He’s writing another letter, it seems, this time to Kim Jong-Il, the dictator of North Korea who’s likely an alcoholic, malignant narcissist. The Gormogons have obtained a draft copy. Don’t ask how, but I can say it has something to do with a chip the Mandarin implanted in the cerebral cortex of someone whose code name is, significantly, MERMAN LAHUE.

Dear Dear Leader Kim,

I’ll bet you never thought you’d receive a letter from an American president who looks like me. My saying this reminds me of my years at Occidental and Columbia, during which I wrote my prize-winning thesis on your father’s juche ideology, Japanese gangsterism, and how that made a young African-American with profound sympathies for the oppressed victims of European colonialism feel. (I can send you a copy, if you’d like a further glimpse into the man who represented hope and change to so many millions around the world, as it’s not publicly available.)

Although Korea was never actually occupied by a European power, your nation‘s relative swarthiness touched the farthest reaches of my cosmic capacity for sympathy, and I deemed you a victim of European racism in that the Japanese’s occupation of your country was clearly a product of their almost hypnotized compulsion emulate European powers after Commodore Perry forced all their little girls to play with blue-eyed dolls. I swore never to forget your pain.

Let me formally apologize, as well, for the 1871 American incursion into Korea, or as I call it, the Shinmiyangyŏ. There is, perhaps surprisingly, nothing I can do to abase myself sufficiently for this atrocity against the faultless Korean people on behalf of my guilty nation which has only begun to expiate its sins with the election of a president who might have been (though, I must note, technically was not) the descendant of the very slaves freed but six years previous—but I bow deeply before you in their memory. I am sending under separate cover 243 copies, one in memory of each fatality, of The Wretched of the Earth, autographed by my own hand and inscribed with a profound apology. I hope my gift can make my wishes known to the Korean people, perhaps by distributing my gift throughout the world-class public-library system on which I know that you pride yourself.

I will not pray to my God—the Triune God of Christianity, I must point out, though I have nothing but the deepest and highest respect for its supercessor in the Abrahamic tradition—to change your heart in response to this plea for your good opinion. My study of history has led me to the knowledge which I prize that your forebears were forced to massacre French priests and the converts they had tricked and bribed into accepting their degrading Western ways. I understand the pain this must have caused them, and must cause you as their heir. One is put in mind of the Crusades. I myself faced a similar situation in my rotasubteriation of many of my former associates, and indeed I will probably be forced against my will to exercise my rotasubteriative powers again. I know you can understand my difficulties. We share similar positions where many of our past associates turn not to be the people we thought they were. Sometimes, I envy your ability to act directly in such cases.

Nevertheless, I stand firmly and equally opposed to those who say that we must nuke this world to ashes and those who say that we must never under any circumstances ignite any sort of fire. Consequently, I must respectfully ask you with all the tact I have shown to world leaders such as ‘Abdallâh b. ‘Abd-al-‘Azîz al-Sa‘ûd, King of Saudi Arabia, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, Commander of the Saudi National Guard & Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia; Manuel Zelaya, Rightful President of Honduras; His Imperial Majesty the Tennō, Emperor Akihito of the Era of Heisei (whom I did mention should be more mindful of his people’s crimes against your people—I suggested an apology); Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías, President of Venezuela and Leader of the Bolivarian Revolution; the queen of Grand Britain, and so forth, to please cease and desist with regards to any nuclear program surplus to your legitimate and completely understandable energy needs—or if you find it impossible to desist, at least slow it down—or if you find it impossible to slow it down, at least keep it out of the papers. Please. I say to you again as the symbol of a changed, better America: Please.

Sincerely,

버락 후세인 오바마 2세
노벨 평화상 수상자

But Confucius digresses.

The point is, haven’t we been here before? Twice?* And we’ve learned…? Not a damn thing, apparently.

Can we just skip ahead a few months to our massive payoff to the DPRK after Kim seizes six container ships, fills them with kimchi and ox dung and straps remote-controlled bombs to Japanese people kidnapped in the 1970s and forces them to crash the ships into Pusan, Long Beach, Melbourne, Yokohama, Vancouver, and the Panama Canal?

Sometimes Confucius is amazed that his Fallacy of Foreign-Political Egocentrism can be so pellucidly instantiated. One hopes dearly that this isn’t one malignant narcissist reaching out to another as a scene in his personal drama.

* For those of you scoring at home, GorT never did follow up on that macro for his Volgi. Slackerbot.

Confucius, Œc. Vol.

Don’t ask impertinent questions like that jackass Adept Lu.