As you may have heard, Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico just got back from a trip to North Korea as a “private citizen.” Yeah, right.

North Korea once again threatened the world, attacked South Korea, and got us to the negotiating table. We’re like a battered wife. No matter how many times North Korea beats us we just keep coming back.

Barack Obama knows he cannot hold direct talks with the DPRK, because it would destroy him at home politically. So he sent a corrupt governor as his surrogate and then trotted out the “private citizen” canard. I don’t buy it.

North Korea didn’t see a private citizen paying them a visit. They saw Gov. Bill Richardson as a representative of the US (with Wolf Blitzer in tow no less) and they made the most of it. They agreed to let IAEA inspectors into their nuclear plant at Yongbyon, in return for God knows what.

This is what they always do. They make agreements in return for aide, and once the aide give us the middle digit.

Then they detonate nuclear weapons, sink South Korean ships, shell South Korean villages, kidnap South Korean fisherman.

All the violence causes us to beg them to negotiate which they finally do and the process begins all over again.

We already have Jimmy Carter flying around the world conducting his own foreign policy against the best interests of the US, we don’t need another one.

Frankly, just the thought of handing even a single kernel of corn or a grain of rice to the North Korean regime is morally repugnant. The people starving to death see nothing

Kim Jong-Il is without a doubt the most vicious and brutal dictator alive on this planet. I’m not a fan of Hitler comparisons, but North Korea is more like Nazi Germany than you can imagine. The crimes the Kim family have committed against their own people are unspeakable in their horror and unimaginable in scale.

Millions and millions of people have died and are continuing to die of starvation in North Korea. Hundreds of thousands of people are being worked to death in concentration camps. There really is nothing you can compare it to besides the Holocaust.

The government has no food and private industry is illegal. Entire families die one by one of starvation. North Koreans are 4 to 6 inches shorter than South Koreans on average. They are permanently stunted as a result of chronic starvation. Meanwhile, South Korea is one of the wealthiest nations on earth. Only a fence and a minefield separate the hungry from the full.

The government of Kim Jong-Il is the personification of evil. The English language simply does not have words that adequately describe the monstrous nature of his regime. Saddam Hussein’s Iraq was Disney Land compared to North Korea.

The only talks we should have with North Korea are through the barrel of a gun.

Giving anything to those thugs in Pyongyang is a stain on this nation. After the Holocaust we promised “never again,” but we weren’t telling the truth.

It’s happening again. It’s been happening. And we’re doing nothing to stop it.

Source: Reuters

New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson has won an agreement from North Korea to allow nuclear inspectors to return while China continues to pressure Pyongyang.

Gov. Bill Richardson has officially withdrawn himself from consideration to be commerce secretary in the new Obama administration due to the ongoing investigation into how some of his political donors won a lucrative state contract in New Mexico.

A federal grand jury is investigating how a California company that contributed to Richardson’s political activities won a New Mexico transportation contract worth more than $1 million. Richardson said in a statement issued by the Obama transition office that the investigation could take weeks or months but expressed confidence it will show he and his administration acted properly.

President-Elect Obama said he accepted Richardson’s withdrawal with “deep regret.”

From the AP:

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson ended his campaign for the presidency Wednesday after twin fourth-place finishes that showed his impressive credentials could not compete with his rivals’ star power.

Richardson planned to announce the decision Thursday, according to two people close to the governor with knowledge of the decision. They spoke on a condition of anonymity in advance of the governor’s announcement.

The Richardson campaign would not comment on the governor’s decision, reached after a meeting with his top advisers Wednesday in New Mexico.

Prior to Richardson’s bid for the Presidency I thought he would probably be a good candidate. I was surprised after his campaign began how out of touch and naive many of his positions were.

From actually having been a diplomat, I was especially surprised how ridiculous most of his foreign policy ideas were.

-Chris Jones