ostensible terms

Would you please explain the following in bold more easily?

1. The pseudo-doctrine of (North Korea's) Juche continues to serve its purpose all the same. It enables the regime to lionize Kim Il Sung as a great thinker, provides an impressive label for whatever policies it considers expedient, and prevents dissidents from judging policy on the government's own ostensible terms.

2. Most North Korean refugees remember the 1970s as a happy time. Food, energy and clothing were in far more plentiful supply than they are today, Pyongyang's proud rhetoric not having stopped it from squeezing even Bulgaria and Cuba for economic aid. As the North Korea saw things, it had shown its moral superiority by rejecting, at no small cost to its standard of living, all concessions to capitalism.

Is the above saying "Food, energy and clothing were in far more plentiful supply than they are today because Pyongyang continued to demand economic aid even from Bulgaria and Cuba"?

Thank you.

:up: - specifically, because they hadn't yet made the political decision to stop asking for it.

And the 'ostensible' isn't doing anything much in the other sentence, except* to suggest that the writer expects to government sometimes to say something other than what it really wants. What it says it wants is its ostensible wish.

b

PS * I suspect that it may also carry the implication 'Look at me mum, using grown-up words!' ;-)

Thank you for the help.

Could I rewrite #1 like "Juche prevents dissidents from judging policy based on the government's own ostensible words. In other words, Juche makes dissidents judge policy based on what the government really wants, not what it says"?

And I didn't understand your last sentence "look at me mum, using grown-up words."

a) In other words, Juche makes dissidents judge policy based on what the government really wants, not what it says"?
b) Pyongyang's proud rhetoric not having stopped it from squeezing even Bulgaria and Cuba for economic aid.
c) And I didn't understand your last sentence "look at me mum, using grown-up words."

unpakwon.

a) possibly, but perhaps: "Juche prevents dissidents from judging policy on what it actually achieves rather than what the government says it achieves".

b) I believe the writer is saying that despite the North Korean government's statements about its independence and self-reliance, it still tries to get economic aid out of largely impoverished countries like Bulgaria and Cuba.

c) If I may speak for BobK, he is suggesting that the writer is trying to show how clever he is by using a difficult word, when a simpler word, or none at all, would do.

not a teacher

I see.

It's been a big help.

Many thanks. :-)