'Enigmatic' North Korean 'Rulers' in NYTimes, but Right-Wing 'Dictators' Use 'Terror'
Can we declare a moratorium on using the word “enigmatic” to describe North Korea’s totalitarian leadership?
The death of the North Korea dictator Kim Jong-il made the late edition of the Monday New York Times. The obituary by veteran foreign policy reporter David Sanger appeared under the rather neutral online headline “A Ruler Who Turned North Korea Into a Nuclear State.”
The initial web headline was almost offensively neutral: “Obituary: Kim Jong-il, North Korea’s Enigmatic Strongman.” The front-page headline to the Monday print late edition: "North Korea Says Strongman Dead After 17-Year Rule." To be fair, one of the several versions of the frequently updated story has a headline that reads: "Kim Jong-il, North Korean Dictator, Dies," but it's unclear where it appeared in print.
The Times print headline of July 10, 1994 marking the death of Kim Jong-il’s father also could not help using “enigmatic” to describe that dictator: "Kim Il Sung, Enigmatic 'Great Leader' of North Korea for 5 Decades, Dies at 82.” (That obit was also written by Sanger.)
By contrast, when a “right-wing” dictator dies, the Times manages to be forthright. The headline from the December 11, 2006 edition: "Augusto Pinochet, 91, Dictator Who Ruled by Terror in Chile, Dies."
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Comments
The spirit of Walter Duranty is alive and well at the Times.
Submitted by drsamherman on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 2:47pm.
Still the same old apologies and defense of communist dictators who murder millions of their own.
I guess once a communist apologist, always a communist apologist, eh, Pinch?
I'm still waitin'
Submitted by killa37 on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 3:23pm.
I'm still waitin' (Obamaspeak) for Barry to take a break from his golf game, beach time, or hanging around the shave-ice stand to make a comment on L'il Kim............I'm sure it'll be 'soft'.
And I noticed that Nurse Ratchett is 'concerned' about the abuses going on in Egypt............but I don't think that Brave Barry has weighed in on that one yet, either.
Enigmatic? Really?
Submitted by almostacowboy on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 3:22pm.
enigma (ɪˈnɪɡmə)
— n
a person, thing, or situation that is mysterious, puzzling, or ambiguous
Slave labor camps, rampant, nation-wide malnutrition, state control of every facet of life. Yep. Pretty 'enigmatic'.
enigma
Submitted by ladeflippinda on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 5:04pm.
So true.
Our own dictator, Obama, has
Submitted by jkwtrading on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 3:23pm.
Our own dictator, Obama, has killed now 60 people whom none had a trial..
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/secrecy-defines-ob...
All the killing of fetus, none have a trial or have committed a crime or a sin.. one man's reason or one females reason gave them death.
Too late for TIME Person of the Year
Submitted by Galvanic on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 3:29pm.
Kim died just a little too late to join Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin in that exclusive club: TIME Persons of the Year (nee Man of the Year).
After all, all three were enigmatic. Stalin turned the USSR into a nuclear state; Hitler was trying to but terminated his reign rather than allow himself to be taken alive by Stalin's boys.
Next year, the death of Hugo Chavez and the strong possibility of Castro's demise ought to boost their candidacies for TIME PotY.
I'm sure obama is greatly
Submitted by LAM SON 719 on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 3:50pm.
I'm sure obama is greatly saddened at the lost of his friend and mentor.
Enigmatic?
Submitted by taznar on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 4:38pm.
That's what I thought. He was a dictator. Enigma solved.
LAT's - how about "the mercurial strongman?"
Submitted by Gary Hall on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 6:09pm.
". . the mercurial strongman?"
That was the Kim's label in yesterday's Los Angeles Times.
The headline was simply, "North Korean leader dies.
The byline was, "Kim, 69, defied and baffled world with his nuclear aims, bizarre actions."
And began (my bold), "North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, the mercurial strongman who styled himself as a "Dear Leader" while ruling over an impoverished police state, died at 69, according to North Korean state media."
Adj -- changeable; volatile; fickle; flighty; erratic nature; animated; lively; sprightly; quick-witted.
Synonyms -- inconstant, indecisive, spirited.
Do I have to choose one of those?
Soon enough, we're hearing about the, "The diminutive leader . . ."
. . . and later, we get the bio, where the LAT's actually finds a place for the word dictatorship, albeit an "enduring" one:
Kim, who came to power in 1994 upon the death of his father, North Korea founder Kim Il Sung, led one of the world's most enduring dictatorships, a repressive regime that has long defied predictions of its demise.
Perhaps the true sense of the little [diminutive] man, is offered up in the next to closing paragraph:
. . he ignored pressure to release an estimated 200,000 citizens kept in a gulag of prison camps, some for transgressions as minor as failing to keep portraits of Kim and his father on their walls.
Mercurial sentences handed out for diminutive little things like that . . during the enduring era.
Saved for the closing one sentence paragraph, is the only true analysis of how this tyrant should be remember. This was presented awkwardly; not even an introduction, nor an effort to segue to it:
"I loathe Kim Jong Il," former President George W. Bush once told journalist Bob Woodward, calling him a "pygmy" and a "spoiled child."
(;~/ gary
gary...
Submitted by Jer on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 6:25pm.
"I loathe Kim Jong Il," former President George W. Bush once told journalist Bob Woodward, calling him a "pygmy" and a "spoiled child."
My guess is that Jong has been called far worse names in private--even to a journalist--than would ever be uttered in public.
Jer
Jer . . I might be guilty of just that
Submitted by Gary Hall on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 6:33pm.
Couldn't disagree with you, on that - in regards to foreign despots.
However, when it comes to what Jong was called in public compared to what President Bush was called, by our national media folks, Hollywood folks, radical Democratic party members, and on the streets by the radical rag tag orgs -- there would be no comparison.
The post on how our national media treat leftist tyrants vs rightest tyrants, I would submit, is right on.
(;~/ gary
The Slimes just seems to have
Submitted by eaglewingz08 on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 6:17pm.
The Slimes just seems to have an endless supply of Durantys willing to whitewast commie terror regimes and to hyperventilate over the minor sins of right wing governments. But dont dare call them biased commie lovers or dual standard bearers. That would be wrong.
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Submitted by Jer on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 6:22pm.
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It Is A Question of Intent.
Submitted by Avitar on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 8:55pm.
Right wing dictators know what they are doing and kill on purpose and for reasons.
Communist dictators are idiots and don't know what they are doing just like the New York Times and kill through monumental stupidity, which is why they are so ineffeceint at it and kill several times as many people as right wing dictatores do.
Some times the liberal dictators learn and correct their mistakes. When the Chinese dictators killed 50 million people in the "Great Leap Forward" it laid the foundation for the later Deng Xiaoping national policy of "To get rich is gloious" (alternative translation: "Greed is Good") Which has brought their death rates down to the levels of right wing dictatorships.
Ever seen this?
Submitted by GregE on Tue, 12/20/2011 - 10:41pm.
Hard to even imagine such a place.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxLBywKrTf4