The South Korean President's Welcome Offer to Resign

If there was to be a leadership crisis on the Korean Peninsula, one might have expected it to unfold in the autocratic North, not democratic South Korea. As Koreans now grapple with the fallout from an enormous political scandal in the presidential Blue House, they will need to trust in the strengths of that democracy.

On Tuesday, after mounting protests against her rule, President Park Geun-hye essentially offered to resign on any schedule worked out by the National Assembly. The influence-peddling scandal that’s brought her down is in some ways lurid, involving allegations of shamanism, mind control and mysterious Viagra purchases. Yet even the more straightforward charges -- that Park allowed her friend Choi Soon-sil to interfere in government affairs, and that Choi used her ties to the president to squeeze tens of millions of dollars in “donations” from major Korean conglomerates -- have yet to be fully investigated and aired in court. And if Park leaves office and thus relinquishes her presidential immunity, they can be pursued transparently and according to law.