Kim–the art of the deal

For three generations my family has been experts at the art of the deal. Because of what's going on right now I can't help but brag about this technique. My focus is upon dealing with United States, a country with infinitely more power and assets than my country.

The crucial first step in any deal is sizing up your opponents. The previous us presidents and their administration's had several characteristics we could use to our advantage. First, they were naïve and idealistic, thinking that the leaders of a country were primarily interested in bettering the welfare of that country. My family has been only interested in one thing, keeping complete control of our country ourselves. We had no interest in" democratic reforms". We adopted the communist model since it is well-suited to create a totalitarian government as it centralizes power. Second, these administrations thought that we would bargain in good faith. This allowed us to manipulate them by suggesting we were moving towards political reforms and willing to make good bilateral agreements. We were careful to structure all the agreements so that the other side would make the first commitments. This has worked well .

Donald Trump it is what we call in Korea a different breed of cat. It was easy to discern that he had only one real interest and that was self aggrandizement. It was obvious he craved applause and also lied about his accomplishments in order to receive it.

We thus begin phase 1. This was a series of provocative actions on our part to stir up the pot. We knew this would entice him to react and he did by series of belligerent and bellicose statements. Those of course were quite useful to us in continuing to convince the population of our country that we were under attack  by imperialist Western nations. That keeps them willing to accept hardships.

We then began phase 2, A series of seemingly conciliatory gestures and statements indicating we knew we had to deal with this new president. We started discussing a need for a new deal and a presidential summit. We call this casting out the bait. He jumped at the bait and begin congratulating himself and preparing his Nobel prize acceptance speech. This we call setting the hook. Then we abruptly changed, saying they're probably could be no deal. This we call tightening the line. Now Trump, who was salivating over his success and crowing about it is faced with having egg on his face. He badly wants something to brag about. He really wants a deal. We now have created an advantage in dealing with him that we will begin to exploit. I wish it could always be this easy. His name should be "trout" not Trump.