Daily Kor for the week ending February 14, 2011: Let it snow!

With the IOC coming to check out Pyongchang in reference to their third bid for the 2018 Winter Olympics, Mother Nature couldn't have picked a better time to belch over half a meter of snow all over Kangwon Province. Let's not forget that a lack of snow is a concern for the Winter Olympics, even in Vancouver and especially in places like the summer resort of Sochi, Russia.

On an administrative note, this blog reached 300,000 hits yesterday since I officially started keeping track. It was eight-and-a-half months ago that I hit 200,000, and eight-and-a-half months before that that I officially hit 100,000. That's only one-eight of Marmot's Hole's daily numbers, but still respectable, I think.

1. Inter-Korean talks end as North Korea walks out (NYT, LAT)
• North Korea rejects new talks with "sinister" South Korea (BBC)
2. Bank of Korea keeps base rate at 2.75 percent (AP via WaPo, WSJ, Bloomberg)
3. Washington and Seoul sign amendments to KORUS FTA (AP via WaPo)
4. IOC arrives in Korea for inspection of Pyongchang (Pyeongchang) facilities for 2018 Winter Olympics bid (Yonhap)
• February "snow bomb" may help bid (Korea Times)
5. SK and Samsung engineering arms win $2.5 billion construction order for major gas plant in Saudi Arabia (AFP, Yonhap) 
6. South Korea offers easier loans for tenants and tax incentives for builders in bid to curb rising rents (Reuters)
7. Foot-and-Mouth Disease spreading across North Korea (Yonhap)
8. In wake of Foot-and-Mouth Disease outbreak, South Korea plans to increase tariff-free pork imports (Reuters)
9. Democratic Party ends boycott of National Assembly (Joongang Daily)
10. Op-ed: Is angry Tea Party rhetoric to blame for Cupid's violent rampage? (MSNBC)