Who Is Kim Jong-un's Optometrist?

image: The LoneOptom

Who is Kim Jong-un’s optometrist? It’s a question that has been asked both by intelligence agencies and stylists around the world. We know about Mao suits, the Stalin era overcoats and especially the hairdo, but it's the glasses that give Kim Jong-un a particular distinction (his black frames are similar to the ones worn by Nelson Rockefeller). Most people don’t realize that Stalin was short like Hitler and Napoleon for that matter and neither Hitler, Stalin nor Napoleon sported glasses. Spectacles like the ones that the Korean leader wears weren’t even made back during those long winters in 1812 and l943 when invading armies were defeated by the Russian winter. But there's no doubt that Kim Jong-un’s stature is coming up in the world. When he wears the glasses he almost looks like a Korean Mister Rogers as he peers genially over his babies. Kim Jong-un has the most pleasant avuncular expression on his face when he stands over a bomb; he's never threatening and whoever writes his responses to Trump’s tweets (particularly the one where Trump was called a “dotard”) has the arcane sound of Victorian age Oxford don. As the Times recently reported there are cute little names for his ICBM’s ("North Korea's New Missile is Bigger and More Powerful, Photos Suggest,"NYT, 11/30/17), Hwasong-12, Hwasong-14, and most recently Hwasong-15—this last deemed to have the capability of hitting the East Coast of the U.S. You begin to buy the notion of the North Korean dynasty as a way of life unless, of course, you're a reviled sibling name Kim Jong-nam who doesn't have enough time to administer the atropine, the antidote to the VX nerve agent that killed him in a Malaysian airport ("Kim Jong-nam Carried the Antidote to the Poison that Killed Him," NPR, 12/1/17).