Opinion - The Korea Times

Will Tiger Escape the Woods?

By Tom Plate Buddhism is one of the historic religions of Asia and today its influence remains strong throughout the world. One has only to scratch the surface of this philosophical religion that originated in India in the 5th or 6th century B.C. to know that it has much to say about suffering. Suffering emerged as a primary focus of the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama because the true Buddhist understands suffering to be a constant of existence. And don't we all know how true this is! In effect, Buddhism tells you that there is no easy escape from the reality of existence, other than coping with present reality through Buddha's consistent (if rather severe) teachings. With this as a necessary preface, let us now examine the strange case of an American news-television personality who made a splash the other day by advising Tiger Woods, with all his troubles, to forswear Buddhism and turn to Christianity. Yes, Tiger received that unsolicited advice from one of the mainstays on the Fox News cable network. The golfer Woods, by his own testimony, inherited the gift of Buddhism

Jan 14, 2010By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Optimism for 2010

By Tom Plate It is said that the optimist peers at the glass and assesses it as half full, and the pessimist gauges it half empty. But the cynic asks: Where's the leak? This past year was so bad, it was almost impossible to describe. New words were needed. For example, consider the ruckus of the recent United Nations Climate Change Conference in Denmark, headed by the indefatigable U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. It is now known simply as ``Copenhagen," which immediately morphs into a new verb ― ``to Copenhagen" ― which means something like to fuzz over the reality, such as ``zero plus zero equals whatever you want but never equals zero." As in ``polluted" means ``almost as clear as the eye can see." You get the idea. That's one new term. Then from a proper noun ― the last name of our U.S. president ― comes the morphed verb: ``to Obama." This means to split political differences to such a fine degree that it's hard to detect the presence of any actual coherent policy change. A third I fear will make it into our political lexicon is ``to Ahmadi-Nejad," created to honor I

Jan 7, 2010By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Three Insights Into Diplomacy

By Tom Plate In America, trying to understand what makes other complex countries and cultures tick is usually done in the university classroom, through travel abroad or by following the mass news media. But there's another option that sometimes produces gold: Peering into other cultures through the behavior of their stars and their artists. Take Hideki Matsui, my favorite active baseball player who until recently played on what used to be my favorite American baseball team, the New York Yankees. Amazingly, the Japanese-born slugger garnered the title of Most Valuable Player in the recent World Series, the first Japanese ever so honored. He well deserved it. A hitting virtuoso, he almost won the deciding game single-handedly. It was a performance to remember, but here is the complaint: the callow management of the New York Yankees had no trouble dissing him. For various reasons, it did not try to re-sign Matsui, who was quickly snapped up by the Los Angeles Angels ― now my favorite team. Further, I want nothing to do with the Yankees and am officially resigning as a fan, aft

Jan 3, 2010By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

China Gifts Offer Best Value

By Tom Plate Professor at University of California, Los Angeles Director of Asia Pacific Media Network Attention last-minute holiday shoppers! We have an easy-to-purchase gift to recommend. And we guarantee that it will fit all sizes, shapes and tastes. This is assuming your intended recipients are intelligent, literate and eager to learn about the world. For as your intellectually slothful friends (if any), we recommend you just keep off your list entirely. Why waste your (presumably) hard-earned money on them? Let them spend their holiday watching football or something. The answer to your gift-list problem is to buy your friends a book on China ― in fact, any book on China, or any two or even three books. You absolutely cannot go wrong. In the last year not one book on China has been published in the U.S. that's not worth buying and reading. This is a serious statement. That's not because the best writers in the world are writing only about China, necessarily. It's because China is a subject of such vast and profound interest right now that it's virtually impossible

Dec 20, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Obama Needs Fair Criticism

By Tom Plate LOS ANGELES ― Foreign-policy performance is anything but the total measure of a president's worth. America's domestic politics, not to mention its elections, are more often than not driven by the forces, and failures, of economics. But get foreign policy matters seriously wrong and the president of the world's only superpower walks around looking like a three-legged dog. Just recall Lyndon Johnson's Vietnam failure, which more or less wound up defining his tragic presidency. Barack Hussein Obama's address at West Point was remarkably clear and direct. This relatively young, amazingly articulate man was pretty much at his best. He was (a) the college professor lecturing on the historical background, (b) the First Strategist pointing out the trade-offs and options, and (c) the Cheerleader in Chief trying to pump up the troops and the American public to rally round the urgent cause. Obama made a good case that the cause was indeed just, reminding everyone of the retaliation's origins and of the unforgivable atrocities in New York eight years ago. But whet

Dec 7, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Odd Couple on Earth

By Tom Plate They're both up against it now. They looked over the precipice and gasped at the steepness of the drop. They looked down at a desert of dashed hopes and old skeletons, scraping the bottom of the canyon. This is where a failed U.S.-China relationship could wind up. It does look like a very long way down. But gravity would make it a fast trip . All it would take is a cliff-edge miscalculation or a loss of balance by one or the other and there could be a huge geopolitical slip. China and the United States, the odd couple of the first half of the 21st century, would be at the bottom of the canyon of international stability. It was that breathtaking possibility ― that arid abyss ― that caught the attention of the two leaders of China and American in Beijing earlier this week. U.S. President Barack Obama was on the third leg of his Asia tour, after first hitting Tokyo (its long-time Asian ally) and then Singapore for an international meeting. All smiles, but little evident warmth, Chinese President Hu Jintao greeted him for a four-day stay in China. After

Nov 22, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Godzilla Sweeps World Series

By Tom Plate Professor at University of California, Los Angeles Director of Asia Pacific Media Network A lot of Hollywood pros believe almost religiously that ``Bull Durham" (1988) offers one of the best opening lines in the history of American movies. You see first a parade of images of past baseball greats and not so greats, as if a promenade of saints. And then you hear the sweet voice of Annie Savoy (played unforgettably by Susan Sarandon) saying, ``I believe in the church of baseball." Nice, eh? Permit us, then, to extend this ecclesiastical metaphor further. If the game of baseball is a secular church, then the American version last night installed a new cardinal. Just throw off his New York Yankee baseball cap and replace it with appropriate cardinal's headdress. For the secular god of baseball in the U.S. right now is Hideki Matsui, the first Japanese-born baseball player ever to win the Most Valuable Player Award for overall performance in a World Series. This is the crowning Olympian height of the professional sport. In Japan, where this giant star played pro

Nov 8, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Another Twist From N. Korea

By Tom Plate Professor at University of California, Los Angeles Director of Asia Pacific Media Network LOS ANGELES ― Like the baby that hurls its rattle out of the crib to grab attention, North Korea has never been known for a subtle diplomatic style. Right now, though, it appears to have abandoned, temporarily at least, the crude infantile approach for a more adult turn. Yes, once again, we are being manipulated. But this particular manipulation might just lead to something more hopeful than the usual. The latest twist in the ditsy diplomatic schizophrenia known as the foreign policy of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea came in the form of an official apology. It's hard to believe but the North Korean government actually said it was sorry about something ― and said it very much in public. The apology came in the wake of a presumably inadvertent flood-control error. Water from a North Korean dam was released last month that flowed downstream as if a mini-tsunami. In a flash it wound up drowning a half dozen South Koreans along the Imjin River. After weeks

Oct 25, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

President’s Afghan Agony

By Tom Plate The current Afghanistan policy review facing Barack Hussein Obama is quite far from the easiest task on the Presidential chore list. This youngish President didn't order up this war, but today, eight years after September 11, 2001, it is his distinct political inheritance, in part, of course, because of his oft-expressed sense of Afghanistan's strategic importance. So before too long ― and for as long as our troops are there ― it will be increasingly thought of as Obama's war. There will be no ducking this. Our American President is thus in the toughest of spots, and I would only wish for him some magnificently obvious and simple way out. There is none. Some Presidential decisions are simply bitterly tough, with huge consequences. But if asked for a policy analysis, this is what one humble West-Coast based columnist would say: Dear Mr. President: Your instincts as both a gentleman and as a serious policy scholar will be to try to split the difference between those who want more troops sent to Afghanistan and those who want them gradually recalled. You must r

Oct 11, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Beyonce and Palin Take on Asia

By Tom Plate KUALA LUMPUR ― Who said foreign-policy issues and problems don't have entertainment value? Who said rich and prominent Americans, without exception, are insensitive to the rising importance of Asia? In that spirit, whoever said that Beyonce Knowles, the sexy rock superstar, would never be able to appear on stage in a Muslim country without risking a clash of civilizations? And whoever said Sarah Palin, the defeated Republican nominee for President of the United States, was dumber than a dead elephant and wouldn't know Asia from Africa even with a map? Probably no one has ever said all these terrible things, altogether, in the same breath ― and so breathlessly! But such an enticing rhetorical approach seems a good way to bracket a star-studded week in Asia-U.S. relations in which custom-made American pitches toward Asia took center stage. Let's start with Beyonce. Unholy hipster promoters here in this Islamic Republic have been angling to get her rhythm and blues road-show onto a venue stage in this capital city for some time. But a Beyonce booking two y

Sep 27, 2009By Tom Plate

Tom Plate

Read more

Will Tiger Escape the Woods?

Optimism for 2010

Three Insights Into Diplomacy

China Gifts Offer Best Value

Obama Needs Fair Criticism

Odd Couple on Earth

Godzilla Sweeps World Series

Another Twist From N. Korea

President’s Afghan Agony

Beyonce and Palin Take on Asia

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