William Pesek, Jr. (hearts) the KMT/China

If I tell a reporter something, and that reporter then prints what I said without attributing the quote to me, would it be unethical for me to quote myself anonymously? What if I were using my own quote as "evidence" of "public opinion"? Do you see where this is leading?

Meet the motherfockers
We've already seen this type of behavior demonstrated by the pan-blues earlier in "Bulletgate." This time, it would seem that William Pesek, Jr. is acting as the pan-blues' mouthpiece, because an article he wrote is supposedly the "source" of the term "Bulletgate."

Take a look at the content of page 9 of "Bulletgate," and see if you agree:

Bloomberg News Service has dubbed the shooting incident as "Bulletgate," stating that "While Chen's razor-thin victory was certified, the 53 year old may never shake legitimacy questions. He won't have much of a mandate to revive the economy or alter the island's relationship with China." (Mar 29, 2004) The Washington Post has repeated its warning of "the risk of war with China" due to Chen's actions. (Mar 29 and Apr 12, 2004)

China issued a warning that if Taiwan's political crisis dissolves into chaos, "we will not sit by and watch idly."
-- CNN, March 26, 2004

As far as I can tell, the pan-blues "fed" these words and all the information that went into the articles in which they were wrapped to Pesek, CNN, and the Washington Post.

Pesek seems more than happy to spread these rumors and push the "distrust" element. What he's done here is to help the pan-blues generate a meme that will be repeated over and over until it "becomes the truth" -- which will then be repeated some more.

By the way, though the gist is pretty much the same, the words "the risk of war with China" which appear between quotation marks on this page of "Bulletgate" do not appear in the April 12 Washington Post article. Liars!

Not legit enough to quit?
What Pesek is actually telling us when he says that Chen "may never shake legitimacy questions" is that the pan-blues will never, ever, EVER accept defeat. Instead of doing so, they prefer jumping up and down with glee whenever China (either directly or by proxy) threatens Taiwan, as if to say, "Look, it's all Chen Shui-bian's fault." The disinformation the pan-blues feed to the foreign media always attempts to place blame for the tension on Chen rather than on the 600 missiles China has aimed at Taiwan.

Latest related news
Just today, Taiwan's High Court announced that they had rejected the pan-blue losers' request to annul the results of Taiwan's March 20, 2004 presidential election, saying that "the election commission did not break any laws," and thus upholding Chen Shui-bian's election victory. Despite the lack of evidence, pan-blue politicians exhibited cartoonishly melodramatic behavior (such as falling on the ground and wailing) for the TV cameras when they heard the announcement. Pan-blue spokespersons on Taiwan's talk shows tonight continue to spout lies about "dead people" having voted in that election, make ludicrous comparisons to the recent situation in the Ukraine, and claim that their post-election protests back in March and April were "peaceful."

If the pan-blues had an ounce of proof that there was any voter fraud, the presiding judge (a pan-blue supporter!) would certainly have ruled in their favor -- but it didn't happen, so their theatrics will apparently continue 'til the end of time.

RELATED LINKS:
* The March 26, 2004 CNN article quoted above
* The March 29, 2004 Washington Post article quoted above
* A March 31, 2004 Taipei Times article: "Presidential Office blasts 'Washington Post' for distortion"
* The April 12, 2004 Washington Post article quoted above

NEXT UP: Rebellion without a cause, or "Democracy is evil"