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"Pay close attention to that man behind the curtain!"

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Ma Ying-jeou is not a lawyer

... so stop saying that!

Taiwan's president-elect Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) graduated from Harvard Law School, but unlike his opponent Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and his predecessor Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), Ma never passed the bar exam.

Yet a simple Google search locates multitudinous examples of people calling Ma a "lawyer." Where did this meme come from, and can it be stopped? That all depends on whether you, the reader, fall for the media's lies.

Count the lies and measure the flattery
Look who's fluffing Ma Ying-jeou!

With Saturday's election results putting Ma's win at the top of Google News' English-language page, and with the lie about him being right in the first sentence of so many articles, it's more than I can silently endure.

Lies about Ma Ying-jeou
A March 23, 2008 search of Google News for
["Ma Ying-jeou" "Harvard-educated lawyer"]

Notice the article from the Malaysia Sun there, which is already calling Ma "president" almost two months prior to his inauguration instead of "president-elect."

Furthermore, his party isn't just called "the Nationalists" or "the Nationalist Party" -- it's the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT or 中國國民黨), as the Mandarin version of their own web site and political ads will tell you:

The first two characters mean ''Chinese''
Why doesn't most of the English-language media
use the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) full name
like the party does in Mandarin on its own web site?

A-gu (阿牛) tells us that the China Times (中國時報) is saying that "79% are happy about Ma's victory." How is that even possible when he only got 58.45% of the vote? (Yo, Raj, the key word is "happy.")

All the "fluffing" has got to stop. Come May 20, 2008, let's see if the media treats Ma the same way they did Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). I won't be holding my breath waiting for that to happen. They're already calling his wife "Big Sister Mei-ching."

Peace?
People are suggesting that things will be more peaceful with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in the presidential office and with a 3/4 majority in the legislature. I'd like anybody who believes that to take a look at this collection of recent clips of the pots who would call kettles black:


0:31 YouTube video: "Is the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) better than the DPP?"


Silver linings?
Ma's willingness (so far) to use English with the international media may let more people around the world hear his moment-to-moment self-contradictions. Then again, that would require a slightly diligent media instead of one that acts as his "fluffer."
- - -
* Well, he might be considered an "abogado" in Mexico, but not too many other places.
Legalities: , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

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