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Cowardice rules China

Cowardice is the greatest indication of failure in government. It is evidenced by fear of freedom, fear of information, fear of dissent and fear of knowledge. It is evidenced by a pattern of ritual prevarication, bluster, extreme (and often forced) chauvinism, an internally omnipotent (and often ruthless) military or police and hidden or secret oppression.

These governments and tyrants are easy to recognize. Adolf Hitler was a coward. So were Benito Mussolini, Idi Amin, Saddam Hussein and Pol Pot.

No governments in history have been more cowardly than communist governments.

From the Josef Stalin, Fidel Castro and Kim Il-sung regimes to the regimes of Mao Zedong (毛澤東), Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平), Jiang Zemin (江澤民) and Hu Jintao (胡錦濤), communists have struggled almost from the outset to forcibly extract loyalty from their subjects through coercion (a sure sign of cowardice and failure) and to restrict the free flow of ideas and information, and even travel (strange how almost no one ever defects to a communist country).

In China, public discussion and debate is strictly limited to subjects chosen by the government, to extents strictly limited by the government.

In order to see what the government is afraid of most, one need only see what the government bans the most. In China, free speech is banned. Talk of democracy is banned. Democracy itself is banned. Free knowledge of the outside world is largely banned. A free press is banned. Anything relating to Taiwan's independence is banned.

Even the picture of the Dalai Lama is banned -- and acknowledging the existence of the chosen Panchen Lama is banned too. Acknowledgement of the gradual ethnic cleansing of Tibet through "sinification" is banned. How frail this ideology must be to have so much to fear.

The sign of a truly courageous and powerful government is one which opens itself up to democracy, scrutiny, dissent, debate and change, and survives. Talk of Beijing's frailty and cowardice is, of course, banned too. Naturally.

Lee Long-hwa
Pasadena, California

Lien lacks substance

In recent speech, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chair-man Lien Chan (連戰) said Taiwan must "Use China's dynamism to power Taiwan's transition." Despite his doctorate in political science (or perhaps because of it), Lien has never really paid much attention to reality.

I can never figure out why Lien has this fixation on China. Sure, China is a big market, but as any good businessperson, or rather, as any good investor knows, you never bet your entire fortune on one stock. Despite Lien's doctorate, I don't think he's ever heard of the concept of diversification. What Lien has failed to realize is that by depending too much on China, Taiwan will become a part of China to the extent that the national security issue that Lien is supposedly keenly aware of will become threatened.

Lien has stressed that Tai-wan can become a high-tech and services center, while using China as a manufacturing hub. My question for Lien is simple -- what makes him think that China will stand idly by as Taiwan takes the high-margin services business while it is relegated to the low-margin manufacturing business? Does he have an agreement with Beijing? Is there a deal that we don't know about?

It seems like most of Lien's speeches, they sound good in a speech but lack substance when examined with an ounce of practicality.

Lien stressed that Taiwan-ese businessmen in China have contributed greatly to cross-straits relations. Let's not kid ourselves here. Businesspeople are in the business of making money -- to attribute any altruistic motives to them is pure fantasy. If anything, Taiwanese businesspeople in China have hampered cross-strait relations by imposing a special interest view into legislative affairs. Again, Lien didn't pay much attention to his doctoral classes.

Lien is a man who holds all the credentials, but his remarks are generally tainted by a lack of vision and practicality. As the elections draw near, is this the type of person we want running a nation at its crossroads? Whether the Chen administration has been effective is another issue ... but a Lien administration is clearly not the answer.

Ryan Shih
Hong Kong
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