The World’s Leaders Master Political Spin
The Harper government, the Obama administration and even the Vatican are trying to spin their way out of awkward situations.
North Korea has just tested its third nuclear device, of a more advanced variety than the ones in 2006 and 2009. The blast was greeted with resignation and hand-wringing. There was, however, more hoo-ha in some quarters over the latest suspected Iranian advances in nuclear technology. It’s always thus with Iran — it is thought to have done this or that with its nuclear program, which it says is for peaceful purposes but which we know is not. Kim Jong Un is irrational, yes, but the ayatollahs may be far more dangerous.
The North Koreans’ nuclear tests were characterized by Barack Obama, in his State of the Union address to Congress on Tuesday, as “provocations,” which will “only further isolate them.” But on Iran, he was firm: “We will do what is necessary to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon.”
Bulgaria blamed Hezbollah for the 2012 bombing of Israeli tourists. But its interior minister only said that it was “a reasonable assumption” that two suspects had links to the Lebanese terrorist group.
A Canadian was said to be involved in the Bulgarian operation and another in the terrorist gas plant hostage-taking in Algeria. The Harper government made appropriately disapproving noises, but did not identify the suspects and, crucially, did not say whether those with Canadian passports were indeed Canadians or merely carrying stolen documents.