After last weekend's elections, there were the winners. There was the "refuse to lose" crowd. And then there were the just plain confused.
By the last, I'm referring to the clown car of also rans that livened up what otherwise would have been the dullest election since US president Jimmy Carter left politics. Call them the MADD (Media Attention Deficit Disorder) gang: a motley crew that included independent Taipei mayoral candidates Li Ao (
Li touted himself as "anti-LP government," employing colorful Hoklo-English fusion slang for male genitals. He advised voters to "go shoot others with guns" because Taiwan was "finished" (optimism was never his forte).
Ko ran for the same position in order to get back his cow, which was seized two years ago by the Taipei City Government. Interviewed by TTV after the election, he seemed shocked that he lost, despite a raft of polls consistently showing him pulling less than 2 percent of the vote. Staring into the middle distance while clutching his trademark pole weapon, he vowed to run again from Hualien in next year's legislative elections and blamed Taipei City residents for being "too proud." Meanwhile, his heifer will continue to languish somewhere in Pingtung County.
Clara Chou transformed the "psycho xiaojie" stereotype so beloved of my foreign friends into an electoral strategy, turning up every morning like a jilted lover outside Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei mayoral candidate Frank Hsieh's (
And Hsu entered the city council race to great fanfare before abruptly dropping out of view. The rabid publicity hound and variety show mainstay, who claims to be a tutor in the ways of "high society," surfaced after the vote to complain about how tired she was, how much money she'd spent and how politics just took too much hard work, darnit.
She was right. Never has so much energy been expended on so many doomed campaigns.
And what of the other Taipei City Council candidates that I previewed a few weeks ago?
The People First Party's (PFP) Mike Wang (
Shilin and Beitou also gave the DPP's Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) a seat with a steady 6.54 percent of the vote, which just goes to show that a campaign ditty that could have been written by a serial killer can get you into council. Oh, and wearing the odd black leotard. Fellow Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) protege Hsu Shu-hua (許淑華) polled first in Songshan/Xinyi, so it seems that the Hsiao Army is marching on the Presidential Office. Expect a "Bi-khim for president" campaign by 2020 if we're not all Chicoms by then.
The sheen of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman and Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
The PFP's jolly "Dr Husky" Hung Shih-chi (
And lastly, what became of the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) team of CSI: TPE fame? Key member Chen Chien-ming (
But what really worries me is this: Who's looking after all of these spurned candidates? Suddenly, without their media fix, this group of unstable would-be politicos is going cold turkey. And Ko Szu-hai, for one, is armed.
We can only pray that in some dimly lit basement near the Legislative Yuan they're huddled together clutching Styrofoam cups filled with weak coffee.
Finally, a quiet voice says: "Hello, my name is Clara Chou, and I'm a mediaholic" (murmurs of encouragement). "It's been six days, three hours and 27 minutes since I appeared on television."
And the "refuse to lose" crowd? After his embarrassing showing -- 4 percent in the Taipei mayoral race -- James "Hungry Ghost" Soong (
Not that the winners are much better. The KMT's Hau Lung-bin (
Meanwhile, Chen Chu's (
Scandal Magnet-in-Chief Chen Shui-bian (
But the biggest losers in last week's elections were the wildly inaccurate opinion polls, and media outlets that peddled them. Two days before the election, most polls favored Huang over Chen Chu in Kaohsiung -- by 39 percent to 27 percent (United Daily News), 43 percent to 29 percent (China Times) or 51 percent to 31 percent (TVBS). Think an esteemed international polling group like Gallup could do better? Think again. They had Huang leading Chu 51 percent to 28 percent, albeit in late November.
The explanation from those in the know: Some polls are deeply biased to begin with, but even the well-designed and conducted ones will fail to capture a large number of "hidden voters," who will not tell a stranger their preferred candidate -- but who are more likely to vote green.
With candidates like Ko Szu-hai prowling the streets, it's no wonder some voters are hiding.
Endnote: Two weeks ago I lamented the fact that even a top newspaper like the New York Times and its formidable, prize-winning staff can be bamboozled by local English-speaking interviewees who prefer not to tell the whole story or declare their interests. Then I discover that Patrick L. Smith, writing in the International Herald Tribune one week later, does exactly the same thing ("For many in Taiwan, status quo with China sounds fine," Dec. 11). In a piece worthy of KMT propagandist Su Chi (
What gives, Patrick? Don't you know what Emile's been up to?
Smith endorsed Sheng's views on the KMT's rapprochement with China by painting the narrow DPP win in Kaohsiung as a "shift in public sentiment" toward "accommodation with Beijing," among other things. Good grief. And I thought all politics was local.
With all these upmarket papers and freelancers doing this kind of thing, it makes you wonder how much of this is inherent to the craft, and to what extent journalists -- and editors, who should intervene if necessary -- are able to tell you what you are entitled to know, and what is being left out.
For the moment, this dreadful virus of quoting Emile Sheng as a credible source is spreading much faster than I feared possible.
What say I give World Health Organization director-general-elect Margaret Chan (
Heard or read something particularly objectionable about Taiwan? Johnny wants to know: dearjohnny@taipeitimes.com is the place to reach me, with "Dear Johnny" in the subject line.
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