President Chen Shui-bian's (
It was interesting that the major criticism of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) spokesman Alex Tsai after the speech was that it was late in coming. Actually, Chen said nothing Saturday night that the presidential office had not already offered before. A recount, international participation in the shooting investigation: these had been on the table as of midweek, but KMT Chairman Lien Chan (
That Lien and People First Party Chairman James Soong (
But this week has shown something far more upsetting to anyone who cares not just about democratic processes and the rule of law, but also about simple common sense. Everyone involved in this dispute knows how the balloting process in Taiwan is carried out. Everybody should therefore know quite well that it is a model of openness that other democracies would do well to imitate.
You cannot stuff ballot boxes in Taiwan. The bookkeeping about how many ballot papers are delivered to polling stations, how many are used and how many must be returned is simply too strict. You cannot fraudulently count the vote, since it is carried out in too open a style, and the registration of each ballot is liable to objection from party representatives if there is a hint of partisanship or skullduggery.
All parties involved in the election know this. All of the pan-greens, all of the pan-blues, everyone. You cannot rig a vote in Taiwan under the present system.
There is another thing that people should already know, unless their minds have been rotted by too many bad action films. You cannot "shoot to wound" a man in the stomach standing on a moving vehicle. And yet people believe these things.
Both these events have obvious explanations.
As to the election, Chen and the Democratic Progressive Party won it by a small number of votes. This happens: that is the way the system works.
And as to the shooting, some wacko, his mind turned crazy by the endless diet of pan-blue hate propaganda against Chen in the last few weeks -- the analogies with Hitler, bin Laden, Saddam and the like -- decided that Chen simply couldn't be allowed to win, and tried to kill him to prevent it.
This makes absolute perfect sense. It is a model of events that we can all understand. That does not mean that it is exactly what happened, but it is the most likely chain of events and should do as a working hypothesis for most people, until other evidence comes along. But not for the pan-blues.
What is disturbing about this is not that an election can be challenged: that is a legal right. Nor that losing an election is frustrating: that is human nature.
What is truly disturbing is the way that common sense has simply been thrown aside. Sane and rational people have been willing to overlook the obvious and believe the most preposterous things, rather than face the truth. A large number of people in this country are in the grip of hysterical self-delusion.
Perhaps Taiwan needs psychiatric help.
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
As former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) wrapped up his visit to the People’s Republic of China, he received his share of attention. Certainly, the trip must be seen within the full context of Ma’s life, that is, his eight-year presidency, the Sunflower movement and his failed Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, as well as his eight years as Taipei mayor with its posturing, accusations of money laundering, and ups and downs. Through all that, basic questions stand out: “What drives Ma? What is his end game?” Having observed and commented on Ma for decades, it is all ironically reminiscent of former US president Harry