Nuclear Mistakes & Funky Haircuts

The closest I came to a nuclear accident was in 1979 when something went terribly wrong at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant facility in Pennsylvania. No, I wasn’t at the facility, but I was a student at the private boarding school, Milton Hershey. Our school was approximately 10-15 miles away from the power plant. The picture you see is of the Milton Hershey School founder, Milton S. Hershey and his wife, Catherine.

I was going to post this the other day immediately after the news about North Korea firing their test missiles. And then I thought about posting something that addressed the correlation between stock market volatility and political/global uncertainty. Got tired.

When I picked up today’s paper, I saw that the Dear Leader, Kim Jong II had a small picture (hairdo and all) at the bottom of the local paper, "see page A2 for story", it said. I realized that even the media, to some extent, wants to downplay North Korea’s testing of the nuclear missiles.

It is my belief that our country may not have a choice but to downplay it. Why? Because we can’t control North Korea. It is quite possible that their nuclear program is so far advanced, that the only thing we can do - our government can do - is to downplay it, lest the American public becomes agitated and demands that the government leaders do something more aggressive. If your enemy is superior, and you know it, you walk away. I guess in Chess, if you know that you are beat, you lay down your King. What is America’s next move?

The North Korean leader, Kim Jong II, is testing nuclear warheads - seven of them so far? - and creating worldwide anxiety. Over the past 2 days, my wife and I watched CNN and exchanged opinions about the matter, "the provocation", as the White House has called it. She said, "I’m very nervous about this." I am too, considering we usually hear about "accidents", not some moron (whose country’s streets are littered with dead bodies due to starvation), testing nuclear weapons.

I commented to my wife that this guy is testing for a reason and that I found it quite troubling how some government officials started to downplay the "Dear Leader’s" intentions now that he is testing the warheads, when, in the past, prior to the tests, there were stark warnings against testing. It does not matter to me that his "test missiles" have fallen into the Sea of Japan. What matters is that his long range missiles are capable of reaching the western part of the United States! So, if our government wants to downplay the matter - "they were duds" - then that is fine. However, when he is successful and our friends in Seattle are glowing in the dark, then we’ll know that it wasn’t a test.

I personally think that our President may have - and I am not the only who believes this - rattled the cages of some really nasty people here. Remember the "axis of evil" comment? Iran, North Korea et.al. Remember the American military plane that China captured and would not release?

I find it very odd that our country talks about diplomacy, and yet, we are forcing democracy and our will onto other countries. I find equally disheartening that what we are experiencing in Iraq, our inability to find Osama Bin Laden and now the problem with North Korea, America is still losing it’s global power and that since 9/11 we have been forced to be interdependent. In the end, we no longer can sit back while watching the world destroy itself. Welcome to the global community America.

To be sure, I think Kim Jong II is a nut. But I also think that this is one of those situations - "having a wolf by the ears" - where there may not be a way out. There really isn’t much, in my opinion, we can do with North Korea. They are already isolated. They get nothing from us. Mostly everything they need, they probably get from China and Russia.

I am hoping that my wife and I do not have to prepare for yet another exposure to some kind of nuclear phenomenon. I hope not. But then again, maybe I will get a funky haircut like Kim Jong!