President Lee Jae Myung’s recent press conference Sept. 18 was a rare opportunity to show whether he had his finger on the pulse of Korean society. Housing costs put the squeeze on daily life, stock-market turmoil has hit individual investors and ministerial nominees have become embroiled in ethical controversies. Many expected him to acknowledge the problems and offer solutions, but what they saw was not a new Lee. It was the Lee they already knew. Asked about his past remarks on jeonse, Korea’s lump-sum deposit rental system, Lee remembered saying jeonse “would disappear,” not that it “should disappear.” He challenged the reporter to show when he had ever said otherwise. It was remarkable — while ordinary Koreans are struggling with jeonse deposits and monthly rents, the president focused on parsing his earlier wording. The real question was what he would do about housing insecurity. The scene was not unfamiliar. After a controversial Criminal Procedure Act revision eliminated prosecutors’ supplementary investigative authority, Lee said he had not read the revised pro