What if I told you, there was this tiny country able to extort tens of millions of dollars from China multiple times over the past couple decades? And what if I told you the U.S. conceded millions in aid, too? And what if I told you this country could convince its starving, tortured citizens it was the greatest place in the world? And what if I told you the rest of the world knew all of this and more, and did nothing about it out of fear of what this nation might do if provoked? What if I told you, this nation looks like this at night?
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| Night lights prohibited |
If you can't quite make it out, try this...
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| No, not Sub-Saharan Africa |
If you still can't get it, here is the link, which will outline it for you. I've read four books on the topic - two by defectors, one by a Russian professor who has spent time there, and one by a woman who spent two semesters as an ESL teacher for the sons of North Korean elite. Their stories are crazy consistent. The atrocities there include famine; arrests leading to labor camps and executions for any crime considered to be against the state (including a high ranking official being executed by anti-aircraft guns for falling asleep during a meeting); total lack of electricity, fire wood, and, in many cases, food; and the pictures of the three leaders from the Kim family required to be up in every home and building in the country.
Whenever the North Korean government gets close to collapsing or runs out of money, they start threatening to attack pretty much everyone and go bat shit crazy. This is why you saw all the saber rattling a couple of months ago. While they usually do when the U.S. and South Korea perform their yearly war prep exercises, it was intensified this year. Most reports believe North Korea has a severe food shortage this year, perhaps close to the one that killed hundreds of thousands of people back in the 1990s. So China, South Korea, and the U.S. got together to pay off North Korea to shut them up, and the North Koreans went back to brainwash their people into claiming victory.
Honestly, these books are all fascinating reads, and most were available at the local library. I read most of them shocked by the consistency, but moreso wondering... how in the hell did this happen?
Unfortunately, as noted, these idiots have nuclear weapons (quite possibly learned from the Russians, one of their only allies, though recently they are started talking with India). It's proximity to Seoul, plus the fact the ruling part will do anything to stay in power (and in all likelihood, will go down with the ship), pretty much prevents anyone from entering and trying to fix that mess. I couldn't stop reading books on this topic for awhile, and my heart just goes out to the people suffering there. I got angry about it for awhile, then had to let it go (not hard, given my profession).
Now that we have the NSA's attention (thanks for reading, guys! Follow me on Twitter!), here's my point with all this North Korea prattle. What it really taught me is that pretty much anything is possible, in sports and in life. For good and for evil. For the obvious and the amazing. Examples?
- I moved on to read a few books by Neil DeGrasse Tyson about the universe. The furthest known part of our universe is 13 billion light years away. The speed of light is 186,000 miles per second. So try and figure how far a beam of light, flashed right now from the edge of the universe, would travel before it got here 13 billion years from now (side note - Earth won't be here 13 billion years from now... sorry). That's mind blowing.
- Picture a football team, up 2, with like 8 seconds to play... actually, don't picture that. F**k me...
- Imagine some guy starting a campaign against a thus far incurable ALS by dumping a bucket of ice on his head. Then imagine it goes viral. Then imagine that it leads to a major breakthrough in ALS research.
- The Kansas City Royals won the World Series, largely in part to a strong bullpen. The Detroit Tigers, coulda/woulda/shoulda won at least one over the past 10 years, except for lack of said bullpen and the worst pitching coach* in the history of baseball. In response, my beloved Tigers continue to run out crap relievers and keep said coach. I'm not bitter...
- The life expectancy of a child born today is approximately 90-95 years, if they live past 65. That gives both of my kids a really strong chance to see the turn of the next century. Pretty wild, right?
- There is an editing trick to proofread by reading it backwards. Me to sense no makes that.
- The newborn you hold in your arms, is going to be an elderly adult one day. Those are the same people. (No, I'm not high, but you might want to stop reading if you are)**
I honestly don't know where I'm going with this anymore. Random stuff like those books on North Korea, plus the challenges of my field, often send me on these "perspective" rides. I guess I just think we should all spend a lot more time looking twice at the world. There is so much goodness around us hiding in plain sight that we don't seem to slow down and appreciate anymore. And perhaps if we spent more time slowing down, looking closely, through someone else's eyes... we might just gain some empathy and maybe, just maybe, we can save the world.
Whenever the North Korean government gets close to collapsing or runs out of money, they start threatening to attack pretty much everyone and go bat shit crazy. This is why you saw all the saber rattling a couple of months ago. While they usually do when the U.S. and South Korea perform their yearly war prep exercises, it was intensified this year. Most reports believe North Korea has a severe food shortage this year, perhaps close to the one that killed hundreds of thousands of people back in the 1990s. So China, South Korea, and the U.S. got together to pay off North Korea to shut them up, and the North Koreans went back to brainwash their people into claiming victory.
Honestly, these books are all fascinating reads, and most were available at the local library. I read most of them shocked by the consistency, but moreso wondering... how in the hell did this happen?
Unfortunately, as noted, these idiots have nuclear weapons (quite possibly learned from the Russians, one of their only allies, though recently they are started talking with India). It's proximity to Seoul, plus the fact the ruling part will do anything to stay in power (and in all likelihood, will go down with the ship), pretty much prevents anyone from entering and trying to fix that mess. I couldn't stop reading books on this topic for awhile, and my heart just goes out to the people suffering there. I got angry about it for awhile, then had to let it go (not hard, given my profession).
Now that we have the NSA's attention (thanks for reading, guys! Follow me on Twitter!), here's my point with all this North Korea prattle. What it really taught me is that pretty much anything is possible, in sports and in life. For good and for evil. For the obvious and the amazing. Examples?
- I moved on to read a few books by Neil DeGrasse Tyson about the universe. The furthest known part of our universe is 13 billion light years away. The speed of light is 186,000 miles per second. So try and figure how far a beam of light, flashed right now from the edge of the universe, would travel before it got here 13 billion years from now (side note - Earth won't be here 13 billion years from now... sorry). That's mind blowing.
- Picture a football team, up 2, with like 8 seconds to play... actually, don't picture that. F**k me...
- Imagine some guy starting a campaign against a thus far incurable ALS by dumping a bucket of ice on his head. Then imagine it goes viral. Then imagine that it leads to a major breakthrough in ALS research.
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| I called it! Check the archives! |
- The life expectancy of a child born today is approximately 90-95 years, if they live past 65. That gives both of my kids a really strong chance to see the turn of the next century. Pretty wild, right?
- There is an editing trick to proofread by reading it backwards. Me to sense no makes that.
- The newborn you hold in your arms, is going to be an elderly adult one day. Those are the same people. (No, I'm not high, but you might want to stop reading if you are)**
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| Inacadadavita, honey... |
Now would be the time to follow the LB Twitter feed... Mojo will be here for Army/Navy soon (always a good follow) and in the spring the live tweets of the Dawg's bachelor party oughta be classic. Just rereading this... how the hell did North Korea turn into an existential ramble with a psychadelic reference? I gotta go. Hasta.
* I hate you, Jeff Jones
** Don't read Neil DeGrasse Tyson if you're high
1 comments:
Michigan Stadium is the second largest active capacity stadium in the world... second only to Rungrado in North Korea. Go Blue.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stadiums_by_capacity
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