Taiwan's politicians probably think they are doing a good job.

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By Jou Yi-cheng 周奕成
The results of the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP) legislative primaries have two political implications. One is that some talented politicians from different generations were eliminated from the legislature. The other is that the "democratic war" between Taiwan's two sides will get even fiercer. Most of the politicians who were eliminated were better known as rational politicians than political warriors. The intensification of Taiwan's "democratic war" is both the cause and result of the rise of the warriors and the decline of the doves within the DPP.

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By Liu Kuan-teh 劉冠德
With a year left to his term, President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) appointed former premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) as his sixth premier in seven years. After a partial Cabinet reshuffle, the main mission of the new "combat team" led by Chang and Vice Premier Chiou Yi-ren (邱義仁) is to boost the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP) profile and win the presidential election next year, while at the same time saving Chen's legacy as a defender of Taiwanese consciousness.

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By Feng Chien-san 馮建三
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications has said that it will evaluate the possibility of promoting cycling for short-distance transportation. This report has brought hope to those who are in the habit of riding bicycles to and from work.

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More of us are taking food supplements to `balance' our diets, but they may be doing us more harm than good
By Lucy Atkins
They are exculpation, insurance and saintliness in handy pill form. They supposedly guard against anything from wrinkles to cancer. But are dietary supplements -- from the humble multivitamin to the mega-dose antioxidant -- really as benign as they seem?

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Germany's ruling coalition is divided on how to handle Russia and Chancellor Angela Merkel refuses to gloss over Vladimir Putin's human-rights record
By Mark Landler
Germany's relations with Russia were never likely to be as cozy under Chancellor Angela Merkel as under her predecessor, Gerhard Schroeder, who adopted a three-year-old Russian girl and, on his 60th birthday, invited Russian President Vladimir Putin home to celebrate.

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Japanese should decisively abandon ultralow interest rates, albeit gradually so as to allow an orderly unwinding of global investors' speculative positions
By Thomas Palley
Over the past several years, much attention has focused on the role of China's trade surplus in creating today's global financial imbalances. But too little attention has been paid to the role of Japan's policy of near-zero interest rates in contributing to these imbalances. As global financial uncertainty rises, it is time for Japan to change course.

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