perfidy

Reuters has a story today, "North Korean general cracks George W. Bush joke".

SEOUL (Reuters) - In North Korea, where cracking a joke about the country's leader could see you, well, die laughing, poking fun at the U.S. president is obviously not as serious.

As military chiefs from both sides of the Korean peninsula met on Tuesday for talks, a general from the North started proceedings by telling a joke at George W. Bush's expense.

The South Korean generals appeared befuddled as to what to make of the humour...

Why the reticence to laugh, I don't know. It can't be because of a language barrier, right? The lack of laughter shouldn't be due to the DPRK being, basically, a totally screwed up wasteland, even though that's precisely what it is. The fact that the same joke couldn't be made about the Human Chia Pet in Platform Shoes is moot, really - it's got nothing to do with the story, notwithstanding Reuters' lead in.

And, if you ask me, it shouldn't be due to the joke not being funny, because, while not yucktastic, it mildly humorous, not at all offensive, and doesn't seem wildly far from the truth:

"I recently read a piece of political humour on the Internet called 'saving the president'," Lieutenant-General Kim Yong-chol was quoted as saying in pool reports from the talks.

He then retold the old yarn about Bush who goes out jogging one morning and, preoccupied with international affairs, fails to notice that a car is heading straight at him.

A group of schoolchildren pull the president away just in time, saving his life, and a grateful Bush offers them anything they want in the world as a reward.

"We want a place reserved for us at Arlington Memorial Cemetery," say the children.

"Why is that?" he asks.

"Because our parents will kill us if they find out what we've done."

OK, admittedly, it's a bit poorly constructed and it's derivative of other jokes I've heard, but so are most jokes, at my age. Apparently, both Reuters and the SoKo generals thought it was a bigger deal than it really was.