Split tickets not always best
In the legislative elections in 2020, the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) number of regional legislative seats increased, but the DPP only won 33.9 percent of the total party votes for the legislators-at-large, which was similar to that of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) despite the KMT’s defeat in the regional legislative elections at that time.
The reason for this was that many voters who supported the pro-local regime voted for the DPP in the regional legislative elections, while casting their party votes to small parties with the same ideologies through split-ticket voting.
I cast my party votes for the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) in 2008 and 2012, the New Power Party (NPP) in 2016 and the Taiwan Statebuilding Party (TSP) in 2020. The TSU and TSP failed to cross the 5 percent threshold to have any legislator-at-large in 2008 and 2020 respectively.
For the upcoming legislative elections, former KMT presidential candidate Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) is on top of the KMT’s nomination list for legislators-at-large, and he has been eyeing the legislative speaker’s seat. Some other nominees on the list include former Tainan City councilor Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介), who claims to embrace the Republic of China (ROC), but was once reluctant to wave an ROC flag at a 2019 campaign rally in Tainan, as well as the second-generation members of several questionable political families who try to portray a clean image. Plus, since the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) is likely to have more legislators-at-large this time, the TPP has been bragging about itself lately. Under such circumstances, I have decided to cast my party vote for the DPP, instead of voting for a split ticket.
For Taiwan’s legislature, there should be representative figures for the weak such as Jing Chuan Child Safety Foundation CEO Lin Yue-chin (林月琴), who is on top of the DPP’s nomination list, and political warriors such as assistant professor of civil engineering Wang Yi-chuan (王義川), who are able to refute Han, Hsieh and the TPP’s nominees for legislators-at-large like Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌). As long as the voters could focus their party votes on the DPP, even though Wang is in the 14th spot on the party’s nomination list and not within the first 12 nominees, also known as the “safe list,” he could still become a “safe” candidate.
Yi He-hsuan
Tainan
George Santayana wrote: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” This article will help readers avoid repeating mistakes by examining four examples from the civil war between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) forces and the Republic of China (ROC) forces that involved two city sieges and two island invasions. The city sieges compared are Changchun (May to October 1948) and Beiping (November 1948 to January 1949, renamed Beijing after its capture), and attempts to invade Kinmen (October 1949) and Hainan (April 1950). Comparing and contrasting these examples, we can learn how Taiwan may prevent a war with
Taiwan is rapidly accelerating toward becoming a “super-aged society” — moving at one of the fastest rates globally — with the proportion of elderly people in the population sharply rising. While the demographic shift of “fewer births than deaths” is no longer an anomaly, the nation’s legal framework and social customs appear stuck in the last century. Without adjustments, incidents like last month’s viral kicking incident on the Taipei MRT involving a 73-year-old woman would continue to proliferate, sowing seeds of generational distrust and conflict. The Senior Citizens Welfare Act (老人福利法), originally enacted in 1980 and revised multiple times, positions older
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has its chairperson election tomorrow. Although the party has long positioned itself as “China friendly,” the election is overshadowed by “an overwhelming wave of Chinese intervention.” The six candidates vying for the chair are former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), former lawmaker Cheng Li-wen (鄭麗文), Legislator Luo Chih-chiang (羅智強), Sun Yat-sen School president Chang Ya-chung (張亞中), former National Assembly representative Tsai Chih-hong (蔡志弘) and former Changhua County comissioner Zhuo Bo-yuan (卓伯源). While Cheng and Hau are front-runners in different surveys, Hau has complained of an online defamation campaign against him coming from accounts with foreign IP addresses,
Taiwan’s business-friendly environment and science parks designed to foster technology industries are the key elements of the nation’s winning chip formula, inspiring the US and other countries to try to replicate it. Representatives from US business groups — such as the Greater Phoenix Economic Council, and the Arizona-Taiwan Trade and Investment Office — in July visited the Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區), home to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC) headquarters and its first fab. They showed great interest in creating similar science parks, with aims to build an extensive semiconductor chain suitable for the US, with chip designing, packaging and manufacturing. The