Joshua over at One Free Korea has done it again because I couldn’t stop laughing after reading this posting about Michael Jackson offering to go to North Korea to negotiate the release of the US journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee being held hostage there:

The last time I spoke to my friend Michael Jackson was about a month ago, 3 weeks before his shocking death. He had called me late one night to ask about another of my close friends who he had read about in the news. Laura Ling, a former colleague and friend, was detained originally by North Korean border guards along with her colleague Euna Lee on March 17th. [….]

Michael had read some of the details regarding Laura and Euna’s predicament. As was often the case with him and global events he read about – from famine in Africa to victims of natural disasters in far off countries, to orphans created by wars – he felt a deep sense of empathy for Laura and Euna. When I shared with him that Euna had a four-year-old daughter, he was even more anguished.

He asked me whether I had had any contact with Laura. I told him I had written her a few letters and had been assured they were getting through. Outside of that, her own family had only heard from her twice – brief monitored phone calls – in the over three months they had been imprisoned. When I told him that, Michael paused.

“Do you think,” he said hesitantly, “that the leader of North Korea could be a fan of mine?”  [Gotham Chopra, Herald de Paris]

Click here to read how Joshua pictures such a summit happening.  LOL