Moon Administration Allegedly Cuts Funding to US Think Tank Because They Would Not Fire Conservative Employees

Over at One Free Korea here has a very interesting posting up about how liberal South Korean administrations target certain think tanks to fire employees or lose funding:

Contemporary press reports alleged that Roh’s people directed the funding cut because they didn’t care for what TAE wrote, and because they really didn’t care for Nicholas Eberstadt (interviewed at this blog eons ago). One of the TAE authors called for an “amicable divorce” of the U.S.-Korea alliance, something that even most anti-American South Koreans fear. If this were to happen prematurely, it could cause capital flight, crash the KOSPI, and undermine the political support left-wing politicians build by profiting from the anti-American demagoguery of their simpaticos without openly propagating it themselves. Clearly, these issues are important matters of public policy for Americans.  [One Free Korea]

Here is the most recent example of a liberal administration trying to influence a think tank:

The Chosun Ilbo and the Joongang Ilbo now report that the South Korean government directed the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP) to cut most of its funding to Johns Hopkins University’s U.S.-Korea Institute (USKI), (…………)

Paradoxically, USKI is best known for publishing the reliably soft-line, anti-anti-North Korean, pro-“engagement” 38 North blog. It’s the last outlet you’d think Moon Jae-in’s people would mess with. (…………)

Not surprisingly, USKI and the KIEP have different explanations for KIEP’s funding decision, and by the end of this post, you’ll see why. KIEP says the National Assembly demanded the cut over questions about the transparency of USKI’s budget. But Robert Gallucci, the Director of USKI, says the real reason is that the Blue House wanted him to fire Jae Ku, one of the few right-of-center thinkers at USKI. (Mr. Ku gave an interview to this blog way back in 2005. I hope I’m not doing him any more harm by calling him a friend.) Later, Gallucci says the Blue House also told him to fire Jenny Town, a co-founder of 38 North.  [One Free Korea]

I highly recommend reading the whole thing at the link, but it looks like the people at the Blue House involved in cutting the funding have ties to the People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy (PSPD) organization.

Hong and his boss Jang spent 6 years at People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy: it's an activist group ostensibly opposed to abuses of power by government & chebols. But it also put on anti-US beef (mad cow disease) demos and called for alternative Cheonan investigations pic.twitter.com/f4OW0Vay6u

— Noon in Korea (@NoonInKorea) April 7, 2018

So who is PSPD?  They are a group that has long championed anti-US causes to include opposing the US-ROK FTA, the Camp Humphreys expansion, exploiting the No Gun Ri issue, wanting SOFA changes, and closing the Kooni Bombing Range.  The most ridiculous issue they helped to lead was the 2008 anti-US Beef Riots.  Most recently PSPD has been one of the major groups behind the anti-THAAD protests in Seongju.

The way I look at it the Korean government has every right to cut funding to think tanks they support.  However, then they should release from jail the people imprisoned for the so called cultural blacklist during the Park Geun-hye administration.  If the Park administration could not blacklist certain cultural organizations than shouldn’t the Moon administration not be able to blacklist certain think tanks?

Once again I highly recommend reading One Free Korea’s entire posting.