Some people are thick-skinned. They do not care much about what other people think. Such people know that they can get away with saying what they want. They can stand in front of others and spout platitudes about being loyal to the party and a patriot and being up for the fight, but this is little more than Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) propaganda and a carefully crafted policy designed to govern Taiwan through a “divide and conquer” strategy. And it has the gall to say that it has “class” and “standards.”
Unfortunately for the KMT, the nation’s democratization has exposed its lies. The things that it wants the public to believe just no longer ring true and people are starting to question the lies being fed to them.
The KMT wallows in peddling untruths and pulling the wool over the eyes of ordinary people. There have been, over the past few months, three occasions in which presidential or vice presidential candidates’ academic qualifications have been called into question.
First, allegations were made against the KMT’s former presidential candidate, Deputy Legislative Speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱), casting doubts on the authenticity of a master’s degree she obtained in the US.
After the party had rescinded Hung’s nomination, KMT vice presidential candidate Jennifer Wang (王如玄) referred to her doctorate in law from the Renmin University of China, a degree that was not recognized by the Ministry of Education.
Then there is KMT presidential candidate Eric Chu (朱立倫) himself. Chu apparently received a doctorate in accounting from New York University (NYU) in 1991.
On the Legislative Yuan’s Web site, on the Chinese-language page on educational histories, it says that Chu taught as an assistant professor at NYU between 1990 and 1992, which would seem to indicate that he taught at NYU as an assistant professor before he received his doctorate from that institution. Could this be true?
However, according to Chu’s English-language resume, the university at which he taught as an assistant professor is listed as the City University of New York, not NYU.
On the Legislative Yuan Web site, the word “city” has been removed from the name of the school at which Chu taught, causing people to mistake it for NYU. There really is quite a difference between the two.
The KMT is fond of criticizing the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) for being too “unsophisticated,” not sufficiently worldly and unable to speak foreign languages.
However, during the current election campaign, KMT legislators Alex Tsai (蔡正元), Chiu Yi (邱毅) and Alicia Wang (王育敏), always out to get DPP presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), have called for her to “open your data.”
Open her data? What does that even mean?
All three words are English, yes, but two of them are being used incorrectly, and all three strung together make absolutely no sense at all.
Here is another interesting English phrase for them to study: Own goal.
Perhaps that “open her data” was just a little joke on their part.
Nevertheless, it is no joke when you deny apologizing for false allegations when you have already submitted both a written and a verbal apology for said allegations in court.
For that is a matter of record, it is a smoking gun, but still those of “proper breeding” say that this is the simply the “orthodox” KMT.
And all that other people can say, with their short-sightedness and their lack of standards, is: “Oh, that is just the way the KMT is.”
James Wang is a media commentator.
Translated by Paul Cooper
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