Sometimes history is bizarre; sometimes it is ironic; and sometimes it is cruel. This is particularly true in the case of PFP Chairman James Soong (
Recently, Soong announced his "vision for Taiwan." Some people interpreted it as an announcement of his candidacy in next year's presidential election. Others thought it meant he was withdrawing from the race, and still others read it as a letter of surrender. In fact, they are all correct. Soong is running in the sense that he is willing to defer to Lien by becoming his running mate and making "KMT-PFP cooperation" a reality for the sake of giving Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) a real challenge.
He is withdrawing in the sense that he has expressed willingness to play second fiddle in the presidential election. The vice president has no influence on the big picture, so Soong's move could be called a withdrawal. He is surrendering in the sense that the PFP is a party that was formed to back Soong as a presidential candidate. Now Soong is pulling out of the race and deferring to Lien, so he is surrendering. PFP supporters point out that his statement is a letter of surrender because the commander-in-chief raised the white flag. Clearly, the pan-blue camp pushed aside the pro-Soong camp, or perhaps the pro-Soong camp's decision to disband of its own accord enabled the accomplishment of "KMT-PFP cooperation."
In plain terms, the reason why Soong is willing to compromise next year is that he knows his influence is waning. There is no way that Soong himself or the PFP alone could win. Even Lien and Soong combined won't necessarily be able to defeat Chen with ease. In 2000, when Soong was determined to drop all pretense of friendly relations with Lee Teng-hui (
In fact, Soong was wasting his energy when he used a 10,000-word statement to announce "KMT-PFP cooperation" and a joint Lien-Soong ticket. What need is there for so many words to announce that he will play the supporting role? To quote Laozi, "words are weak."
Soong is indeed weak. In 2000, a reporter asked him, "Will you team up with Lien or not?" At the time, Soong replied with a simple question of his own, saying "I would only team up with Lien in order to win, but could a joint Lien-Soong ticket really win?"
He went on to answer his own question. "First, in a presidential election, the chief comes first, and his assistants ultimately play only a backup role. Second, if a joint Lien-Soong ticket fails to help the KMT reform its `black gold' politics ways, which the public can no longer tolerate, what meaning does such a pairing have except for the success or failure of a particular administration or individual?"
Even more interestingly, Soong also added, "If a politician's sense of mission is so simple that it changes to suit a particular distribution of power, can it still be called a sense of mission?" Soong has also said, "victory is only a low-level consideration." The original drafts of these speeches are all available for reference.
Comparing the speeches of 2000 with the 10,000-word statement of 2004, aren't Soong's basic points pretty much the same -- i.e. is the point of the joint Lien-Soong ticket purely to defeat Chen Shui-bian, will a Lien-Soong joint ticket necessarily mean victory, and after cooperating and beating Chen Shui-bian, then what?
It's just that Soong used exactly the same rhetorical questions to argue against a joint ticket in 2000 and to argue for a joint ticket next year. Soong can't make his statements sound plausible and has made no headway as a leader. Not moving forward means moving backward.
No wonder Soong accepted second place.
Chin Heng-wei is editor-in-chief of Contemporary Monthly magazine.
Translated by Ethan Harkness
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