The situation in Korea has gotten quite interesting. Truly k-drama levels of drama, only less motivated by romantic affairs. A convoluted mess of a plot with surprise twists upon surprise twists upon surprise twists. There's probably a lesson here about hubris and maybe not doubling down when faced with overwhelming opposition - but that's going to wait until the current cliffhangers are resolved.
Recall that earlier this month, the president declared martial law - which was immediately cancelled by the National Assembly. He was then impeached and the prime minister took his place. This is the instigating incident for the craziness to follow.
An interesting aspect of Korean government - the prime minister is appointed by the president and then confirmed by the National Assembly. Since the elections for the presidency and National Assembly are independent and can happen years apart, there can be some very divided governments, as in this case where the opposition controls 192 of 300 seats in the National Assembly. Also, the prime minister does not need to be a member of the National Assembly, as it is the current situation.
Now the impeachment of the president took two attempts - it requires 2/3 of the National Assembly to vote for it. The opposition Democratic Party only had 192 of the required 200 votes and the first time around, the president's party just left the chambers and didn't vote at all. But the outrage at the declaration of martial law was still so intense that they caved and agreed to have their president impeached.
And now, the Democratic Party is demanding a special commission to investigate the president for treason (and his wife for corruption) but the prime minister/acting president is not signing those laws into force. In response, the opposition is now threatening the prime minister/acting president with impeachment and they say that the 2/3 threshold for impeachment only applies to the president, other members of government are impeached on simple majorities. The opposition says it's only a simple majority since he is only acting as president and not the actual elected president.
Now IANAL - let alone someone with any actual knowledge of Korea's constitutional intricacies, but my understanding is that this decision - along with the actual verdict of the impeachment - would be decided by the Korean Constitutional Court. So now we get the mid-season introduction of a bunch of new characters.
The Korean Constitutional Court only has 6 of 9 justices at the moment, and four of those were appointed by the impeached president - so it may seem like this bodes poorly for the opposition. HOWEVER, these justices are also confirmed by the National Assembly - so they needed bipartisan support. And the president only directly appoints 3 of them. And due to term lengths, 2 of those direct appointments are from the previous president who was a Democrat and had a Democratic National Assembly to confirm. What of the other 3 justices? Those were recommended by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, whom the impeached president appointed. But the Chief Justice is also a position requiring confirmation by the National Assembly, and is his second choice since the first was too conservative to be confirmed. So it's not so clear how those votes will go.
The bill to impeach the prime minister/acting president is scheduled for Thursday, the day after Christmas. It will almost certainly fall between 1/2 and 2/3 of the National Assembly supporting it. And then it is a true constitutional crisis as the legitimacy of the acting president will be in shreds. It's really wild - the conservatives are doing all of this to protect their impeached president - a man whose approval ratings are just off the charts bad. Even before that guy declared martial law, he was at 19% support, and his crazy ass gambit certainly did not turn things around for him. A net negative 74 approval rating - try to wrap your head around that. There's a glaringly obvious solution - and that's to just throw the wildly unpopular asshole under the bus - but the conservatives of South Korea are just refusing to do so.
So thanks to South Korea for providing more end-of-year drama to fill in the dead space between Christmas and New Years.
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