Johnny’s blind countrymen
Dear Johnny,
I have been amused on many occasions by the sheer irony that you present on cross-strait matters. Your article “Hey babe, wanna see my identity?” (June 14, page 8) conveys exactly the labyrinth of complications that exist between Taiwan and China, which unfortunately not many people seem to realize, or else choose to put aside.
Metaphors like “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” should be made known to everyone, and I strongly suggest that you translate this article and distribute it among the Taiwanese population, because at times it seems that Taiwanese don’t seem to know what is happening to them.
Alice
Johnny replies: Ah, Alice, it’s a universal truth that the older you get, the less people are inclined to listen to you. This is no less true in Taiwan, despite our alleged heritage of venerating the elderly (exceptions are made for choice of spouse, but even on this matter I was not consulted).
The fact is that in writing for a foreign audience I have to change my style so much that the jokes — or so I am told — are too difficult to translate. What about a rejigged Chinese version of the column, I asked? But no, there were no takers.
One time I was contacted by a local financial magazine for an interview. I said: “I’ve got grandkids to mind. Let’s do it by e-mail.” They said: “In person or not at all.” I said: “Later, dude.”
I may appear grumpy to foreign readers, but to locals it’s much worse: Sarcasm is pretty much taboo, unless you’re a legislative thug on the talkshow circuit. It’s a shame, really: Sarcasm was one of the most valuable things I took away from my jaunt across Europe in the 1970s.
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
I have heard people equate the government’s stance on resisting forced unification with China or the conditional reinstatement of the military court system with the rise of the Nazis before World War II. The comparison is absurd. There is no meaningful parallel between the government and Nazi Germany, nor does such a mindset exist within the general public in Taiwan. It is important to remember that the German public bore some responsibility for the horrors of the Holocaust. Post-World War II Germany’s transitional justice efforts were rooted in a national reckoning and introspection. Many Jews were sent to concentration camps not
RSS