Cadence of Conflict: Asia, May 8, 2017

The US media is pulling out a trump card that has been hiding in the deck since 2016. Otto, a traveling student, was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor by the Kim dynasty for touching a government propaganda poster. Now, his parents are near tears on national television as released film of the large assembly sitting in approval of his sentencing replay in homes across America and the world.

Otto is only one person. His parents know this. Americans know this. But, Otto is one person whom Americans can identify with to understand all the others. Americans can understand why China is preparing for Korean refugees.

The story is beyond bad press. Skinny people seen collecting grass in parks, skinny soldiers working on farms to get enough food to eat, people pushing their own buses when they run out of gasoline, and no reports of what is happening in Korean hard labor camps—and now pretty-handsome college boy is put in a labor camp for touching a poster? What’s next, hating pink ponies, baby kittens, and Santa Clause?

There’s no defense for keeping North Korea. Not even Russia can object if the US peppers Pyongyang with BLU-82 “Daisy Cutters”.

On Friday China’s Finance Minister Xiao Jie left an annual conference in Japan for an “emergency domestic meeting” in China. No one knows why, not even Forbes or their friends in Hong Kong.

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