ROK Drop Open Thread – October 13, 2023

Foreign investors dump Korean stocks, bonds amid rising US interest rates. Korean currency is tanking, thanks to the US economic policy of let the rest of the world burn to save the US economy. Yoon’s mind-boggling incompetent mishandling of the economy isn’t helping either. Koreans tell me that the last couple of years have been the worst deterioration of living standards that they’ve ever experienced. And it’s just the beginning. The country’s coffers and its potential are emptying fast. Thank you Yoon.

Israeli Diplomat stabbed in broad daylight in Beijing:

https://twitchy.com/justmindy/2023/10/13/employee-of-israel-embassy-in-china-stabbed-n2388512

Seems like Beijing isn’t very safe for anyone.

Right on CH. These Korean Chinabots should be blaming their right-wing American overlords instead of blaming the righteousness of the Lord.

No you’re the Chinabot, you freaking Chinabot!

In a gamous movie from the 1960s, a young man is told to invest in plastic”. I think these days “peptides” might be a more interesting path…

@Liz may know which direction I’m pointing…

From Instapundit:

VIA EMAIL FROM A FRIEND ON THE NORTHWESTERN LAW FACULTY:

October 12, 2023 (signers updated through October 14)

TO: Northwestern Pritzker Law School Community

FROM: Concerned Faculty

RE: Terrorism in Israel

On Saturday, October 7, Hamas terrorists perpetrated the greatest mass murder of Jews since the Holocaust. The massacre took the lives of over 1300 peaceful civilians of many nationalities, including at least 20 Americans. Many children were among the dead. Adjusted for population that would be about 45,000 deaths in the U.S., or fifteen 9/11 attacks in a single day.

Celebrants at a music festival were gunned down without mercy. Homes were invaded by gunmen, who used explosives to ensure there would be no survivors. There was no military purpose to the attack, only the goal of murdering as many Israeli civilians as possible. The terrorists posted videos of their barbarous acts. Over 100 hostages were kidnapped and taken back to Gaza, evidently including two women from Evanston.

These events have affected many students and faculty, of all faiths and backgrounds, in the Northwestern Pritzker community. In Israel, 23 students and community members from our partner Tel Aviv University are among the murdered.

As faculty members dedicated to the rule of law, we choose to make clear that we unequivocally condemn Hamas’s wanton acts of terrorism, which have made the establishment of a just peace, recognizing the human rights of every community, all the more difficult to achieve.

Some have claimed that the Hamas atrocities must be blamed on Israel. What Hamas perpetrated was unspeakably evil. It is dehumanizing to blame the murders on the victims. We absolutely reject such acceptance, and near-endorsement, of terrorism.

Signed,

Ronald J. Allen, John Henry Wigmore Professor of Law

Karen Alter, Professor of Political Science and Law,

Norman Dwight Harris Professor of International Relations

Herbert N. Beller, Professor of Practice Emeritus

Maurine J Berens, Clinical Associate Professor

Bernard Black, Chabraja Professor, Northwestern University, Pritzker Law School and Kellogg School of Management

Sarah Megan Brown, Clinical Assistant Professor of Law

Robert Burns, William W. Gurley Memorial Professor of Law Emeritus

Steven Gow Calabresi, Clayton J. & Henry R. Barber Professor of Law

Lynn Cohn, Clinical Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Center on Negotiation, Mediation, and Restorative Justice

Charlotte Crane, Professor of Law Emerita

Jason C DeSanto, Senior Lecturer

Shari Seidman Diamond, Howard J. Trienens Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology

Stephanie Holmes Didwania, Associate Professor of Law

John S. Elson, Professor of Law Emeritus

Thomas L. Eovaldi, Professor of Law Emeritus

Michelle Falkoff, Clinical Professor of Law and Director, Communication and Legal Reasoning

Clinton William Francis, Professor of Law

Alexandra M. Franco, Lecturer, Master of Science in Law Program

Carolyn E. Frazier, Clinical Professor of Law

Ibrahim Gassama, Visiting Professor

Tom Gaylord, Associate Law Librarian for Scholarly Communications

Thomas Geraghty, Professor of Law Emeritus

Meredith Geller, Director of the Writing Lab and Clinical Professor of Law

Ari Glogower, Professor of Law

Adam Hoeflich, Professor of Practice

Rebekah Holman, Clinical Assistant Professor of Law

Allan Horwich Professor of Practice Emeritus

Elizabeth L. Inglehart, Clinical Associate Professor of Law

Michael S. Kang, Class of 1940 Professor of Law

Martha Kanter, Clinical Assistant Professor of Law

Andrew Koppelman, John Paul Stevens Professor of Law and Professor (by courtesy) of Political Science

Kate Litvak, Professor of Law

Monica Llorente, Senior Lecturer

James Lupo, Professor of Practice

Steven Lubet, Williams Memorial Professor of Law Emeritus

Thomas Lys, Professor of Law (by curtesy), emeritus

John O McGinnis, George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law

Ajay K. Mehrotra, William G. and Virginia K. Karnes Research Professor of Law

Marjorie B. Moss, Director, Social Work Advocacy Program Bluhm Legal Clinic

Wendy Muchman, Professor of Practice

Ellen Mulaney, Senior Lecturer Emerita

John M. O’Hare, Lecturer

Leslie A Oster, Clinical Associate Professor

Laura Pedraza-Fariña, Professor of Law

Philip F Postlewaite, Harry R. Horrow Professor of Law

Stephen B. Presser, Raoul Berger Professor of Legal History Emeritus

Laura Rankin, Clinical Assistant Professor of Law

Martin H Redish, Louis and Harriet Ancel Professor of Law and Public Policy

Leonard Riskin, Visiting Professor of Law

Daniel B. Rodriguez, Harold Washington Professor of Law and Dean Emeritus

Judith A. Rosenbaum, Clinical Professor of Law

Leonard Rubinowitz, Professor of Law

Max Schanzenbach, Seigle Family Professor of Law

David L. Schwartz, Frederic P. Vose Professor of Law

Seema K. Shah, Founder’s Board Professor of Medical Ethics, Lurie Children’s Hospital, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, by courtesy

Helene S. Shapo, Professor of Law Emeritus

Brian Silbernagel, Clinical Associate Professor of Law

Matthew L. Spitzer, Howard and Elizabeth Chapman Professor of Law, Emeritus

Sam Tenenbaum, Clinical Professor of Law

John B. Thornton, Clinical Associate Professor of Law

Amy Tomaszewski, Faculty Services and Digital Strategies Librarian

Deborah Tuerkheimer, Class of 1967 James B. Haddad Professor

Robert A. Weinstock, Director, Environmental Advocacy Center & Clinical Associate Professor of Law

Barry Scott Wimpfheimer, Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Law

Kimberly Yuracko, Judd and Mary Morris Leighton Professor of Law

Koreans divided over Israel-Hamas war

https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/nation/2023/10/113_361169.html

“I got the impression that the poster is justifying Hamas’ terrorist attacks. I’ve seen videos of inhumane killings of (Israeli) civilians by Hamas, with many being taken hostage,” said Sim Ga-eun, a senior at Chung-Ang University studying social welfare.

“It doesn’t seem appropriate to take sides when both parties seem to be responsible for the ongoing war,” she added.

Exactly. I don’t support Hamas which just butchered thousands of civilians including women, children, and the old in cold blood.

On the other hand, the extreme right-wing government of Netanyahoo is now engaged in an eye-for-an-eye revenge massacre of Palestinian civilians including women, children, and the old – even going beyond what the Hamas did. He’s lobbing horrible chemical bombs at civilians that are outlawed by the Geneva Convention and is engaged in a total ethnic cleansing/massacre of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

In my books, both the Hamas and Israeli right-wing parties are bad. I support the Palestinian people who don’t support extremist terror organizations and the Israeli people who don’t fall for their own government’s ethnic cleansing policy. But this could be a moot point since there may not be anyone left in those areas that don’t fall into one of the extremist groups from either side due to all the bitterness caused by all the indiscriminate killings from both sides. So my stance is to support neither side, unlike the American media which only shows one-sided support for Israel and its current campaign of ethnic cleansing.

This played out exactly as intended. Everybody has done precisely what they promised to do.

That’s why no one should support either side. Both Hamas/Hezbollah and Israel’s right parties are probably both elated with what’s going on. This is exactly what they wanted, and they can use excuses on both sides to kill each other off. The only people who are innocent are probably the children on both sides who had no control over what their parents did/supported.

How does Israel contribute to the Make America Great Again policy for America to go to war over it? What is America’s national interest in Israel? Genuinely curious.

We have never gone to war over Israel. I”m a little confused by the question.
Even when it looked like the country would be slaughtered right after it was established (six day war), we did not go to their aid. Nor did any other western country.

Ayn Rand, on the subject:
“If you mean whose side one should be on, Israel or the Arabs, I would certainly say Israel because it’s the advanced, technological, civilized country amidst a group of almost totally primitive savages who have not changed for years and who are racist and who resent Israel because it’s bringing industry, intelligence, and modern technology into their stagnation”

Nixon provided supplies to Israel during 1973’s Yom Kippur war; but the USA have never put boots on the ground, as they say.

However, as Hamas has murdered at least 27 Americans, we should possibly supply some 2,000 pound JDAM counseling to sites in Gaza. If Israel requests it.

And we shoul tell the Iranians to sit down and shut up.

Liz, after consideration, I’m not sure Israel is the right answer for those reasons.

Israel/Jews are not the friends of America/Christians. Everyone lies to themselves otherwise, just becasue they seem better than the openly anti-American/anti-Christian Muslims, but Israel/Jews are the Chosen People and they are every bit as fanatic, racist, closed minded, etc., as Middle Eastern Muslims.

Empowering a smart and technologically savvy population which wishes to harm America on religious, nationalist, and racial grounds, might not be clever strategy.

Bonus: While the Eastern European Jews are a bit more liberal, the Middle Eastern Jews are exactly like their Muslim counterparts in temperment.

Why would that be?

“Palestinians are genetically very close to Jews and other Middle East populations, including Turks (Anatolians), Lebanese, Egyptians, Armenians, and Iranians. Archaeologic and genetic data support that both Jews and Palestinians came from the ancient Canaanites, who extensively mixed with Egyptians, Mesopotamian, and Anatolian peoples in ancient times. Thus, Palestinian-Jewish rivalry is based in cultural and religious, but not in genetic, differences.”

I’m watching closely… I think I figured it out.

America is going to fight Iran in Syria.

It will be the reverse of Ukraine, where America is fighting Russia down to the last Ukranian.

In this case, Iran will fight America down to the last Syrian.

This works for Iran, and it works for America. It certainly works for military contractors. America doesn’t really change presidents in a war.

With proper management, WWIII: Battleground Levant will play out like Iraq and Afghanistan…

…just kinda go on and on with no obvious victory because the real definition of victory is a secret¹.

¹keep the regional disorder going

It is unclear in today’s genitals-and-skin-color-happy military if they are capable of proper management, however.

It’s probably for the best.

Few things reorder priorities, burn away luxury values, and deglorify mental illness like losing a carrier in an election year.

Everybody involved is doing exactly what they have always said they will do…

…so the future isn’t difficult to figure out.

Liz, after further consideration, America is going to lose the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower.

…just a few years before it was going to be ingloriously scrapped with no geopolitical benefit.

Fortunately, many of the aircraft will be in the air and make it to nearby friendly airbases where they can rejoin the fight. The ones that go down with the ship were due to be replaced anyway. That was just good luck.

Sorry to hear about the loss of so many sailors. It was the minimum number required to evoke public outrage. It would have been more if it hadn’t been for top-notch training and heroism.

The perpetrators of This Century’s Pearl Harbor have already been decided.

Chinabots are all for muslim terrorists, which is how everyone else sees Afghanistan, Western Pakistan, Iran, Syria, and the non-Iraqi Kurds.

Inside China, muslims are put into forced labor camps for crimes like reading the Quran instead of Winnie Xi’s tho’ts…