Is North Korea’s dictator losing his touch?

WHEN KIM JONG UN, North Korea’s third-generation despot, penned a short, bland greeting to his people to run as a splash in the year’s first edition of the state mouthpiece, Rodong Sinmun, it triggered an avalanche of speculation among Pyongyangologists—over what Mr Kim did not do. Since the founding of the communist state, a near-annual staple has been a prolix new year’s address by the country’s leader, trumpeting the regime’s accomplishments and the glories to come. Like Chinese emperors conducting Confucian rites, the address confirmed the Kims at the summit of a divinely ordained order. Unlike his father and grandfather before him, Mr Kim, in power since 2011, has typically delivered the speech in person. Yet last year he simply published a long screed, and this year there was no paean at all.