Big Brother Looming Large
By Cho Jae-hyon
City Editor
Everything the Lee Myung-bak administration touches is turning sour. From North Korea to Dokdo issues, policymakers are making one blunder after another.
The North slapped the South in the face by shooting dead a housewife vacationing at a resort there. Japan has made a fresh claim to the Dokdo islets. It's a stab in the back as the claim comes on the heels of Lee's promise to bury past Japanese misdeeds for better future relations.
Lee suppressed candlelight protests regarding American beef imports. In return, the U.S. changed its recognition of Dokdo being Korea's territory to it being unclaimed territory. No one in the Lee administration was aware of the change until a local TV station reported on it.
The U.S. geographical agency's modification of its stance is tantamount to the accusation that Korea is illegally occupying the islets. It degraded Korea to a violator of international law. It is apparently taking sides with Japan ― another backstabbing. Many Koreans feel betrayed.
Ties with China? They are in no good shape either. When Lee visited China for a summit in May, he got the cold shoulder, a price he had to pay for his outright courting of closer relations with the U.S.
Its attempt to omit the inter-Korean Oct. 4 Joint Declaration on reconciliation from the chairman's statement at the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) meeting in Singapore underlines the absence of brains in the Lee administration.
It's like Murphy's law: Nothing is going right.
Are all theses problems befalling by chance? Or are they due to the faulty and lefty strategies of the preceding Roh Moo-hyun administration with a time lag?
Within the pragmatic government exist no long-term strategies to turn this bad luck around. However, instead of concentrating all of its energy and time on tackling these challenges, all of Lee lieutenants are busy picking fights with the press, Internet users and citizens critical of his administration.
It needs to look back on itself and think hard about what went wrong. It needs to accept criticism humbly, even though it's coming from those who are at the other end of the ideological spectrum.
Lee is doing the opposite.
Chasing and cracking down on complainers is an easy and effective way to divert public attention away from impending problems. People tend to watch only the fight itself, overlooking the factors that triggered it.
The government is trying to tighten screws on cyberspace, the breeding ground for most anti-government protests.
At the call of Lee, senior Grand National Party members, police chiefs, and prosecutors are scrambling to find ways to punish ``poisonous'' cybercitizens.
The Lee administration has been beaten for months by netizens' postings concerning mad cow disease and other government policies. Justice Minister Kim Kyung-han recently said the government would push a ``cyber contempt'' bill that would criminalize online libel or slander. Web portals will be obliged to monitor numerous postings on their own Web sites and otherwise be sanctioned.
All these sound quite Orwellian. The imaginary world under omnipresent surveillance by Big Brother portrayed in George Orwell's prophetic novel, ``1984'' seems to be upon us.
Police are putting themselves in an awkward situation with threats against human rights body Amnesty International. They accuse the agency of wrongly depicting candlelight protests and warned it of legal action. Even if the agency were wrong, is such a threat worthwhile?
At the same time, National Police Agency (NPA) Commissioner General Eo Cheong-soo recently asked YouTube to block a video of a TV news report on a brothel allegedly run by the NPA chief's younger brother.
All these threats and brawls look comical.
When candlelight protests against American beef imports were at their peak in June, President Lee said that he watched the sea of candlelight from the top of a hill behind Cheong Wa Dae and ``repented bone chillingly'' for failing to serve the people's right.
In hindsight, he seems to have regretted failing to be tougher against demonstrators in the initial stage of the protests. Now he is striking back. He is determined to punish people opposing government polices both on and off line. The awards given to hundreds of police officers to acknowledge their superb job beating up and suppressing demonstrators show his determination.
China has been notorious for its attempts to control the Internet. It never worked. Control of cyberspace is a mission impossible. The Internet culture of openness could leave the government vulnerable. Even so, instead of overreacting to what's happening in cyberworld, it may have to rethink bullying and regulating its own people. Pick the right opponents to fight!