It makes me laugh to see the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) attack the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) over corruption, bribery and nepotism. Look around you and you will see people bending the law whereever they can.
It starts in school, where students cheat on their tests and parents get all upset when teachers fail their kids. Look out of your window and most likely you will see more than one illegally built house extension.
You ask people what they think about bending the law and the most common answer will be: "Everybody does it. As long as you get away with it, it's okay."
As for the KMT, they should take a long hard look into the mirror and clean up their own party before telling others to do so.
Juan Hsiu
Lujhou, Taipei County
I would like to comment on the calls for President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) to resign because his son-in-law was involved in insider trading. If someone should resign from office just because their relative is guilty rather than the officeholder themselves, then the late presidents Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) should have resigned early on because their in-laws, the Soong family, were guilty of large-scale corruption. Why don't we then tear down the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall because Chiang Kai-shek did not do the right thing by resigning?
Saying that someone is guilty because a relative or ancestor is guilty reeks of the Cultural Revolution, the Inquisition, or any other historic witchhunt.
Of course someone could accuse me of committing the two wrongs to make a right fallacy in the above argument. However, a more fundamental problem is this -- the pan-blues are trying to convince everyone that they are more capable to govern because the pan-greens are corrupt. The fact that the pan-greens are corrupt does not imply that the pan-blues are more capable of governing.
For starters, the KMT never fully addressed its own history of extreme corruption when it lost the last two presidential elections, preferring to sweep its corruption into legal gray areas that it conveniently designed during its rule.
Pieces of property such as the KMT's headquarters, the Central Motion Picture Co and the former location of the Broadcasting Corp of China, belonged to the Japanese colonial government and were supposed to become the property of the Republic of China's government after retrocession. Somehow they ended up being the KMT's property because of the ambiguities between the party and the state during that time.
Now the squeaky clean Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
Why doesn't whistleblower Legislator Chiu Yi (邱毅), who has a reputation as a fearless corruption buster, blow the whistle on this corruption within the KMT? He'll probably use the excuse of party stability -- even while he is threatening the stability of the government's separation of powers.
The pan-blues have relentlessly attacked the Chen administration and tried every excuse they could find to obliterate it. Chen has had to flip-flop because the pan-blues are never satisfied with him. They are so filled with hatred of Chen that they can make anything look logical no matter how illogical it sounds by using the media organizations they created during the Martial Law era, who remain indebted to them.
This in return, builds extreme resentment among the core group of pan-green supporters and threatens Taiwan's democracy.
All these tactics make the idea that the pan-blues are more capable of government because the pan-greens are corrupt very shaky. It would seem that the pan-blues, pampered by their old patronage system, feel extremely insecure when they are not in power. Worse, this feeling of insecurity is so strong that they are playing footsie with Beijing to try to feel better.
Ryan Chang
Hsinchu
With the uncovering of the scandals surrounding the first family, a spate of relatively unlawful activities has been exposed. The media is preoccupied with the growing scandals, and many people may be depressed about the state of society and government. But are all the scandals real? Are all the reports even accurate?
There have been several reports about corruption linked to military promotions. While it turns out that there is proof that Chen Che-nan (
Keh rejected temptation and upheld military discipline. His incorruptibility has not only set a good example but also could be considered as solid evidence to disprove the rumor of irregularities in promotions. Who said that brass hats could buy promotion? Let's wait to see what the evidence shows.
Hsiao Wei-hung
Kaohsiung
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