It's fascinating how the west will claim that the DPRK worships this guy and his every action and bowel movement is mentioned on the evening news over there, but like, the only place actually obsessing over what his personal habits are is the west.
I don't know if this article is new, but if I recall correctly there was a bunch of articles like this around the second wave of COVID, as people were speculating he had dropped a ton of weight due to being super sick. If this is from that time, that's probably the angle they were going for, rather than gossiping about his eating habits like a tabloid magazine.
It’s not, it’s two years old. You’re on the right track, but it’s not exactly that, but more covering the speculation, even quoting an interview mentioning it as ridiculous and absurd.
"Now, you might think this means there is more food for the starving citizens of North Korea, but, our sources indicate that Kim is actually eating more than he has ever been, and his weight loss is due to his new workout regime (an authoritarian workout regime at that) that he has adopted simply out of spite for his citizens and the desire to deprive them of food." -- RFA, probably.
It seems silly, but it could indicate that he is either taking care of himself now, even he can't get enough food, or he is sick. All of this could have implications for the Kim regime and their relationships with the external world.
Best case scenario is a slow and steady retreat from dictatorship into a more democratic governance model. I don't think that'll happen, but I don't feel too chipper about a relatively feeble and economically and politically unstable country purchasing any nuclear arms at all.
Your usage of "dictatorship" to describe the Democratic People's Republic of Korea along with the rest of your statement shows your ignorance about the entire country.
I don't feel too chipper about a relatively feeble and economically and politically unstable country purchasing any nuclear arms at all.
So then the US should get rid of their nukes, correct?
The label of dictatorship by itself is not a meaningful indicator due to the constant redefinition of words by the Liberals. The Liberals had redefined dictatorship to mean absolutism and no 20th century Communist countries use dictatorship to refer to a political system where one people have absolute power. I could also suspect that the Soviets did not realized that the Western European diaspora redefine dictatorship to mean absolutism. The accusation that USSR, other Communist countries, or Non-European diaspora populist government support absolutism is a better indicator that a person either know nothing about the people who they are criticizing or that they are lying. However, I do agree that the US should follow the moral standard that it imposes on non-western European diaspora and remove its nuke, especially when Pax Americana supporters claimed that violence was never the solution. The Liberals like Fukuyama used Cold War as an "example" that "Liberal" pacifism is a better solution than violence to end war.
So I think I was pretty tired when I wrote that. But in case I wasn't clear, I meant that I don't like the thought of countries, such as North Korea, who are only relatively stable, in possession of nuclear arms.
I really was not talking about the United States. We have our own issues, but I don't think we're about to start any nuclear wars on a whim. Yes our politics are pretty screwed up at the moment, but I don't see it as likely that any yahoos, like that bodily fluids air force guy in Dr. Strangelove, can just start a nuclear exchange.
No, I don't think the US is going to give up it's nukes anytime soon, there's lots of politics in play, and half the point of NATO is that it's under the protection of the US nuclear umbrella.
By dictatorship I mean a government with extreme accumulation of government, and usually military, power in less than a handful of individuals with ineffective or even lack of democratic elections.
Edit: so what's up with all the N. Korean defenders here???