Reasons to Celebrate (And One Reason Why I Might Get Black-Listed in North Korea)

So OF COURSE some of the years biggest events decided to happen while I was busy vanishing into the ether and had unplugged myself from all sources of news information for the last 10 days. Murphy’s Law at its finest, really–if anything can go wrong or get worst, you know it will.

However, the two major highlights that somehow got to me without the use of my trusty news feed were, mainly, about the death of a dictator and the end of an 8-year bloodbath.

So Kim Jong-il bit the big one. And, while I do not wish to disrespect anyone nor do I think that any death is something to be taken lightly, my initial reaction to hearing this news was basically this: Good riddance.

Now, I know that a lot of people within North Korea are wailing their eyes out over this ‘loss,’ but, for the life of me, I cannot say that the world has really ‘lost’ anything worth keeping in the death of Kim Jong-il. Here’s why: Kim Jong-il was a ruthless dictator who, throughout his history, has committed crime after crime which defy all manner of human rights laws that his own people  have endlessly suffered from. He subjected his own people to an extreme famine which lead to the thousands of deaths in North Korea. In arming his country with nuclear weapons (which I take no issue with because I believe that if even one country has the right to develop nuclear power, every other country has that right as well), Kim Jong-il would send North Korean NUCLEAR MISSILES out across the ocean as ‘practice’ in the hopes of eventually being able to hit their target in North America (now THIS I take issue with). That’s NUCLEAR, practice bombs, people. That’s right–FREAKING NUCLEAR. That kind of insanely hostile and careless LEADERSHIP cannot be reiterated enough. Of course, he was only able to do this by ruthlessly using up all of North Korea’s resources, which the North Korean people rightly deserved and desperately needed, and using foreign aid towards this end of dangerously developing and testing NUCLEAR power.

Here’s hoping Kim Jong-Un, Kim’s son and his successor, didn’t inherit his father’s bull-headed, ruthless cruelty. Although, I’m not really holding out for that one. So, for all the people who are in mourning over this man: I respect your right to do and think whatever you want, but I will never respect the disgraceful leadership history of Kim Jong-il nor will I “respect” such a memory either.

And, also, in what seems like an under-played ceremony, the 8-year American WAR against Iraq has finally been called off and is now finally over. Yes, the war which led to the full on MURDER of 110,000 Iraqi civilians (although I suspect the real number is higher–these are just official numbers), and the loss of thousands of soldiers from all-around the world (over 4000 American alone), and cost a grand total of 800 BILLION dollars, is now over. And, I don’t know if this is just me, but when you consider these kinds of heartbreaking statistics, and consider the significance and the controversy under which this war was waged (you could venture to say it was one of the most controversial wars of modern history), I feel its end needs to be acknowledged with more pomp and ceremony than just some quite shin-dig. Not only to pay our respect to the catastrophic amounts of lives that were innocently lost in this tragic FULL-ON WAR but to also serve as a global reminder why we should never EVER tolerate any kind of belligerent politics which could lead to such a human rights and international law crisis again in the future.

So, as far as I’m concerned, this week brings two pieces of good news to the world. We’re one dictator down and a war is over. That’s two points for TEAM HUMANITY AND RAINBOWS AND PRETTY STUFF. However, I don’t think I’ll be planning any vacations to North Korea anytime soon.

And, on a lighter note, merry belated Christmas to whoever celebrates it. I don’t, but its nice to be nice, for god’s sake! So merriment to all!

All my love!