The Olympic flag of the Chinese Taipei team was raised, and the National Flag Song (
Taekwondo and archery are not very popular sports events compared to the national sport, baseball -- and players' future prospects are relatively slim. However, these victories show that if the Taiwanese people carefully select events that are suitable for our physique and are willing to work hard, the investment will eventually pay off. The poor performance of Taiwan's baseball team was a disappointment. But problems in the nation's baseball development due to a lack of systematic cultivation and training is more worrisome.
In fact, the success of our Taekwondo contestants and archers resulted from an accumulation of techniques, training and experience. This achievement is a consequence of the selfless devotion of our senior athletes and the blood and sweat of the newcomers.
Unfortunately, year by year the nation's sports budget has been gradually reduced. This is the result of people judging the caliber of an athlete only by his or her victory or defeat. As a consequence, many sports have shrunk in Taiwan. It's admirable that our archers also accomplished their goals, given that their training ground was nothing more than a parking lot used after-hours.
To encourage the public to participate in sports events and to cultivate outstanding sports talent, we need to use resources appropriately. This is not only a priority for people involved in sports, but is also crucial to the development of a diverse society.
Chen and Chu's hard work have brought the nation before the eyes of the world. How glorious this is! These two gold medals will allow the country to stand proud on the international stage, and have given the nation incomparable assistance in focusing its striving for glory. These two historic gold medals have come just at the right time, for Taiwan really needs a victory. It needs such victories to divert attention from a wearying confrontation, to salve the wounds and grievances of its heart and to rediscover itself.
The images of Chen and Chu winning their medals brought emotions of the Taiwanese masses -- sitting before their televisions late into the night -- to a fever pitch. The strains of the National Flag Song sounded so sweet, and the five-ringed Olympic flag looked beautiful.
This was a moment of enormous pride -- but that pride was mixed with regret. For the flag was not Taiwan's national flag, and the music was not Taiwan's national anthem. Such are the compromises that the country must make in order to participate in international sports. It is not the sort of treatment that a normal nation would expect. Taiwan has to work harder to fight for the same kind of treatment other countries get as part of the international community.
For this Olympics, Taiwan spared neither money nor effort to win international recognition. In the runup to the Olympics, it released advertisements with the slogan "Taiwan on the starting line," but these were removed by the Olympic Committee after pressure from China. Because of the excellent performance of its athletes, the nation was still able to shine at this international sports event -- proving the hard truth that "ability is everything." Taiwan has started the Olympic race, and it will only pick up the pace.
There is much evidence that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is sending soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and is learning lessons for a future war against Taiwan. Until now, the CCP has claimed that they have not sent PLA personnel to support Russian aggression. On 18 April, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinskiy announced that the CCP is supplying war supplies such as gunpowder, artillery, and weapons subcomponents to Russia. When Zelinskiy announced on 9 April that the Ukrainian Army had captured two Chinese nationals fighting with Russians on the front line with details
Within Taiwan’s education system exists a long-standing and deep-rooted culture of falsification. In the past month, a large number of “ghost signatures” — signatures using the names of deceased people — appeared on recall petitions submitted by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) against Democratic Progressive Party legislators Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) and Wu Pei-yi (吳沛憶). An investigation revealed a high degree of overlap between the deceased signatories and the KMT’s membership roster. It also showed that documents had been forged. However, that culture of cheating and fabrication did not just appear out of thin air — it is linked to the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), joined by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), held a protest on Saturday on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei. They were essentially standing for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which is anxious about the mass recall campaign against KMT legislators. President William Lai (賴清德) said that if the opposition parties truly wanted to fight dictatorship, they should do so in Tiananmen Square — and at the very least, refrain from groveling to Chinese officials during their visits to China, alluding to meetings between KMT members and Chinese authorities. Now that China has been defined as a foreign hostile force,
On April 19, former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) gave a public speech, his first in about 17 years. During the address at the Ketagalan Institute in Taipei, Chen’s words were vague and his tone was sour. He said that democracy should not be used as an echo chamber for a single politician, that people must be tolerant of other views, that the president should not act as a dictator and that the judiciary should not get involved in politics. He then went on to say that others with different opinions should not be criticized as “XX fellow travelers,” in reference to
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