In KMT renegade James Soong's (宋楚瑜) continuing attacks on the party he once served, we can find quite a few similarities with the language used by tangwai dissidents in the past.
In fact, while creating the image of an "oppressed" person to generate some public sympathy, Soong still has not given us the answers we have been waiting for. Instead, he has demonstrated a virtuosity of strategy that has been truly dazzling.
Anyone running into a scandal this size should have collapsed long ago. But Soong is still up and running, using the media as his battlefield. Employing Sun Tzu's (孫子) tactics, Soong has been trying to confuse the public with increasingly convoluted stories and increasingly larger figures. To try to follow the scandal gives most people a headache, and that of course is Soong's strategy; confuse people until they no longer care what the truth is.
The story we are now being told is that Soong knows neither how much money nor how many bank accounts he has, so he has to delegate someone else to go to the finance ministry and banks to check up on his own accounts. By peddling this nonsense Soong shows only his contempt for the people whose votes he craves.
In fact, New Party lawmaker Hsieh Chi-ta's (
How long can this circus last before it is forced to a halt by an audience yelling for the truth?
Actually buying time is not a wise strategy at this stage. Many opportunistic politicians are already leaving his campaign; corporate donations have also slumped dramatically. With the cost of each campaign rally running up to tens of millions, Soong is ironically both mired in a scandal about secret funds while facing a financial shortage. His vehement attacks reveal more about his desperation than his innocence.
Usually, holding press conferences is a good way to generate public sympathy. But Soong's two recent press conferences have had just the opposite effect. Instead of answering the numerous questions about his finances, he created even more questions.
Soong's days as a media favorite are over. Reporters used to swallow whatever story Soong fed them; now they are no longer mincing their words in their questions. But Soong has been evasive over even such simple issues as whether his son has a US passport.
Now, even the newspapers which used to support Soong are admitting that Soong has been telling lies. Some have even admitted that he is a rotten apple, but then they say a rotten apple is at least better than a "poisonous apple." Who that poisonous apple may be is a matter of debate.
But the strangest and most shameless attempt to obscure the issue so far has got to be the idea that the continued browbeating of Soong will spawn a sense of crisis among mainlanders and trigger an ethnic conflict. This kind of theory directly contradicts the "new Taiwanese" idea Soong so much likes to emphasize. In fact, all the mess has been created by Soong himself; it has nothing to do with ethnicity.
Choosing a president is nothing like choosing a neighborhood leader. If Soong cannot even figure out how much money he has and needs to call in someone else to help, then how can we entrust him with the job of leading the country?
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