Recent media coverage of a series of political events has clearly, crudely and sadly illustrated the double standards that are applied to pan-green and pan-blue politicians.
The pro-China media in Taiwan enjoys a disproportionate presence in the local news market -- this much everyone knows. But their biased and selective reporting in such a brazen manner has become almost sickening.
Take the coverage of pan-blue legislators' sensational allegations against first lady Wu Shu-jen (
With the pro-China media so eager to dance to the pan-blue camp's tune, it seemed as if Wu was Taiwan's version of Imelda Marcos.
Sure, Wu has drawn much criticism for her investment activities. And given her position as first lady, she should have known better than to engage in commercial activities or meet with the executives of state-owned enterprises. Such conduct was, at the very least, stupid.
However, the critical -- some would say libelous -- coverage of Wu was out of all proportion to her alleged misdeeds, especially when compared with coverage of the KMT. The KMT's stalled deal last December to sell the party's three media outlets to the China Times Group has recently been clouded in controversy. Originally the China Times Group wanted to buy all three outlets from the KMT; now it seems they don't have the money to do so.
The whole thing smells like a sweetheart deal for one of the KMT's pro-China media pals. Naturally enough, KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (
And then there was the news earlier this week that a number of Ma's Taipei City Government staff took more than 30 days of official leave to prepare for a Dragon Boat race. Had this happened while President Chen Shui-bian (
But Ma, the media darling, was able to work his way out of the controversy with the response: "The city government is keen to promote the concept of a health-conscious city."
"Clean" and "transparent" were the catchwords of Ma's campaign for the KMT chairmanship last June. How much "cleanliness" and "transparency" has he really implemented since then? And how much attention has the nation's media been paying to this matter? The short answer to both questions is: not very much.
The KMT recently announced that its vice chairwoman Lin Cheng-chih (林澄枝) would be stepping down, with the vacancy to be filled by Legislator Chang Jen-chian (章仁香). Many members of the KMT's Central Standing Committee -- supposedly the highest decision-making body of the party -- weren't even aware that the appointment had been made. So much for Ma's transparency.
The media have a responsibility to keep the powerful in check. If the pro-China media really want Ma to win the 2008 presidential election, what they ought to do, for the sake of the country's welfare, is keep him to his word.
On May 7, 1971, Henry Kissinger planned his first, ultra-secret mission to China and pondered whether it would be better to meet his Chinese interlocutors “in Pakistan where the Pakistanis would tape the meeting — or in China where the Chinese would do the taping.” After a flicker of thought, he decided to have the Chinese do all the tape recording, translating and transcribing. Fortuitously, historians have several thousand pages of verbatim texts of Dr. Kissinger’s negotiations with his Chinese counterparts. Paradoxically, behind the scenes, Chinese stenographers prepared verbatim English language typescripts faster than they could translate and type them
More than 30 years ago when I immigrated to the US, applied for citizenship and took the 100-question civics test, the one part of the naturalization process that left the deepest impression on me was one question on the N-400 form, which asked: “Have you ever been a member of, involved in or in any way associated with any communist or totalitarian party anywhere in the world?” Answering “yes” could lead to the rejection of your application. Some people might try their luck and lie, but if exposed, the consequences could be much worse — a person could be fined,
Xiaomi Corp founder Lei Jun (雷軍) on May 22 made a high-profile announcement, giving online viewers a sneak peek at the company’s first 3-nanometer mobile processor — the Xring O1 chip — and saying it is a breakthrough in China’s chip design history. Although Xiaomi might be capable of designing chips, it lacks the ability to manufacture them. No matter how beautifully planned the blueprints are, if they cannot be mass-produced, they are nothing more than drawings on paper. The truth is that China’s chipmaking efforts are still heavily reliant on the free world — particularly on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing
On May 13, the Legislative Yuan passed an amendment to Article 6 of the Nuclear Reactor Facilities Regulation Act (核子反應器設施管制法) that would extend the life of nuclear reactors from 40 to 60 years, thereby providing a legal basis for the extension or reactivation of nuclear power plants. On May 20, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) legislators used their numerical advantage to pass the TPP caucus’ proposal for a public referendum that would determine whether the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant should resume operations, provided it is deemed safe by the authorities. The Central Election Commission (CEC) has
RSS