Can his fat, dorky son handle the reigns? Tune in and find out!
The revolution will not be televised. Because the power is out again...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tieKL_5b2Io
Korean people gnashing their teeth and weeping in the (otherwise deserted/traffic-free) streets of Pyongyong.
Hilarious. I can't wait to see this edited into all kinds of comedy videos for years to come.
Somethingawful publishes a word-for-word KCNA obituary.
>In a worldwide tragic event, Supreme Leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, General Secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea, Viceroy of the People's Korean Beautiful Man Solution, Grand Admiral of the People's Korean Sailboat Club and Chief Judge of the Workers' Best Guitar Solo Contest, Kim Jong Il, has died at the age of 70. He was the oldest man in world.
>"He would not wake up," sobbed a doctor as he was placed into a prisoner van. "If only he had been alive to tell us how to save him."
>>4
Are North Koreans, as a whole, all brainwashed or something??
>>5
That's a parody article. See link in >>3 for actual brainwashed masses. On the other hand, bear in mind that you're pretty much judged by how hard you grieve by party minders and they wouldn't film anyone not giving an adequate performance. Also, you have to be someone of at least minor importance and of sufficient loyalty to even live in Pyongyang. No telling what's going on in the countryside...
>North Korea says a fierce snowstorm paused and the sky began glowing red above sacred Mount Paektu just minutes before leader Kim Jong Il's death.
>State media say the ice on volcanic Lake Chon at the mountain in the far north cracked with a load roar.
>And in the city of Hamhung, a Manchurian crane circled a statue of Kim's father, late President Kim Il Sung, before alighting on a tree, its head drooping before it took off toward Pyongyang.
Oh Dear Leader, you keep bringing us famine and LOL even in death.
On that note:
>South Korean spies are skeptical about the official Pyongyang line that Kim died of a heart attack while hard at work on a train Saturday morning...
>satellite photographs revealed that Kim's train was actually stationary at a Pyongyang station at the time of the ruler's death, as announced by the North, according to media reports.
>...Kim Jong Il actually died in his bed at his Pyongyang residence. But the image of a sickly, weakened and prone "Dear Leader" taking his last breaths may not have sounded sufficiently patriotic to suit Pyongyang's propaganda machine.
Sorry to turn every DPRK thread into my personal heaven on earth, but hey, North Korea is hilarious:
From the Wall Street journal (23 Dec 2011):
>Saturday's death of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has given lift to that country's only openly traded securities, a batch of bonds that haven't received a payment in almost three decades...
>The sporadically traded bonds...were recently quoted at 14 to 18 cents on the dollar, compared to 13 to 15 cents...
>The premise that has attracted hedge funds and pension funds is that North Korea can't exist in isolation forever, and like other former communist countries, will need to tap the international markets for funds. ...[F]irst it will have to clear its unpaid debts.
Steve Blowjobs and Kim Dong Heel, what a great year for death. Hopefully we can get some other twat in the ground before New Years.
>0412 GMT: South Korean news reports say a group of embalmers from Russia left for Pyongyang on Sunday. Russian experts embalmed the corpse of Kim Il-Sung.
Our grandkids will get to see the waxy face of Dear Leader at his final resting place as a side attraction in Pyongyang Disneyland!
The funeral was today. Did you all observe your moment of silence???
>The funeral procession, which began and ended at Kumsusan Memorial Palace, where Kim's body had lain in state and where his father, North Korean founder Kim Il Sung, is preserved, passed by huge crowds of mourners, most of them standing in the snow with their heads bare, many screaming and flailing their arms as soldiers struggled to keep them from spilling onto the road.
Presumably as Party minders struggled to push them onto the road. Also, I like that the "procession" began and ended at the same place.
>...there was little doubt who the leader was. Son and successor Kim Jong Un served as head mourner, walking with one hand on the hearse, the other raised in salute, his head bowed against the wind.
Aww.... It's almost as poignant as John F. Kennedy Jr. saluting his father's funeral procession. You know, if John F. Kennedy were a monster who starved hundreds of thousands to death for fun and profit...
Something is possibly happening with Kim Jong-Nam (Dear Leader's eldest son), who notoriously attempted to enter Japan under a false passport to either go to Disneyland and/or a Soapland (brothel) depending on the story:
>... he arrived in Beijing from Macau a few days ago and "has been placed under Chinese protection".
This guy has been living in Macau, Las Vegas of the East since 2001 after his little adventure abroad led to a "falling out" with his father. There's also plenty of other reasons to assume he and his father did not see eye-to-eye, height differences aside:
>In a January interview with the Tokyo Shimbun, Jong-Nam was quoted as voicing opposition to the planned dynastic succession.
>"Even Chairman Mao Zedong of China did not enforce hereditary succession," he was quoted as saying.
Perhaps China is planning its own succession plan for the DPRK? That's wild speculation, but then again, with North Korea, everything is!
BREAKING NEWS: One person on earth ACTUALLY saddened by Dear Leader's passing!
>For more than a decade Kim Young-Sik has been moonlighting as an impersonator of North Korea's longtime leader.
>Keeping up appearances takes some work. He perms his hair every three months and before Kim's death closely followed changes in his look and demeanour, even going on a diet when the late leader lost weight following a 2008 stroke.
>But since Kim Jong-Il died on December 17, the 61-year-old father of two fears he may have to hang up his tailor-made suits after an illustrious career that saw him appear on Japanese TV and in a Middle East chocolate commercial.
Poor guy. He still his has day job, though...
In all the rest of the world, there are good tidings with the start of the new year. With that in mind, the DPRK decided to take another direction entirely:
>North Korea welcomed the New Year with a haunting message about how its citizens would serve as "human shields" to protect its new leader "unto death."
Splendid! Happy New Year to you too, North Korea! Happy Juche 101 to us all!
(source is Daily NK which posts a lot of rumors)
Were you wondering why everyone in those hilarious KCNA youtube videos were crying so much?? Let's get this party started:
>The source from Yangkang Province told Daily NK yesterday, “From the 29th, enterprises at every level and people’s units started criticism sessions. Those who were not in attendance at commemorative events were branded ‘traitors’; those who were not sufficiently sincere during mourning events became ‘reactionaries’.” ...
>The North Korean authorities mobilized people from all sectors of society to mourn Kim Jong Il in various ways from December 19th to the 29th. However, given the frigid weather and lack of real love felt by many for Kim, it was inevitable that some would not ‘mourn’ to the satisfaction of the authorities.
>In addition, branches of the Kim Il Sung Socialist Youth Leagues are investigating absenteeism from elementary and senior middle schools, and universities.
>The funeral was today. Did you all observe your moment of silence???
I observed my moment of dancing and shrieking like a gibbon.
Kim Jong-Un is a photo-op genius.
>For two years, North Koreans were told that Kim Jong Un, who graduated from Kim Il Sung Military University, was a military genius, Pyongyang residents have told The Associated Press.
Wait no, MILITARY genius! That's what I meant to say.
>North Korea's new leader vowed in 2009 to wage war if the country's enemies shot down its long-range rocket, footage aired on state television showed Sunday in the first official word of his role in military operations before his father's death.
>The documentary is the second in a week seeking to highlight Kim Jong Un's experience in leading North Korea's 1.2 million-strong military...
>The video also showed Kim Jong Un navigating a tank, observing fighter jets and firing exercises, and posing for photographs with soldiers. He is shown seated in the tank's cockpit and speaking to officers with the hatch cover open. He later drove it on a snow-covered road as his father watched from a reviewing stand.
By this measure, Michael Dukakis has all the qualifications necessary to run North Korea... (none of you kids will get that, but I don't care)
By the way, the AP has a desk in Pyongyang. How does one get a job there? The decadent west just doesn't provide enough LOL for me (and far too much electricity, protein, etc). I'd bet a job requirement is NOT making snide comments about Dear Leader :( Also, what is there to report, really?
PYONGYANG (AP) - KCNA reports the DPRK is the world's #1 economy, that North Koreans have the longest life expectancy on earth, and 78 other easily refuted lies this evening alone. Associated Press reporters were allowed out of the office by Party officials four times this week, each to see an excessively choreographed parade. Please send canned goods and fuel for our generator. kthx.
>SEOUL (AFP) - North Korea will compete in at least seven events at this year's summer Olympics in London including women's football...
>The North will also be represented in weightlifting, the marathon, wrestling, table tennis, archery and shooting...
Is there any better way to remember Dear Leader's flawless march to socialist victory quite like coming in 18th place in Olympic archery?
Wait, WHAT? It appears the AP office in Pyongyang (which opened yesterday) is asking North Korean officials actual questions. I'd love to see the deer-in-the-headlights look on their faces when not confronted with scripted questions...
>PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — A senior North Korean party official dismissed concerns about Kim Jong Un's readiness to lead, saying he spent years working closely with his late father and helped him make key policy decisions on economic and military affairs.
It's going to take awhile to get used to the "PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP)." Granted everyone they interview is just spouting prepared propaganda, the story is quite good and gives hints that the reporters are allowed some freedom of movement around the city. =Let's see how long this lasts!
One is tempted to make jokes--"Kim Jong Un, the Charlie Sheen of Asia"--but it's not funny. People are suffering and dying because of this crazy government, which seems to be genuinely worse than most, both in the region and worldwide.
>worse than most
Really? THAN MOST? Please give me one example of a current government that's worse than the DPRK. It has to take the prize. Sure there are ineffective and completely corrupt African governments, but none are as good as starvation, oppression, or absolute misappropriation of all resources.
Zimbabwe? Sure they shut down the only farms producing food, but you could still leave the country...
Japan's international security do you think?
Remember when I asked "how long will this last?" in regards to the AP office in Pyongyang? The countdown begins today!
>"Perhaps this is an incorrect road?" mumbled one of the North Korean minders ... A cloud of brown dust swirled down deeply potholed streets, past concrete apartment buildings crumbling at the edges. Old people trudged along the sidewalk ... Two men in wheelchairs waited at a bus stop. There were stores with no lights, and side roads so battered they were more dirt than pavement.
> ... the drivers of the three buses quickly backed up in the narrow streets and headed back toward the intended destination: a spotlessly clean, brightly-lit, extensively marbled and nearly empty building that preserves digital music recordings and makes DVDs.
lol
This article is absolutely amazing and a sure-fire sign that the AP senses its days in paradise are numbered! Read it!
>>29
The northern part of Somalia is actually fairly stable AFAIK and call themselves the independent Republic of Somaliland. No other country recognize their independence because... I actually can't tell why, even after some web searching.
Part of the reason seems to be that the African Union disapproves of secession movements unless they reach a mutual agreement with the other claimant of the territory, which I guess means they'll only recognize breakaway states if overt civil war erupts and the secessionists force a truce.
>>24
Syria. <i>What</i> could be more unstable than a dictatorship undergoing a civil war/violent revolution!