The Legislature Yuan achieved a new low on Tuesday, difficult as it may be to believe that it can continue to find new depths to sink to. The usual tussles and shoving matches included two female lawmakers in a hair-pulling and slapping contest. Both women ended up in the legislature's medical center afterward and one was later taken to a hospital for further examination.
While the public appears to have grown inured to chaotic nursery-school scenes on the legislative floor, one cannot help but imagine how frustrating it must be to be a president of a country who has to deal with this delinquent behavior on a weekly basis.
If any inspiration were to be drawn from Tuesday's chaotic replays of the previous week's spats, it would be that the country is in desperate need of a new constitution since the current one no longer provides the framework for a functioning democracy.
When Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi ran into strong opposition to his efforts to privatize Japan Post, he decided to dissolve parliament and call new elections. The result was a victory for his Liberal Democratic Party, which now holds a parliamentary majority.
Taiwan's political system is different from that of Japan. The premier does not possesses the authority to initiate a no-confidence vote. Taiwan's system is a semi-presidential one, similar to that of France. So President Chen Shui-bian (
Lawmakers' absurd behavior is all right if the legislature wishes to keep its infamous reputation. But it is disturbing and intolerable that lawmakers seem determined to drag Taiwan's development and national reputation down as well.
There are 12 legislative committees. Dominated by the pan-blues, the committees' sole motivation appears to be an obsession with chipping away at the administration's authority and blocking any of its reform efforts. The worst one in this regard is the Procedure Committee, which on Tuesday rejected the arms-procurement budget for the 30th time, refusing to put it on the legislature's agenda. It also blocked Chen's lists of nominees for the Control Yuan once again.
No matter how much the pan-blue lawmakers try to deny their bias, it is clear that any draft bill or budget proposal that the pan-blue camp is opposed to will never make it out of the Procedure Committee. There is no chance that any of the other committees might have the chance to review the proposals, much less that they get put to a vote on the legislative floor.
There are a number of politicians, both inside and outside the legislature, who are apparently blind to the mass migration of Taiwanese industries to China, to China's military threat, the rising unemployment rate and the plight of people living in flood-prone areas. They cannot see the people because they have their sights locked on the 2008 presidential election.
The complete malfunction on display daily in the legislature has pushed Taiwan's democracy to the edge of a cliff. The lawmakers may enjoy their fistfights, name-calling and food fights, but most people are heartily sick of it all. The emperor Nero has gone down in history as fiddling while Rome burned. Taiwan's legislators will be remembered for their histrionics and sham fights as the nation's economy and future fell to pieces around them.
The conflict in the Middle East has been disrupting financial markets, raising concerns about rising inflationary pressures and global economic growth. One market that some investors are particularly worried about has not been heavily covered in the news: the private credit market. Even before the joint US-Israeli attacks on Iran on Feb. 28, global capital markets had faced growing structural pressure — the deteriorating funding conditions in the private credit market. The private credit market is where companies borrow funds directly from nonbank financial institutions such as asset management companies, insurance companies and private lending platforms. Its popularity has risen since
The Donald Trump administration’s approach to China broadly, and to cross-Strait relations in particular, remains a conundrum. The 2025 US National Security Strategy prioritized the defense of Taiwan in a way that surprised some observers of the Trump administration: “Deterring a conflict over Taiwan, ideally by preserving military overmatch, is a priority.” Two months later, Taiwan went entirely unmentioned in the US National Defense Strategy, as did military overmatch vis-a-vis China, giving renewed cause for concern. How to interpret these varying statements remains an open question. In both documents, the Indo-Pacific is listed as a second priority behind homeland defense and
In an op-ed published in Foreign Affairs on Tuesday, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) said that Taiwan should not have to choose between aligning with Beijing or Washington, and advocated for cooperation with Beijing under the so-called “1992 consensus” as a form of “strategic ambiguity.” However, Cheng has either misunderstood the geopolitical reality and chosen appeasement, or is trying to fool an international audience with her doublespeak; nonetheless, it risks sending the wrong message to Taiwan’s democratic allies and partners. Cheng stressed that “Taiwan does not have to choose,” as while Beijing and Washington compete, Taiwan is strongest when
US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) are expected to meet this month in Paris to prepare for a meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). According to media reports, the two sides would discuss issues such as the potential purchase of Boeing aircraft by China, increasing imports of US soybeans and the latest impacts of Trump’s reciprocal tariffs. However, recent US military action against Iran has added uncertainty to the Trump-Xi summit. Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) called the joint US-Israeli airstrikes and the
RSS