TOKYO — When President Obama arrives in South Korea on Friday, he will be thrust anew into the role of consoler in chief in a time of crisis, a responsibility he has become all too accustomed to in the United States.
Doesn't South Korea have a president?
South Korea is reeling from the ferry disaster that has left more than 300 dead or missing, with the vast majority of the victims students from a high school near the capital of Seoul. The tragedy has consumed South Korean President Park Geun-hye in the lead-up to Obama’s visit and could distract from the security and economic agenda she had been expected to highlight during her meetings with the US president.
Another world issue is shadowing Obama on his four-nation Asia trip: the crisis in Ukraine.
That's my next post after this one.
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Throughout his five years as president, Obama has been called upon frequently to offer reassurance following natural disasters and other tragedies at home, including twice just this month. On his way to Asia, Obama met with families of the more than three dozen people who perished in a mudslide in Washington state. And in mid-April, he spoke at a memorial service for three victims of shootings at Fort Hood, Texas — the second time the president has mourned the loss of life in violence at that military base.
Related: Fort Hood Flip-Flop
Pre$$ did a quick fade on that and double-crossed Obama with an omission, while all I have gotten about the mudslides since Sunday was this printed photograph:
"IN MEMORY, IN TRIBUTE -- President Obama embraced Jon Lovick, Snohomish County executive, after thanking emergency and recovery workers Tuesday at the Oso Fire Department in Oso, Wash., where a mudslide killed 41 and left two missing. "To see the strength in adversity of this community, I think, should inspire all of us," Obama said (Boston Globe April 23 2014)."
And then it was back to business-as-usual, and honestly, I'm sick of the positive spin on tragedies.
Obama will arrive in South Korea on Friday afternoon from Japan, where he was feted during an official state visit and attended meetings with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Ahead of Obama’s departure from Tokyo, negotiators from the United States and Japan worked through the night to try to resolve differences over a stalled trans-Pacific trade agreement. But Japan’s economy minister and chief trade agreement negotiator Akira Amari said Friday that there had been no breakthrough, though the two sides agreed to continue talks soon.
Good grief!?
‘‘Overall, we have narrowed differences, but there is no agreement as a whole,’’ Amari said. The two sides are still struggling to work on few sectors, especially agricultural products and auto, he said.
The president’s overnight stay in Seoul is the second stop on a four-country Asia swing that also includes visits to Malaysia and the Philippines.
What is the carbon footprint on that?
The president has been serving as something of a mediator between Japan and South Korea, two US allies with strained relations due to Seoul’s lingering resentment over Japanese actions during World War II.
Obama the peace-maker, right.
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White House officials said Obama did not plan to change his schedule in South Korea as a result of the disaster. But the president probably will balance his expected statements — warnings against North Korean nuclear provocations and calls to lower tensions in regional territorial disputes — with words of condolence for the ferry victims and the people of South Korea....
Translation: the tragedy has interrupted the war-mongering. Maybe there are inspiring silver linings; the kids lives were not lost in vain.
UPDATE: Obama speaks out on possible N. Korea nuke test
What a f***ing asshole!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The president’s trip will come at a sensitive point in the ferry recovery mission, as the April 16 disaster has outraged many in South Korea....
That's next.
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"Improperly stored cargo ferry design led to disaster" by Choe Sang-Hun and Jiha Ham | New York Times April 25, 2014
JINDO, South Korea — Grief-stricken relatives have blamed the captain and crew for the loss of life, and have blamed Korean officials at all levels for the slow pace of the recovery operation.
Scores of parents stormed a temporary command center for rescue operations late Thursday. Some mothers slapped the man in charge there, Choi Sang-hwan, deputy head of the Korea Coast Guard. As blows landed on his face, Choi did not resist, and police officers did not try to intervene.
Korean karma.
Later, Kim Seok-kyun, head of the Coast Guard, and Lee Ju-young, the minister of oceans and fisheries, arrived at the scene at the Paengmok port on the southern coast of this island. Parents surrounded them in a sit-in protest, demanding that the officials speed up the rescue operations.
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At the Paengmok port, parents gathered in a white tent, exhausted and dejected, waiting for Coast Guard ships bearing the bodies of passengers....
Good thing the consoler-in-chief is coming.
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"Hope is fading in S. Korea ferry disaster" by Choe Sang-Hun and Jiha Ham | New York Times April 24, 2014
JINDO, South Korea — Divers searching the ferry that sank a week earlier off southeast South Korea brought out scores of bodies, nearly all those of high school students, but reported no sign of life inside. With hope of finding more survivors all but gone, some families, as well as the nation, began bidding farewell to the students whose bodies have been recovered. And in an unusual gesture, North Korea sent its condolences.
I'm sure those mean more to Koreans than the U.S. president flying in for the day.
In Ansan, a city south of Seoul, students and relatives filed into Danwon High School, which the students had attended. The mourners, some weeping and wailing, laid long-stemmed white chrysanthemums, traditional flowers for funerals in Korea, before an altar in a gymnasium.
Had a hard time reading that sentence.
On the altar was a row of photographs of students who had been found dead.
Oh, man. It's the South Koreans 9/11.
Survivors said most of the 325 students on board on a school trip were trapped inside after the crew repeatedly urged them to stay where they were even though the ship was badly listing. Most of the crewmembers, however, were among the first to flee the ship. Survivors have said they never heard an evacuation order.
Politicians, government officials, and citizens lined up at the memorial site to offer their tribute to young lives lost in one of the country’s worst peacetime disasters. The country was gripped by soul-searching over how South Korea, no longer a third-world military dictatorship but a globalized economic powerhouse, could suffer a calamity of this scale.
That's holding the South Koreans to a rather high standard, isn't it? Seems like all governments respond inadequately to disasters.
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“The saddest thing about this disaster is that the young students did as the adults told them to, but the adults abandoned them in a crisis and the system didn’t save them,” said M. J. Hwang, a professor of sociology at Korea University, referring to the difficulties young students have in questioning decisions by their elders in the Confucian and hierarchical South Korean society.
Grief and condolences, as well as anger, swept online communities of this highly wired nation. This week, a spontaneous campaign started online, with thousands of Facebook and Twitter users posting messages of condolences for the students, many of them venting anger at the government and the ferry’s crew and owner for not preventing the disaster.
It's a double-edged sword; however, despite the spying applications the mass information is an improvement from the past.
North Korea sent its condolences through a hot line at the truce village of Panmunjom on the border, the Unification Ministry of the South said. The North’s Korean Central News Agency confirmed that the message had been sent. Seoul did not immediately respond.
The exchange of condolences between the two uneasy neighbors is not unprecedented. The North sent one in 2003 when an arson attack in the South killed 198 people. The South reciprocated in 2006, when the North suffered extensive flood damage.
Maybe this crisis can bring them closer together.
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The water is not so good in China, either.
Related: Plane investigators say debris on shore not a clue
Meanwhile, Flight 370 is missing from today's paper.
"Sherpa strike ends Everest season" New York Times Syndicate April 25, 2014
KATMANDU, Nepal — Climbers who had hoped to reach the summit of Mount Everest have instead begun the long journey home. They had arrived at the mountain’s base camp nervous and elated. But that was before last Friday’s avalanche, which killed 16 Nepali Sherpa guides on a perilous ice field.
In the week since, climbers said, the base camp became a cauldron of emotion, as Sherpa leaders took on a hard-line position in favor of canceling the season.
Several climbers described an atmosphere that had become menacing, after a handful of Sherpa organizers threatened colleagues who planned to continue. Climbers have expressed solidarity with their Sherpa guides, agreeing that they receive too small a share of the proceeds from mountaineering. But in interviews, several said that they had begun to feel unsafe as the standoff mounted.
Yeah, those damn labor unions. Almost as much of a threat as an avalanche.
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Am I plumbing the depths of good taste by mentioning that this is where the trail ends?
"Obama’s trip to Asia undercut by tragedy; Nations reeling from disasters" by Mark Landler | New York Times April 24, 2014
TOKYO — President Obama arrived in Japan on Wednesday evening to begin a four-country tour of Asia, after first stopping in Washington state to survey the devastation left there by last month’s deadly mudslide. It was a fitting start, given that everywhere on this trip, he will witness the lingering fallout of disasters, natural and manmade.
From South Korea, where public outrage is surging after a ferry accident that claimed the lives of scores of teenagers, to Malaysia, where the authorities face harsh scrutiny over their handling of a missing jetliner, Obama will encounter leaders under pressure from angry, often grief-stricken constituents.
In the Philippines, the government has labored to recover from withering criticism of its botched response to Typhoon Haiyan last fall.
That's the first I've seen about the Typhoon since I don't know when, and you can scroll the coverage to check for yourself and see what other things the Globe and AmeriKan media considered more important.
In Japan, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was tripped up by the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, faulted last summer for playing down a leakage of highly radioactive water from the plant.
That's not the only place it has been played down, and quite frankly I'm surprised the NYT mentioned it.
White House officials, who have come with a busy agenda of economic and security issues, worry that the leaders — particularly President Park Geun-hye of South Korea, for whom the ferry tragedy is still unfolding — will be preoccupied when they meet with Obama.
Yeah, what a bummer that war and looting are taking a backseat to actual human suffering and tragedy compounded by government incompetence.
That would be a missed opportunity for the South Koreans, who appealed to the White House to add a stop in Seoul when news surfaced last fall that Obama was planning to visit Tokyo. It will be the president’s fourth trip to South Korea, the most visits he has made in office to any Asian country.
Relations between South Korea and Japan have been deeply strained since Park and Abe came into office, with the two sides replaying World War II-era grievances. Earlier this month, Obama brokered a carefully orchestrated meeting between the leaders in The Hague that was meant to clear the air.
The public relations imagery and illusion didn't work?
The prime minister has raised hopes in Washington because of his commitment to overhauling the Japanese economy. The United States would like to announce progress, if not a signed deal, in trade negotiations with Japan during the visit.
(Blog editor sighs since he is so sick of the U.S. government P.R. machine; I've been told progress, progress, progress since 2003 and Iraq -- unless we needed to stay or send more troops, then it's trouble, trouble, trouble)
In Seoul, administration officials said, Obama hopes to increase pressure on North Korea, which has reverted to a pattern of missile tests and other provocative actions. But Park is likely to be consumed by the desperate effort to find survivors in the sunken ferry.
Obama faces an even more delicate situation in Malaysia, which his advisers had hoped to celebrate as a reliable partner in counterterrorism operations and a model of a majority-Muslim democracy in Asia.
This after the former prime minister came under fire for stating what everyone knows: Zionists are kicking the globe around as they carry out their plan for world domination.
Instead, it has become a byword for confusion and opacity after the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.
Yeah, WTF DID HAPPEN to the PLANE and PASSENGERS anyway?
In the Philippines, at least, Obama will be able to speak openly about the typhoon and offer help for the next storm. He and President Benigno S. Aquino III are expected to sign a deal to expand access to bases for US warships and planes rotating through the archipelago.
But he cares about the rebuilding effort from the typhoon.
"Obama’s longer-term foreign policy challenges" by Nicholas Burns | Globe Columnist April 24, 2014
Nick Burns was a member of the George W. Bush administration's State Department.
WITH 2½ YEARS left in his presidency, Barack Obama finds a series of daunting global crises filling his Oval Office in-box. Countering Vladimir Putin’s aggression in Ukraine and Iran’s drive for nuclear weapons are top priorities.
Good thing Iran isn't building one and Russia isn't being aggressive at all.
He must also do more to help the millions of refugees from Syria’s bloody civil war.
Then stop supporting Al-CIA-Duh, asshole!
And he and Secretary of State John Kerry may choose to circle back to the faltering Israeli-Palestinian talks.
That's what Israel has him doing, running in circles and warming the planet with the plane trips.
But his foreign-policy legacy will also depend on how successfully he tackles the longer-term global challenges on the horizon. Here are four that will test Obama (and his successors) in the years ahead.
I will consider it a modicum of success if he doesn't invade Syria, attack Iran, and start war with Russia. Up until now the legacy is mass-murder and failure. As for his successors, there is nothing but fear and anger....
Balancing partnership and competition with China. Former US ambassador Stephen Bosworth, an Asia specialist and Harvard colleague of mine, believes managing China’s rise could be the most difficult international challenge America has ever faced. On the positive side, the United States has a major economic stake in trade and investment with China. Beijing is also our primary partner on transnational challenges from terrorism to the environment and nuclear proliferation. At the same time, however, the United States and China will compete for military and political power in southern Asia and the Pacific as China begins to challenge our historic predominance in that vital region. How to juggle these competing priorities — retaining America’s number one position in Asia while keeping the peace with an increasingly powerful Beijing — is an underlying theme of Obama’s trip to the region this week.
I don't want a war with China.
A great leap forward on trade? Obama is negotiating two landmark free-trade agreements — the Trans-Pacific Partnership in Asia and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership with the European Union. If he can conclude both, they may well boost global growth and America’s future international power. But Congress has to agree, and prospects look grim for quick passage as the midterm elections approach. Trade exemplifies a particular challenge for this president. He has the right vision in lowering global trade barriers. But will he spend major political capital to persuade Congress, particularly reluctant Democrats, to bring these treaties across the finish line? The odds are against it.
Is Obummer enough of a globalist?
Fraying relations with India and Brazil. President George W. Bush and, for a time, Obama himself enjoyed close strategic ties with these two rising powers. The US-India relationship, however, has fallen on hard times over Washington’s perceived inattention, threatened US trade sanctions on Indian pharmaceutical firms, and a bitter public dispute over the insensitive treatment of an Indian diplomat arrested in New York.
Just an idiosyncrasy of tyranny is all.
To make matters worse, the likely next prime minister, Narendra Modi, has been banned from visiting the United States since 2004 over allegations that he did not act to stop anti-Muslim killings in his state of Gujarat.
Also see: India's Parliamentary Election
Meanwhile, at an Aspen Strategy Group foreign-policy conference near Sao Paulo last week, I heard a litany of complaints from Brazilian business and political leaders about the Snowden revelations and lack of US support for Brazil’s global ambitions.
That explains the recent coverage regarding Brazil.
Restoring close ties with Delhi and Brasilia will reinforce America’s global position. Obama will need to move quickly to reset relations with both following their elections this year.
Finding courage on climate change. My millennial students often say this is the great challenge of their generation — and they may be right.
Proving how completely brain-washed the kids are in light of the record winters the last few years.
Obama has done more than any of his predecessors to move America in the right direction, but it has not been enough. Unless the world takes much more ambitious steps, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warns, severe global environmental consequences will ensue. Will Obama use the presidential bully pulpit to move this issue to the top of his agenda?
Maybe shutting down the wars and not fomenting new ones would help, Nick!
Obama won’t reach the finish line on all these daunting challenges before leaving the White House. But he still has time to show the international leadership that has marked our most successful foreign policy presidents. If, that is, he can find a way to strengthen America’s weakening global leadership in defiance of Tennyson’s lament that “we are not now that strength which in old days moved earth and heaven.”
Time for me to move some stuff into the recycling bag.
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All that from the guy who says we should invade Syria and clean up the mess.
