A vaguely creepy fake trailer, smoothly narrated and assembled by Team Trump, was shown yesterday to Kim Jong Un as an incentive for North Korea to de-nuclearize and generally behave in a more peaceful and constructive fashion.
“Destiny Pictures presents a story of opportunity. A new story, a new beginning. A story about a special moment in time, when an absolute ruler is presented with one chance which may never be repeated. What will he choose? To show vision and leadership? Or not?
“Featuring President Donald Trump and Chairman Kim Jong Un…in a meeting to remake history. To shine in the sun. One moment, one choice, what if? The future remains to be written.”
On one level Trump offering Kim a chance to improve his country’s financial health — to “advance his country and be part of a new world…shake the hand of peace and enjoy prosperity like he has never seen…a great life or more isolation?” — is a practical, constructive approach. In the darkest hours of the Vietnam War, President Lyndon Johnson offered a similar carrot-and-stick appeal to North Vietnam, “a massive TVA-style development project for North Vietnam if Hanoi renounced its efforts to reunify the country by force.”
On another level Trump’s fake video — basically a sales pitch — reminds me on some level of that weird video shown to Warren Beatty‘s journalist character, Joe Frady, in Alan Pakula‘s The Parallax View. [After the jump.]