May 23, 2018

Even By Crazytown Rules, North Korea Isn’t Making Sense

Yonhap News/Newscom via ZUMA

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On the one hand, this is exactly how North Korea operates, so it’s not much of a surprise. On the other hand, what’s the point of all this? The summit was North Korea’s idea in the first place. Why offer a summit, have it accepted, and then play hard-to-get? What would North Korea get out of having the summit canceled?

Is this just ordinary expectation lowering? Or an effort to humiliate Trump a little bit beforehand in order to soften him up? Given their behavior so far, what do we think North Korea is hoping to get out of all this? Can some Korea experts please chime in?

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PLEASE—BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things it doesn’t like—which is most things that are true.

We’ll say it loud and clear: At Mother Jones, no one gets to tell us what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please do your part and help us reach our $150,000 membership goal by May 31.

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