Broken Records 101

So the CIA's Big Cheese made an report today on the growing threat of North Korea's nuclear arsenal. Apparently, it has gone from bad to essentially "badder."

I don't think it's any secret that I have rather damning opinions about the American presence in Iraq, and how all that began, but really... how much faith can we have in the CIA's report? After all, they did cry, "Wolf!" once before, didn't they?

Fortunately for them, those big, bad Korean dudes coughed up an admission to having nukes, but I can understand the Koreans' hesitance to dismantle all their "big boom" toys.

After all, sure, we can tell them, "You're under no threat. You must get rid of them." (Insert veiled "Or we'll come and invade you" threat here.) But who are we kidding?

North America still has them. The US, in fact, is making more bombs, developing more smart weapons. They're not stopping. It's hypocritical, isn't it, to state that your moral premise is somehow more valid than others', just because of cultural clash? After all, isn't it a matter of subjectivity?

Let's be clear about this: I do not feel the least bit comfortable with North Korea having any kinds of arms, period. Their leader is a nutbag, and it's fair to say that nutbags should not possess easier, more efficient ways to kill large numbers of people. Bad things always happen.

That said, to use an analogy, it's flat-out bullshit to be loading and cocking your gun while trying to convince a guy to hand you his grenade. The US continues to operate its foreign policy on a "But we're different" sort of mandate that somehow excludes them from the harsh light of judgment that falls on the rest of the world.

Hell, I'm five seconds away from putting on some John Lennon and chanting, "All we are saying... is give peace a chance" while I dance around my bedroom with a flower in my hair. No nuke is a good nuke, we all know that. Nukes in the hands of nutbags, an even worse kind of nuke. Yes, make them all go away.

But the US is hypocritical in its approach, and worse yet, its attempts at diplomacy and peace-brokering have been laughable thus far. Condoleezza Rice as the Secretary of State? Puh-leezze. The woman's written the book on how to shoot yourself in the foot.

But, gee, on the positive side of things, only 46 more months in Bush's term.