Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
We'll be joined by two guest contributors at Ricochet this week, the first of whom may be familiar to many of you, as this will be her second visit to the site.
Melanie Kirkpatrick is a Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute and a veteran of the Wall Street Journal, where she spent nearly 30 years -- time that included a decade with the paper's Asian edition, a longtime membership on the Journal's editorial board, and the role of Deputy Editor of the editorial page from 2006 to 2009. During her time there, she was also co-editor of several editions of the Index of Economic Freedom, published annually by the Journal and the Heritage Foundation.
A graduate of Princeton and the University of Toronto (where she received her master's degree in English), Melanie's latest visit to Ricochet coincides with the release of her new book, Escape from North Korea: The Untold Story of Asia's Underground Railroad, a chronicle of the brave souls who attempt to flee the hermit kingdom that is by turns harrowing and hopeful.
We look forward to her rare insights on perhaps the most secretive state on the planet and what can be done to help its beleaguered people. Please welcome Melanie to Ricochet.
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Oct '10
Re: Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
Welcome, Melanie!
Did you ever think, in your deepest despair, that mainstream journalism in the US could take on so much of the flavour of the North Korean press?
May '12
Re: Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
Any relation?
Aug '10
Re: Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
Welcome Melanie .
Is North Korea a bigger threat to South Korea militarily or economically ( if they have to save them ala East /West Germany ) ?
And I guess the same question goes for China , although I question the existence of their battle strategies to attack China .
One more thing, I read today that the WSJ is considered to have a very liberal slant among the MSM . Do you buy that ?
Re: Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
Any relation? To Jeane? I was living in Asia when she was our ambassador to the U.N. and she was so famous that even a hotel bell man in Jakarta asked me that question. Just about everyone I interviewed wanted to know that too. The answer is no, we're not related. But I like to say she was my ideological big sister. She was a great woman.
Nov '10
Re: Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
Welcome, Ma'am.
I have worried that we have perpetuated the criminal regime in North Korea by sending them "humanitarian" aid without reserving the means for overseeing the distribution of it. I cannot bear the thought of children starving when we have the means to alleviate their distress.
But, I wonder whether we ought to have demanded something more than we got from their oppressors in the way of control over how the food was distributed. I have not heard of such a collection of gangsters and thieves in a long time. Could you share your thoughts on the negotiations?
Re: Welcome Melanie Kirkpatrick
Yes, I think we may have helped to perpetuate the Kim family dictatorship through aid -- aid that usually ends up in the hands of the elites or on the black market. Several international humanitarian groups refuse to operate in North Korea because they don't believe their aid gets to the needy.
If the Kim regime wished to feed its people, it could do so. Instead, it prefers to spend money on nuclear weapons.