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Monday, December 22, 2003
Touristy Stuff I had my first big chance to do some real sightseeing in America yesterday. I got invited to spend a day tripping around some wineries in Somona Valley just outside of San Franscisco. The day was rainy and overcast which, on the down side, meant I got a poor view of the Golden Gate bridge as we went across it, but on the plus side, the crowds were down at the wineries.
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Wednesday, December 17, 2003
News on Korea South Korea is Australia's No. 1 source of adopted babies. Begging the question what kind of society sends its children overseas?The article goes on to look at government efforts to reduce the number of overseas adoptions in an effort to address the poor image it sends but of course this only increases the number of babies left in orphanages because such a policy fails to deal with the other side, namely, Korean prejudices against out-of-family adoptions. Intelligence from Korea is reporting that Al-Qaeda has been casing the joint. Despite the anonmyous comment given that South Korean's are veterans when it comes to dealing with infiltration by terrorists it is a disquieting commentary. For some reason Korea becomes a more frightening place when you are not there but all your friends are. On the subject of dealing with threats, Foriegn Minister Yoon Young Kwan gives an interview about how South Korea hopes the North Korean crisis might unfold, emphasising the need for piecemeal and gradual opening of the economy, perhaps Chinese style, to avoid a total collapse that would bring about chaos to both North and South Korea. It looks like the poor drunk sap that killed the South Korean women in a drink driving incident could be the first US soldier to be tried by South Korean courts under the revised SOFA. I would imagine the South Korean prosecutors would be handling this matter very carefully to ensure that is exactly what happens. Australia - Shoot 'em up Foreign Policy Not only has the #%@$* Prime Minister of Australia and the spineless oppositionadvocated the death penalty to Saddam despite the fact that our country has long rejected capital punishment now the government is preparing to put guns on customs boats so we can shoot trespassing un-armed fisherman. And better yet, the Courts have ruled Australian officials do not have to take into account the likelihood that a failed asylum seeker would be killed, tortured or persecuted in their home country if deported. What is happening to my country? Sunday, December 14, 2003
Saddam Hussein has been Captured
The news of Saddam's capture seems to be on every web page in cyber space so I thought I'd get with the game as well. There is also video footage of the hidey-hole, medical exam (no footage of anal swabs), and press conference.
"Tax Bomb" The Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs is being accused of threateningan excessive hike by altering the property tax calculations. This obviously pits Metro Goverment against the Central Government since property taxes are in the realm of local government, not central government. MOGAHA is justifying its actions by saying that the reforms will address problems of disequilibria in the current system (in Korean). But the action is coming across that has some expressing doubt and predicting trouble ahead. The Korea Herald expounds, It should not surprise anyone if taxpayers put up resistance under these circumstances. Few would believe it is reasonable to raise taxes seven-fold at a stroke, even if the new astronomical rate applies only to a select few. In addition, longtime residents will make a convincing case if they claim that they are being victimized, as they have taken no speculative action. The Chosun gets a little more riled up about the issue, Such has become the situation, and yet the ministry [MOGAHA] is being stubborn enough to say it's going to push ahead according to the government's plan. Indiscriminate bombing of the people with "tax bombs" is predictably going to invite tax resistance, so it appears to have the crazed idea that being obstinate about the whole thing will save the government's pride.If this does blow-up I doubt anything will save the government's pride. But there is something further to consider, I think, in this issue. As the Chosun notes, The same goes with the ministry's consideration of a plan in which the range within which regional autonomous bodies can adjust tax rates would be reduced from the current 50 percent to between 10 and 30 percent. It's like saying that if smaller governments want to fight the increases, they the ministry is going to have the law changed so it can force the issue anyway. If the national government really does have any desire to open a new era of regional, de-centralized governance, then it should cease this unjustified stubbornness and give ear to the views of regional autonomous governments.As far as I am aware from a previous look into local government, while they do have the power to raise taxes within a certain band, they have rarely (maybe even never) actually altered the tax rates under their jurisdiction. Raising taxes is obviously unpopular and the system is currently structured that any short-fall in budget will be made up by central government via transfers. This negates any incentives local government might have to arbitrarily increase the taxes. However, central government's prescription of reclaiming the right to increase taxes seems an inadequate way to address this problem. It seems to be a systemic issue embedded in the structure of local government taxing policy and transfers. Therefore fixing the issue is not to have central government reclaim a right that belongs to local government as this will only weaken the progress of decentralisation and create animoysity between central and local levels. Unrelated to Korea I finished my first quarter at Stanford! Hoorah! Now I have "time-without-classes" to busily get started on my thesis. Thursday, December 11, 2003
A Lesson in Tact The timing of the Bush Administration asking for non-coalition-of-the-willing countries to show benevolence by cancelling their debt with Iraq just after the Pentagon told them that they werebarred from bidding for Iraq reconstruction projects was comical. The co-ordination and communication obviously absent at the top level was suddenly very salient and very funny. Suffice to say, I doubt any country will be feeling charitable enough to cancel its debt for the US colony of Iraq. A Look into Japan’s Ambitions Recent international events and Japan’s reaction is creating a maelstrom of tension in Asia. In particular is Japan’s decision to send peace-keeping troops to Iraq at the behest of US. The decision is causing much angst in China and and Korea (or that part of which Hankoyreh is representative) (in Korean - hat tip to Marmot for the link). A primary reason to oppose this move stems from Chinese and Korean memories of WWII atrocities and fear of Japanese recidivism. However, for Japan, following the US lead in foreign policy is not only a norm, but is all the more pertinent in the context of the current North Korea nuclear crisis. By sending troops Japan is able to affirm the strength of its alliance with US, provide a background to expect mutual assistance in the eventuality of war or increased threats from North Korea, and to diminish criticism of its ‘checkbook diplomacy’ and address its free-rider image. But more than that, this could also be interpreted as yet another move toward becoming a ‘normal’ nation. Henry Kissinger long ago predicted the inevitability of Japanese re-armament and even a build-up of nuclear capability. Evidence of moves in this direction is not hard. Recent Milestone Changes in Japanese Security Policy 1. In 1992 the Diet in Japan passed the “International Peace Cooperation Act” which allowed for the deployment of peace-keeping troops overseas for peaceful purposes. Japan sent troops to Cambodia, East Timor, and now Iraq A further indication that Japan is increasingly breaking free of the shackles of a US-Japan alliance is its increased leadership role in Asia. While only a few years ago Japan would have been pulled into line by the US for promoting regionalism that excluded the US, Japan is now championing the expanding role of ASEAN+3 and has recently concluded its first bi-lateral trade deal with Singapore. This trend is not only reducing the influence that US maybe able to exert in the region, but it is also lining up Japan and China as competitors for regional dominance. The Financial Times notes that “Tokyo would be unlikely to make public its negotiations with four new countries unless it thought it had a realistic chance of concluding them. That suggests prime minister Junichiro Koizumi's government may be prepared to get tougher with vested interests in what it deems to be the national interest.”The key here is national interest. On both the security and economic front, if Japan perceives that it will be better served by forging its on path rather than continuing to rely on US protection and membership in US dominated multilateral economic arrangements, it is not inconceivable that Japanese re-armament is just around corner and whatever else that may entail - most likely a souring of relations with other Asian nations, especially Korea and China and an arms race in Asia. Immune to Mad Cow Korean scientists have developed a mad cow-resistent bovine. Surely not turning the cows into cannibals and giving them a cow-free diet would be a far cheaper means of creating a mad cow-resistent cow. Afterall, prevention is better than cure/genetic modification. Saturday, December 06, 2003
An update on Buan's nuclear waste dump project with some proponents of the project announcing their presence to a skeptical audience. This is a positive development and helps show that Buan's rioters are not the whole of society. Friday, December 05, 2003
Party Politics in Korea Cathartidae has made some comments on Korea's solons and the political maneuvering between the MDP and the Uri Parties, namely a possible re-merger. The basic premise of th arguement as articulated by the Korea Herald is that the two parties may merge to get a bigger support base for the upcoming elections. The lawmakers, who are under enormous pressure to win next year's parliamentary elections, argued that coordination of the MDP and the Uri in selecting candidates and its strength as one group would almost surely guarantee victory in the elections, they said.The article didn't metion this but it seems to me to be a HUGE logical jump here regarding the base of support and the reason for lost support in the first place. I would argue that factionalism between conservative and reformists in the original MDP party will not be solved by a reunion and also that Roh himself will not be able to gain any popularity by returning to the MDP. Firstly, any rejoining of the parties will come across as a failure of the Uri Party and only heighten the position of the conservatives within the party. Secondly, Roh's floundering in the political arena between parties and declining popularity will not improve by such a retreat back to the original party. The logical leap then, is how do these two parties figure that the people will continue to support them, even return to support them, after all this shfiting and changing only to end up back where they started? I would be inclined to think that any merger would be viewed skeptically and be unlikely to gain support. Perhaps the talks of a merger will not actually lead to any merger at all. In the meantime, Roh's followers are trying to brainstorm ways to win the election, or less ambitiously, let people know who they are. Jeff in Korea has a LONG blog about *bad* Korea using protectionism, industrial policy, and export promotions and argues that it would be better for the Korean economy to become more open. I think I can pretty much say I disagreed with the argument in its entirity but its definitely worth a read. The back and forth bantering of how trade barriers affect an economy, to what extent, and what constitutes barriers and what is culture , what kind of trade it is, be it FDI, intra-industry, intra-sector, or direct exporting, etc, etc has been hashed out in the Japan-US case and the dynamics are very similar with the Korea case. For example, is Korea really hurting itself by paying extra for rice or is it actually helping itself by providing rural employment and keeping some food growing capacity firmly entrenched for national security, domestic stability, regional balance, etc reasons. I don't think any country would be fool enough to abandon its food growing capacity and let the "market" have a free reign, however inefficient the agriculture may be. The assertion often noted that countries (including Korea but many others as well) should open their agriculture market to "competition" when the main entrants into the market would be America's *massively* subsidised US farmers reeks of hypocrisy. The below cartoon was published in Australia over the proposed FTA between US and Australia that is running into problems because the Australians want greater access to US markets but (not) surprisingly this has been met with resistance.
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