The foul-mouthed KMT Legislator Yu Yueh-hsia (游月霞) once again resorted to her old habit, attacking DPP Legislator Chou Ya-shu (周雅淑) on the legislative floor, calling her "shameless" and using a vulgar Hoklo phrase (討客兄, to cuckold one's husband) to accuse her of having an extramarital affair.
Because Yu's vitriolic language was an attack on Chou's integrity, the DPP caucus wanted to lodge a complaint with the legislative Discipline Committee. But the move was blocked by the KMT caucus.
Chou held a press conference shortly afterwards and said she would not respond to such verbal attacks because she did not want to emulate Yu. However, Chou said, she would take legal action in order to safeguard her integrity.
Yu held a press conference of her own to say that what she meant was "stealing someone else's husband" and "ruining someone else's family."
Yu said she hated people who had affairs with married people because her own family was ruined by such a "third party."
Yu's uncouth style is nothing new. She recently insulted Mainland Affairs Council Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) by calling her a "spinster with psychological problems." Yu then asked how a woman who can't "communicate" with men could possibly handle complex cross-strait affairs. She was later forced to make a public apology by the Discipline Committee after the DPP caucus filed a complaint.
In a recent survey, journalists covering the legislature have rated Yu at the bottom of the list due to her poor performance. Her wayward posturing has always been an entertaining subject at the coffee table, but it also reflect the declining quality of legislative operations.
Yu does not only hate "third parties." She hates all women. Because of her failed marriage, she views any woman as a possible "third party," who can steal her man at anytime.
After the "spinster" incident, some commentators pointed out that Yu's attack on Tsai was a case of "phallus worship." They said Yu was trying to prove herself superior to Tsai by emphasizing that she had "experience" with the other sex while Tsai apparently did not.
The DPP's attempt to file another complaint against Yu was blocked by the KMT caucus. But that was by no means a surprise. The KMT would have blocked the first "spinster" complaint as well if it were not for the uproar among women's activist groups and their overwhelming show of support for Tsai. The KMT's logic was simple: a cat that catches a mouse is a good cat, whether it is black or white. In the 2001 legislative election, Yu won a large number of sympathy votes in her Changhua County constituency by emphasizing that someone had stolen her husband.
The KMT certainly knows where Yu's public image stands, but selecting good people and getting rid of bad ones have never been its strategy for maintaining its grip on power. Anyone who can help attack the DPP's power base, anyone who can win votes, is sure to get the KMT's attention, no matter if he or she is a local faction leader or a thug. Much of the political corruption and the turmoil in the legislature is the result of the KMT's cultivation of opportunist politicians.
Politicians are human beings too. They say inappropriate things when their emotions run out of control. But an alert political party will immediately move to protect its own image by demanding its foul-mouthed legislator to issue a public apology. Looking at the KMT's repeated condoning of Yu's behavior, we are worried that the people may have to put up with the ugly antics of KMT politicians just to let the party fulfill its wish of taking back political power next year.
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