North Korea Manufacturing Its Own U.S. Aid

North Korea is a financial and cultural mess, without the ability to feed its own soldiers, let alone its citizens. It does, however, have plenty of money to throw at its nuclear weapons program.

For years the North Korean government has tried to extort aid from the U.S. and others in exchange for stopping their nuclear program. You might remember that Jimmy Carter won a Nobel Peace prize for brokering such a deal during the Clinton administration...a deal the North Koreans immediately violated, though Jimmy didn't have to give the prize back.

The dollars for nukes offers have been spurned by the Bush Administration, and so apparently the North Koreans have decided to manufacture their own dollars:

The Bush administration formally has accused North Korea of manufacturing high-quality counterfeit $100 "supernotes" for the first time, according to an indictment made public yesterday as part of a 16-year probe.

"Quantities of the supernote were manufactured in, and under auspices of the government of, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)," said the indictment of Irish national Sean Garland and six others. "Individuals, including North Korean nationals acting as ostensible government officials, engaged in the worldwide transportation, delivery, and sale of quantities of supernotes."

The fake notes from this case were being sold to Sean Garland, leader of the Marxist-Leninist Worker's Party, an arm of the Official Irish Republican Army. I'm sure Mr. Garland is an upstanding citizen and a pillar of the community.

Perhaps those notes should have been manufactured with the portrait of Jimmy Carter on them.