회고回顧/懷古

A few years ago, I visited the National Assembly while sponsoring a certain member of parliament. After getting the receipt and finishing my business, I got off the elevator and saw someone getting out of a car and coming in. It was a woman, and for a moment, I felt a distinct sense of dirtiness from the aura that brushed past me. I glanced back, and the thought that came to mind was, 'Why is someone like a peddler allowed into the National Assembly?' At the same time, my thoughts extended to wondering if the member of parliament I genuinely supported was of the same ilk, and I was overcome with the desire to get my 5 million won donation back. I tried to comfort myself by thinking of the National Assembly as a sacred legislative body, but I wondered if it was acceptable for someone with such an inauspicious aura to frequent the people's representative body.

The woman's attire, shoes, hairstyle, and even the way she held her wallet as she walked away gave me the impression of a daily loan shark or a female con artist I used to see in the market. The 'smell' that emanates from a person is not just body odor; it also includes the aura that carries the weight of their life experiences. This energy, as one ages, manifests as dignity or vulgarity depending on one's maturity, and that woman truly exuded an astonishingly foul aura.

These days, it's hard to find people with manners and restraint. There aren't many conscious people, and it's hard to find adults who scold young people. It's become a world where if you express your political convictions to someone, you just point fingers at each other, so it's a wicked time where it's not even easy to just preserve one's own life. Nevertheless, thinking that someone who gives the impression of a female peddler frequents the National Assembly, I returned in confusion, wondering if everyone, from the National Assembly building to the area around National Assembly Station, and even the young male and female police officers guarding the National Assembly, had been overwhelmed by a strange energy and atmosphere. I later found out that woman was Choi Min-hee.

It was the second day of the Park Geun-hye impeachment rally, and Joo Jin-woo, wearing designer jeans and with long hair flowing, was enjoying the attention of the crowd and loudly chattering on one side of Gwanghwamun Square near Sejong Center for the Performing Arts. He looked cool that day. As people gradually started gathering on the opposite side of the square, a man in a gray suit, his face flushed red, began to furtively glance at those around him and shout impeachment slogans without a clear subject. Was he a politician? Or a citizen? The man, who looked like a highly engaged political figure in a suit, exuded the strong scent of a swindler. I wondered if such a citizen even existed. If he were a citizen encouraging the candlelight vigil in which the public participated, he should have focused on the protest as part of the people gathered in the square. Instead, he was raising his voice and focusing on getting people's attention. He openly darted his eyes around, sidelong glancing at the reactions of those nearby, and his appearance gave the impression of some shoddy provocateur.

He was Jung Cheong-rae, whom the party had excluded from strategic nominations, and his constituency, Mapo-eul, had given Son Hye-won the term of a 20th National Assembly member. However, that seat returned to Jung Cheong-rae after Son Hye-won left the party due to issues such as conflicts of interest and real estate purchases under borrowed names, and did not run in the next election. As a result, this became an opportunity that eroded President Lee Jae-myung's precious term. If it weren't for Son Hye-won, I idly wonder if we wouldn't have been able to witness Lee Jae-myung's political prowess, focused on reform during the golden year that Jung Cheong-rae squandered, and learned about politics of substance and reality, not just superficial politics. While Son Hye-won's judgment in bringing back Jung Cheong-rae, whom the party had excluded, is problematic, the party itself was a dog covered in its own excrement.

The trading of parliamentary constituencies is incomparably dirtier than a merchant's business dealings, making it seem that today's Korean politics is not governed by judgment that considers public sentiment and the nation's future. In that sense, the Democratic Party is merely one side of the two-party system that is pushing for a 'parliamentary system' that the public opposes. Given that the opposing side, the People Power Party, is even dirtier, and the public is forced to endure this system, the de facto parliamentary system can be seen as having established a sufficiently strong stronghold. The People Power Party, which advocated for insurrection, is a group that should be disbanded and cannot be a subject of judgment, but the fact that it persists is entirely the responsibility of the Democratic Party. The public knows that these individuals, who cling on like parasites in a symbiotic relationship, holding the president hostage and only serving their own interests and private gains, will not change anything, but it does change.

Just as ignorant people, when their rights are taken away, open their eyes to anger and become knowledgeable, and just as a union member becomes an owner responsible for the company, people also realize that the nation does not run by itself. However, only the 300 members of Yeouido in South Korea, with an annual salary of 1.1 billion won and more, live a life adrift, obsessed with maintaining their status until death, thereby losing sight of the true purpose of political action. I emphasize again, without re-discussing the method of nominating parliamentary candidates from scratch during Lee Jae-myung's term, the political absurdities of this country will reach their peak and will not be able to endure.

The Democratic Party is at the forefront of hindering the president's efforts to reform deep-rooted evils. Instead of supporting and assisting the national power, the "watermelon" faction within the Democratic Party participates in the power-sharing scheme of the pro-Moon Jae-in forces, who prematurely call for impeachment and a lame duck presidency while watching the fabricated judicial risks of these deep-rooted evils from afar. They constantly obstruct and are solely focused on retaining their parliamentary seats, which is their reality. Those who understand this dirty structure either leave politics as first-termers or are pushed out for being less corrupt. This is one aspect of those who enter the National Assembly in real-world South Korea. Even Min Hyung-bae, the National Assembly member I supported, has shown political actions that are nothing more than a disappointment, suggesting that the number of Democratic Party members who care about the country won't even fill the fingers of one hand. How these individuals, who only think of their personal advancement, endured such difficult campaign periods and reached their positions is baffling. We need to separate the necessary political institutions from human nature's political weaknesses and commission AI to build a system. Perhaps Korean politics, as a major data point serving as a cautionary tale, might even be used as an exemplary (?) case.

The President's press conference, where he wasn't even offered a chair, made viewers uncomfortable for 100 minutes as they watched him lie down comfortably, and viewers were shocked to hear the President answer a barrage of third-rate questions from an unqualified reporter not even worth mentioning. It was all in the name of the people that created this country's political system, which has neither minimal courtesy nor minimal conscience left. While some might have enjoyed the President's humiliation, remember that the whole world was watching the moment when the Republic of Korea became the first country in history to be recorded as starting and ending with politics.

The attitude of the people towards the president is the attitude of the people towards the nation itself. The people, who had to feel shame and tremble with anger at Yoon Suk-yeol, who lived with a prostitute, overcame the cold and fear and prevented a civil war, but now the Democratic Party's behavior is like a quack selling fake medicine. Respecting the president is not worshipping a powerful person, but respecting the nation's institutions established by the people themselves and respecting oneself. However, the current phenomenon where those elected for this representative government come forward and undermine the president's well-being and the nation's well-being is a total mental illness. The international relations unfolding at home and abroad determine the fate of this nation depending on who holds the initiative at the beginning of World War III. At a moment when even Pakistan is hesitating to participate in the war, domestically, there is only a frenzy to kill Lee Jae-myung, and the public opinion that leans towards this as if it were the trend and inevitable is a nation where neither politicians nor the people are adults, a nation afflicted with mental illness. How far will the people and the nation drag on this bizarre form of a mentally ill person?

This nation, which has been forcibly led by the power of the weak and vulnerable common people, does not believe that Lee Jae-myung is the people, even after seeing it. Countless anti-Japanese nationalist intellectuals who became wandering ghosts, not knowing why they died, are looking down crying from the Han River, Yeouido, and that place that has become Chinese territory. Only dead ghosts know the memory of the cruel acts and plans that occurred on a world-historical scale when the nation was lost, to the point where people's minds went mad. Our ancestors, who cannot help us even if they want to, are watching this reality. We, the people, must first realize that we are building and blocking our own internal barriers in our brains.

The birth of the pro-Moon faction was not easy, but they are making Lee Jae-myung into a second Roh Moo-hyun, so if we don't want to prepare for another funeral, the people must protect the president. Jeong Cheong-rae might want to lead the funeral preparation committee, but since he couldn't, he met Moon Jae-in and was hospitalized, coinciding with the president's press conference. The sight of these human parasites, who cannot be killed but are not worth saving, gathering around the National Assembly like a swarm of mayflies, is proof of how bleak the future of this country is. Moon Jae-in, Kim Eo-jun, and Jeong Cheong-rae and his associates who cling to Kim Eo-jun are all parasites, used and exploited in a power struggle to prevent losing their vested interests. I hope the shameless Jeong Cheong-rae does not return until he has finished treating his serious illness, 'Nangabyeong'.

Software alone is enough for a nation to exist. Even in national defense, where some citizens are soldiers, generals, and special forces, the entities operating the system can be considered part of software. However, South Korea's biggest weakness is that the identity of the nation and its political power, which is the hardware of the system, cannot escape its outdated state. Only Lee Jae-myung can overcome this situation. Just ten years ago, South Korea's enemies were external, but now the enemy is within. The 'watermelon' faction of the Democratic Party right before our eyes and the clumsy leadership of the Democratic Party are precisely the enemies of the people, the adversaries, and the culprits holding back the nation.

Lee Jae-myung is the only person born in South Korea who has consistently faced reality. It's not easy to enjoy food when you've lost your sense of smell due to the harsh chemicals of factory work. It must be difficult for him to meet and shake hands with world leaders, enduring the neuralgia in his injured arm. The biggest flaw of Koreans is their inability to recognize the slavish mentality that repeatedly makes the foolish mistake of regretting that spring has come only after the flowers have fallen. The majority of the people work diligently from dawn to make a living. Just as they protected the country, they will protect the president.