For Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), being president means always having to say you’re sorry.
This past week has seen Ma and his entourage tour disaster-hit areas to engage in ritual acts of contrition before a seemingly endless number of town halls packed with zaimin (災民, disaster zone victims).
They’ve pretty much got the routine down now: (1) Appear contrite and mumble something about your “deepest regrets.” (2) Execute a group bow of 90 degrees, sufficient for the zaimin to note the thinning hair on your pate, or, if you are Yao Yao (瑤瑤), to blind the zaimin with your cleavage. (3) Hold position for 10 seconds. (4) Conclude with a hearty “Taiwan, jiayou!” (5) Drive to next zaimin town hall. (6) Repeat.
It took a while for Ma and his cronies to get coordinated on Step 2, with TV commentators at first criticizing their group bows as being just as disorganized as their typhoon response.
But after much practice, their moves are looking as polished as F4 — without the gravity-defying spiked hairdos.
I think they’re ready for one of those Chaoji Xingguang Dadao (One Million Star) shows, where a panel of Simon Cowell-wannabes can coach them on the finer points of their apology ditties wherever there’s room for improvement.
But don’t invite Control Yuan President Wang Chien-shien (王建煊). As far as he’s concerned, the “apology shuffle” is about as tired as the Macarena (“It’s so last week,” he was overheard saying, except not in those exact words).
Meanwhile, Cabinet member resignations are coming so thick and fast it’s almost like these guys can’t wait to get out of the government. Oh, wait … they probably can’t.
Yes, it’s the trend du jour — all the cool kids are quitting.
The resignation train includes Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrew Hsia (夏立言), Cabinet Secretary-General Hsueh Hsiang-chuan (薛香川, widely panned for attending a lavish Father’s Day blow-out the day the typhoon hit instead of, oh I don’t know, monitoring the situation) and Minister of National Defense Chen Chao-min (陳肇敏).
The foreign minister reportedly also offered to resign, but the ministry later rebutted that. In reality, he’s probably humming to himself that other golden oldie, Should I Stay or Should I Go.
But the musical chairs will have to wait another week or two, insists Ma, until after the typhoon relief efforts have wound down.
In other news, Reuters reported on a coming-of-age ceremony in Tainan, where 16-year-olds crawl around under an altar to symbolize their passage to adulthood. Then everyone stuffs themselves at a banquet.
Here’s the money quote from a local official on the significance of the rite: “It means they’ve grown up, they’re like trees and can’t be blown away by a windstorm,” said Fu Pei-ying, standing director of the city’s culture exchange association.
As my American colleagues would say, “Hello-ooo?” Did old Pei-ying not notice the recent typhoon?
Forget trees being blown down — Morakot toppled a six-story hotel and busted concrete bridges islandwide.
But anyway. No fear: After bungling the response to one crisis, the Ma administration has a golden opportunity to redeem itself by taking strong, swift and resolute action on the next ones: A(H1N1), or swine flu.
So what are they doing? Reported our very own rag:
“The Presidential Office said yesterday that President Ma Ying-jeou has decided for the moment not to activate the national security mechanism in response to the growing threat of an (A)H1N1, or swine flu, epidemic.
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