Tilted election ground

What would it be like if, in a football match, one team played with 12 players while the other is forced to do so with only 10? The result is predictable in most cases. If political parties fail to agree on an election rule, however, local polls in June will likely end up as such a lopsided game.

In the 2012 presidential election, all major

contend

ers, including the then candidate Park Geun-hye, pledged their parties would not nominate candidates for basic local assemblies and administrations to prevent

corrupt

ion and reduce regionalism in local elections. With local polls just two months away, the opposition party is

stick

ing

to

the campaign promise, but Park’s ruling party has thrown it away like a scrap of paper.

Foreigners might think voters will punish the conservative governing party for the breach of promise. Not so in Korea where ideological and regional affiliation weigh far more heavily than political

fidelity

.

Yet President Park should not regard it as just another broken promise, as she all but abandoned the reform of family-controlled conglomerates and implementing universal welfare policies. The charismatic Park has resorted to keeping quiet or passed the buck to the ruling party whenever her political opponents raised an ``uncomfortable” issue.

The chief executive must no longer do so. She should either meet her opposition counterpart or make clear her position on the matter.

It’s rather paradoxical the opposition party in trying to keep its promise is driven to a corner in the victory-at-all-cost politics of Korea. If it names candidates in breach of its campaign promise as did the ruling Saenuri Party, the opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy will lose its greatest asset _ the party’s image and raison d’etre as the reformist group. If it does not by choosing justifiable cause over practical gains, a crushing defeat is more than obvious.

So it was natural that Ahn Cheol-soo, one of the two co-chairmen of the newly merged NPAD, is pressing President Park on this issue to win some electoral points and enhance his status as a debuting opposition leader. The problem is what he would do if Park keeps turning a cold shoulder to his dialogue offer, as the female president has done in the past. There should be no mistake in this regard, however: Ahn must not expect Korean voters will support his party out of sympathy. In a worst-case scenario, the CEO-turned-politician will shrivel even before he blossoms.

Even within the NPAD, the largest and relatively left-leaning faction composed of the allies of former President Roh Moo-hyun, is calling for nominating candidates to avoid a

humiliating

election setback. If the other two more centrist factions risk election defeat to sharply reduce the influence of the so-called pro-Roh faction, they will not be able to avoid criticism for pennywise and pound-foolish.

One might ask where the discussion of bread-and-butter issues for ordinary voters has gone amid rampant partisan politics and electoral engineering. If so, he or she must learn more about Korean politics.

This is The Korea Times editorial for Tuesday, April 1, 2014.

사설 번역 전문은 코리아타임스 음성 사설 해설 강의에서 만나실 수 있습니다.

※ 다음에 나오는 문제들은 본 기사에 나오는 중요한 어휘들로 구성된 토익, 토플, 텝스 기출 및 예상 문제입니다.

※ Choose the number that has the same meaning as the underlined vocabulary.

1. Farmers in 1930's had to

against drought and dust.

① prevent

② conquer

③ struggle

④ censure

2.Our own country is considered utterly

① submitted

② sublimated

③ wrecked

④ depraved

3. He'll

stick to

his opinion to the last.

① cling to

② add to

③ play to

④ go to

4. Ocean-going vessels have often used flags to indicate their national

allegiance

① loyalty

② destination

③ cargo

④ allowance

5. It would be

mortifying

to find myself ten francs short and be obliged to borrow from my guest.

① wailing

② dispersing

③ flattering

④ humiliating

⑤ warning

1. [번역] 1930년대의 농부들은 가뭄과 먼지에 대항해 투쟁해야 했다.

[어휘] contend 다투다, 싸우다, 투쟁하다(struggle, fight); 주장하다(maintain, assert) n. contention 다툼, 싸움, 투쟁; 경쟁; 논전(論戰), 언쟁, 논쟁(controversy); 논점, 주장 a. contentious 다투기 좋아하는, 논쟁하기 좋아하는(quarrelsome); 이론(異論)이 분분한① 미리 막다 ② 정복하다 ④ 비판하다, 책망하다

[정답] ③

2. [번역] 우리 자신의 나라는 완전히 부패한 나라로 여겨진다.

[어휘] deprave 악화, 부패, 타락시키다(corrupt, degenerate)

[정답] ④

3. [번역] 그는 끝까지 자신의 견해를 고수할 것이다.

[정답] ①

4. [번역] 원양 항해하는 선박들은 종종 그들의 조국에 대한 충성을 나타내기 위해 국기를 이용해왔다.

[어휘] allegiance 충성, 충실, 신의(loyalty, fidelity, faithfulness ↔ disloyalty, infidelity, treachery, unfaithfulness, faithlessness, defiance) ② destination 목적지 ③ cargo 화물, 뱃짐 ④ allowance 수당; 허용; 참작, 고려

5. [번역] 10프랑이 부족한 것을 알게 되어 나의 손님으로부터 빌릴 수밖에 없게 된다면 굴욕적인 일이 될 것이다.