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July 24, 2005
Just a Spoonful of Sugar...
Kristof offers that in his latest column. It starts out with effusive (but not undeserved) praise of the the Christian Right:
Liberals took the lead in championing human rights abroad in the 1970's, while conservatives mocked the idea. But these days liberals should be embarrassed that it's the Christian Right that is taking the lead in spotlighting repression in North Korea.
"The biggest scandal in progressive politics," Tony Blair told The New Yorker this year, "is that you do not have people with placards out in the street on North Korea. I mean, that is a disgusting regime. The people are kept in a form of slavery, 23 million of them, and no one protests!"
Actually, some people do protest. Conservative Christians have aggressively taken up the cause of North Korean human rights in the last few years, and the movement is gathering steam. A U.S.-government-financed conference on North Korean human rights convened in Washington last week, and President Bush is expected shortly to appoint Jay Lefkowitz to the new position of special envoy for North Korean human rights.
But (you knew there was a but coming, right?) this time Kristof is throwing a bone to our side while hoping to entice us over to his. The goal? To get us to accept bilateral talks:
Our first step should be to talk directly to North Koreans, even invite senior officials to the United States. Many conservatives would accept direct talks, as long as the agenda included human rights (on the model of the Helsinki accords).
Here's one obvious advantage to having multilateral talks. Because when China is part of the talks, there's one major country at the table that can say, "I don't care what you do to Seoul." Ironically that may make the South Koreans safer.
Posted by pat at July 24, 2005 01:53 AM
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