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Judging by the Cheong Wa Dae website, things are going seriously haywire in the presidential office. A case in point is the string of attacks on former prime minister Goh Kun. Having let loose on an innocent person, the office is beating up on him as a group because he resisted. It¡¯s exactly like a video clip of school bullying that recently shocked the nation.
In a speech to the standing committee meeting of the Advisory Council on Democratic and Peaceful Unification on Dec. 21, President Roh Moo-hyun abruptly lashed out at Goh, a presidential hopeful. The appointment of Goh as prime minister, he said. ¡°was a failure." Thus slapped across the face, who is going to turn the other cheek? The presidential remarks are "self-denying and self-contradictory," Goh retorted. Cheong Wa Dae responded sharply on its website, "We've never seen Goh express himself so promptly and explicitly. Is that really what he thinks or did he say it out of political consideration?"
One Cheong Wa Dae official on Saturday called Goh a "committee premier" who wasted time on endless meetings without making decisive judgments in social conflicts. In short, the attack is personal, a follow-up to the president¡¯s remarks the day before "I've said nothing to disparage him. He may have to apologize.¡± In Korean, it feels rather rude to refer to the former official as simply ¡°he¡± without honorific. Goh is no longer under the president¡¯s command. He is a civilian and the president¡¯s senior in age.
In the speech in question, the president also insulted former defense ministers and chiefs of staff who, he said, "strutted about wearing their stars," while explaining that military service is a waste of time. He scoffed at the Korean people as being "frightened out of their senses¡± and ¡°quaking in their boots" because the U.S. said it could withdraw from Korea. He trampled on our history citing the persecution of Catholics "numbering hundreds at a time and 8,000 in or around 1866." And he accused the U.S. state and finance departments of "collaborating in a poker game¡± against North Korea. There is no way of telling whether the president talked like that because he was agitated or for political reasons. Since he had some notes with him, the remarks don¡¯t seem to have slipped out by accident. In any case, citizens from all walks of life await an apology or explanation.
But neither has been forthcoming for the last three days. Instead, Cheong Wa Dae posted on its homepage a revised version of his remarks with the portions officials themselves find disgraceful omitted or modified. Not so in the portions involving Goh. There Cheong Wa Dae rose as one to beat up on him like a bunch of street thugs.
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