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Editorial: The war of attrition in credibility

Now that Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) has issued a challenge for a debate to Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), it can be assumed that the election campaign has started in earnest.

Hsieh wants to engage Ma on ideological matters: the name of the country, the UN referendum and so on. Little wonder that Ma turned him down, saying that ordinary people are more concerned about the economy. There's a lot of truth in this, but Ma should not underestimate the role of ideology in a presidential election.

Still, Ma is intelligent enough to know when he is at a disadvantage, and he must be conscious that harping on about the glory of the Republic of China and the magnificence of the Chiang family has dwindling currency among most of the people he needs to get into the voting stations. Hsieh would love to have Ma paint himself as the last KMT hardliner and thus look ridiculous. Fat chance -- for now.

With a lack of substantial debate to test the candidates' mettle, voters once again must turn to their personal characteristics. And it must be said: Neither man has scrubbed up very well of late.

Hsieh's disappearing act over the last few weeks has been not so much a display of bizarre behavior on his part -- though it is that -- as an indictment of the DPP's ability to rally around the party flag when it is in the interests of everyone in the party to do so.

We have been told that Hsieh's disappearance resulted from injury or from stress, or both, but we have also been told that Hsieh's brief hibernation was the result of being gored by former DPP chairman Yu Shyi-kun in a battle over the party's "normal country" resolution.

None of this vaudeville lends Hsieh or his party minders any credibility. An ankle injury does not incapacitate a man for two weeks, let alone a budding president. And if stress over an ideological battle as superficial as a party resolution is enough to send the party's presidential hopeful to ground -- leaving even his own supporters speechless -- then we can only wonder what effect a presidency will have on him.

When Hsieh ran for Taipei mayor so that the party could save face in an unwinnable election, election watchers were intrigued by his solid support, stealing an embarrassing number of votes from the pan-blue camp.

Even so, his campaign was tired, cynical and lazy. President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) -- a consummate, indefatigable campaigner -- might want to teach Hsieh a trick or two, because the DPP will not win the presidency if Hsieh does not have his heart in it.

Meanwhile, Ma is doing his level best to impress "deep blue" supporters with statements of such ludicrousness and offensiveness that it is hard to see how he could mend fences with his foes if he became president. Ma's pleasant manner and smiling face are looking a lot less pleasant and a lot more exhausted. There is a manifest lack of sincerity in a lot of his pronouncements, and this could undo the KMT ticket, because there are very few people in the rest of this ossifying party of mercenaries who can appeal to voters across the blue-green divide.

Both candidates seem to be stuck in a race to the bottom in the credibility stakes. If either cares to stop, take a good look around and understand what makes a convincing president tick and attract support, then the Presidential Office will beckon.
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