Editorial: United States's anti-diplomat - Dennis Rodman in North Korea

By: The Republica Editorial 

No harm, no foul? 

If only. 

The news that Dennis Rodman, former NBA star and perpetual whackjob, had traveled to North Korea, where he met with the isolated and repressive nation’s despotic leader, Kim Jong-Un, was a surprise only initially. 

Dennis Rodman as diplomat? It just didn’t add up. 

But after a moment, it all made perfect sense. 

When bad-actor Rodman was in the NBA, one never knew what he’d be up to next. With young Kim heading North Korea, things are much the same. 

Rodman, a hardhead on the hardwood, nicknamed “the Worm,” seemed often to crave attention more than anything else. So too with Kim and his father and grandfather, the only two prior leaders of the most isolated nation on the planet. 

But there are clear differences, too. Rodman, for all his oddities, was very good at his job. Few, if any, would be willing to make similar claims for Kim. And Rodman, while frequently volatile, was dangerous only within proscribed boundaries. He may have been a hothead, but he didn’t have nuclear weapons. 

Everyone knows Rodman as a shameless self-promoter who has long stuck his nose rings into other people’s business. He’s never been the world’s most-diplomatic guy. 

After the recent trip, which Rodman made with members of the Harlem Globetrotters and a film crew from HBO, the five-time NBA champion pronounced the totalitarian Kim to be a “friend.” 

Think the whole thing funny? Consider this: It’s likely that Rodman and his entourage were the first Americans that Kim ever met. We can only hope that the leader, apparently a big basketball fan, understood that he wasn’t meeting your average U.S. citizen. Not at all. 

We don’t need the unstable Kim to be remembering Rodman when he next considers the United States.