The redneck connection
Dear Johnny,
You’ve missed the connection between the American Institute in Taiwan’s (AIT) offer to facilitate our entry into the Creutzfeldt-Jakob community and that guy Kuo Kuan-ying’s (郭冠英) “high-class Mainlander” crap.
You see, while the US was generously funding Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) regime in China, he and his high-class Mainlanders were diverting said funds into their own pockets. Later on, when they all landed upon us one sunny day, they brought that dough with them.
It is often said these days that Chiang “built” Taiwan by financing its development. All together now: Nope, that clique took more than it put in.
Taiwan was, in fact, built by the hardworking “rednecks” on the back of Most Favored Nation tariffs extended to Taiwan by the ever-generous US.
Now, if I were head of the AIT, given that the high-class Mainlanders are back in power, I too would ask them to buy some problematic beef (not for their own personal consumption, of course. For the rednecks).
“What’s a few hundred mil,” I would argue, “compared with the untold billions we gave you to fight Mao Zedong (毛澤東), most of which you stole anyways? C’mon, your betel nut-chewing redneck stock is resilient and won’t mind a few holes drilled into their brains by playful Texas proteins!
“And, come to think of it, if they don’t get mad cow disease, how will they vote you in next time around?”
DR ELIZA
Johnny replies: I don’t know why more research isn’t done on the effect of AIT beef promotions on the political economy of my beloved homeland. Maybe it’s because all the funding is being diverted to beef subsidies.
The only question that remains is how long Stephen Young’s successor as AIT director will wait before wandering down to the World Trade Center, cranking up the shit-eating grin and flashing his pearly whites clutching a beautiful slab of T-bone.
But I tell you, if William A. Stanton is appointed director as some are predicting, we might see a considerable delay in beef spruiking. After all, he would have just arrived from South Korea, and we all know what the Koreans think about US beef. I suspect he might need time to recover and start off with plugging something less confrontational — missile systems, for example.
Clueless in Kiwi land
Dear Johnny,
Something has bothered me a bit in the past few months.
As you know, New Zealand is the land of the Great Chicom Offspring. A lot of them come here to learn English (and bring illegal drugs, and hold some of their own for ransom), find jobs and withdraw my tax money.
Now, where I’m from there are a lot of Kiwis that have no clue when it comes to Asian-looking people; they refer to us as the “Chinese.”
A lot of Kiwis here who have Chinese friends, or who teach English at language schools, have been told that Taiwan is an island of terrorists who will attack China with missiles at any time, and this is why Taiwan needs to be contained.
It’s got to the stage where any Kiwi here who has been in touch with a Chicom has been told this. Of course, they don’t ask themselves why a small island would attack a place that contains so much melamine.
Is this what they are teaching over there in China? Brainwashing the young generation to this level?
Of course, I don’t get offended or anything. One search on Wikipedia shows that Taiwan isn’t a terrorist island with missiles and bombs in every household readying to fight our great enemy to the death.
I’ve had a few Chinese fellows tell me this, though, with one even laughing and asking: “Don’t you have bombs in your hometown in case China attacks?”
I thought he was being sarcastic, but he wasn’t.
Wow. Some of these people are so brainwashed that they have no clue what’s going on.
ERIC LIN
Auckland, New Zealand
Johnny replies: At the risk of triggering an international incident, might I suggest you have a chat with some of your Maori friends and inform them that the Chicoms are threatening the very place that their ancestors came from?
That might lead to some amusing scenes of “international exchange.”
Former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmaker Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) on Saturday won the party’s chairperson election with 65,122 votes, or 50.15 percent of the votes, becoming the second woman in the seat and the first to have switched allegiance from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to the KMT. Cheng, running for the top KMT position for the first time, had been termed a “dark horse,” while the biggest contender was former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), considered by many to represent the party’s establishment elite. Hau also has substantial experience in government and in the KMT. Cheng joined the Wild Lily Student
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has its chairperson election tomorrow. Although the party has long positioned itself as “China friendly,” the election is overshadowed by “an overwhelming wave of Chinese intervention.” The six candidates vying for the chair are former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), former lawmaker Cheng Li-wen (鄭麗文), Legislator Luo Chih-chiang (羅智強), Sun Yat-sen School president Chang Ya-chung (張亞中), former National Assembly representative Tsai Chih-hong (蔡志弘) and former Changhua County comissioner Zhuo Bo-yuan (卓伯源). While Cheng and Hau are front-runners in different surveys, Hau has complained of an online defamation campaign against him coming from accounts with foreign IP addresses,
When Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) announced the implementation of a new “quiet carriage” policy across all train cars on Sept. 22, I — a classroom teacher who frequently takes the high-speed rail — was filled with anticipation. The days of passengers videoconferencing as if there were no one else on the train, playing videos at full volume or speaking loudly without regard for others finally seemed numbered. However, this battle for silence was lost after less than one month. Faced with emotional guilt from infants and anxious parents, THSRC caved and retreated. However, official high-speed rail data have long
Taipei stands as one of the safest capital cities the world. Taiwan has exceptionally low crime rates — lower than many European nations — and is one of Asia’s leading democracies, respected for its rule of law and commitment to human rights. It is among the few Asian countries to have given legal effect to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant of Social Economic and Cultural Rights. Yet Taiwan continues to uphold the death penalty. This year, the government has taken a number of regressive steps: Executions have resumed, proposals for harsher prison sentences