After North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il was a conspicuous no-show at the country’s 60th anniversary celebration yesterday, speculation ran rampant that he was seriously ill. South Korea’s spy agency then confirmed that he had suffered a stroke, most likely several weeks ago, but that he was recovering and there was no power vacuum in the country. North Korean officials responded to the rumors by dismissing them as a “conspiracy plot” against their “Dear Leader” of fourteen years.
Disappointingly, obvious puns were largely absent from the headlines in the major news outlets. Even the wordplay-prone New York Post resorted to a prosaic, if a bit cryptic, title — Kim in Health Mystery. Here’s what the fourth estate had to say: