Monday, March 09, 2009

Really, why even bother pretending?

So North Korea just had an election. Not surprisingly, Kim Jong-Il got 100% of the vote, although surprisingly he was only running for what seems to be the equivalent of an MP. But getting 100% of the vote is pretty easy when there's only one pre-approved name on the ballot in each electorate, and everyone has to bow to a giant photo of you before casting their vote. The guys with guns probably discourage independent thinking on the matter as well.

I wonder why they even bother. This is simply a more expensive way of appointing a body and doesn't fool anyone into thinking this was a real election. Either put on a better show and make it look like you're trying to be democratic, or admit you're a tyranny and use the money you spent on the election on food for your people, or more likely a tank or two.

While I'm on the topic of North Korea, I don't believe this is really a communications satellite. The only people allowed to communicate in the country are the military, and the country's small enough you don't need to send something all the way into space to build something to provide decent coverage. They're doing it to show that they can launch something big a long way.

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Yeah, its definitely interesting. They said the same thing when they trial launched a missile last time. Japan and America have both said they will shoot it down, NK said that will be a declaration of war....so the first week of april will be interesting haha