The ventriloquist Jeff Dunham uses a dummy named Achmed the Dead Terrorist, who periodically leans toward the audience, bugs out his eyes, and screams “I keel you!”

Achmed is a piker.

For the last several weeks, we have been subjected to hysterical eruptions of genocidal bombast from the current Dear Leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea to you). Kim Jong Un (Korean for “psychotic little shit”), repeatedly screams that he is preparing a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the United States, illustrating his point using YouTube visual aids which picture New York, Washington, or some  other den of iniquity like Austin, Texas, in flames. To give street cred to his shrieks, he is moving soldiers, missiles, and other military gear toward his borders.

Our fearless leaders, whose intelligence staffs managed to fail to warn them of 9-11, the Arab Spring (hah!), and other minor foreign hiccups, assure us that Mr. Kim does not possess the capability to drop The Big One on the U.S., this despite the fact that the DPRK has long range missiles, and plutonium bombs that fit in missiles. (These are the same guys who assured us that the North Koreans were abiding by their agreements not to develop nuclear weapons.)

The talking heads are divided on the reasons for Dear Leader’s behavior.

The optimists say that this is just the annual spring extortion exercise, foaming at the mouth to be followed by the whispering of sweet nothings into the Secretary of State’s ear to induce shipments of U.S. grown rice to be airlifted to the bellies of the DPRK Army, while the peasants continue to starve.

The pessimists say that Mr. Kim is not only immature but completely unhinged; accordingly, this is the countdown to Armageddon, and the pessimists are even now cowering beneath their desks.  I, on the other hand, have a much more credible explanation.

Kimchi intoxication.

Are you unfamiliar with kimchi, Dear Reader? Permit me to enlighten you.

Kimchi is a garnish that accompanies almost every Korean meal. It looks like purple cole slaw. When you take a forkful, it feels like the entire roof of your mouth has been removed using a dull file. You sweat, you writhe in agony, you attempt to strangle the waiter. These symptoms are indistinguishable from the behavior currently being exhibited by Mr. Kim.

Our approach so far to calming things down on the Korean peninsula has been to overfly the peninsula with B-52’s and B-2’s. Now, having noticed that this friendly gesture has not calmed Mr. Kim down one iota, the great minds of Washington have concluded that this approach is akin to attempting to calm a swarm of angry hornets by whacking their nest with a broom. So they have announced their intention to back off, counting on appeasement to work as well as it usually is expected to, although there has never been an instance of its working in the entire history of mankind (excuse me, personkind).

I have a better idea. We sneak a chef into the DPRK commissary to replace all the kimchi with vanila ice cream. Mr.Kim’s demeanor will suddenly soften. His army will stand down. His missiles will be beaten into plowshares. Everything will be great!

Potassium iodide, anyone?