<$BlogRSDUrl$>

"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!

Labels: , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted at 4:30 AM by: [Permalink]

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Results of Taiwan's 2008 presidential election

Getting graphic

The Sunday Taipei Times has the election results online in graphic form, available as a PDF download.

There are also three articles on the two failed referendums:
* Referendums fail to meet thresholds

* ANALYSIS: Referendum failure could bring necessary reforms [plus a graphic containing translated ballots and pie charts]

* Torn ballots, some arrests reported as the nation votes
The short story is that because of the Chinese Nationalist Party''s (KMT) on-again, off-again boycott of both referendums, the threshold was not met for either one. Therefore, even though 94.01% of the ballots cast for the DPP said "yes" to their proposal to join the United Nations (UN) using the name "Taiwan," and more than 84% of those cast for the KMT-proposed/-boycotted referendum to "'rejoin' the international body using the name 'Republic of China' or any other 'practical' title that would uphold the country's dignity" also said "yes," both referendums failed. There's also the issue of the US government's "denunciation" of the referendums.

Much more info behind those links, including some partisan arrests for suspected vote buying which was nothing like the discussions in non-hushed tones that happened right in front of me yesterday.

The tautology of not throwing hissy fits
Another article gets the headline "Foreign observers laud peaceful poll." Duh! The simple reason it was peaceful is because DPP supporters don't riot when their candidates lose elections, unlike the KMT, which has done so many times before. Be sure not to miss Lien Chan's (連戰) low-class hissy fit described within that very article.
Ballots, not bullets: , , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Posted at 5:03 AM by: [Permalink]

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Ma Ying-jeou wins Taiwan presidency

Back to square one for Taiwan's democracy

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has won today's presidential election. The web site of Taiwan's Central Election Commission (CEC) says that Ma obtained 58.45% of the vote (7,658,724 votes), and that his only competitor, Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) of the DPP, got 41.55% (5,445,239 votes). With 17,321,603 eligible voters this time around, that gives a turnout of 75.65%, despite the good weather which defied forecasts all across Taiwan.

None of the "dirty tricks" the KMT claimed the DPP would pull came to be, including fires, accusations of sexual misconduct, assassination attempts, or surprise press conferences.

And since the KMT candidate won, there are no riots tonight like there were in 2004, which is about the only "positive" thing I have to say about this.

What's next?
A-gu (阿牛) has some good suggestions about changes the DPP needs to make. I'll save my own thoughts on this for later, but I think his suggestions are a good start.

In the meantime, there will obviously be a lot more fluffing of Ma Ying-jeou by the media, as indicated by this BBC profile of Ma whose first sentence begins, "The US-educated lawyer..."

Ma studied law, but he is not a lawyer because he never passed the bar exam.

Keep an eye out for articles in the English-language media which will say that Ma has "brought peace to Taiwan." As I hinted at above, the lack of pan-blue riots may seem "peaceful," but when pan-blue legislators come show up at your door doing "surprise inspections" or when you go through a "trial by pan-blue media," the feeling will be a bit different. Also, the kind of "peace" the media will be describing is that which comes from kowtowing to the bullies in Beijing who had no right to begin with to create the difficulties that have been faced by Taiwan.

By the way, how many of you readers would sell your vote -- and, therefore, your country and your freedom -- for NT$1,300 (~US$42.62), or even 1,000 times that amount? I really want to know.
Stubs: , , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Posted at 10:17 PM by: [Permalink]

Rocking Taiwan's vote

Punk the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)

Jonathan Adams recently wrote about Taiwan's DPP supposedly losing the youth vote, backing up his claims with numbers from the very blue United Daily News (聯合報) and all sorts of pan-blue talking points. Well, it certainly won't be the case if Freddy Lim (林昶佐) has anything to say about it.

Take a look at the can-do attitude and positive energy displayed in the music videos below, which I hope to see reflected across Taipei and all of Taiwan today:


向逆轉隊致敬，我們一定逆轉勝！
(Translation: Saluting the comeback team: We'll surely turn the tide!)
Video via the Freddy Action blog.


3:45 YouTube video: "逆轉．勝 守護台灣 FreddyAction"
(Translation: Comeback victory, protect Taiwan)

At the March 16, 2008 DPP rally in Taichung's Gancheng Park (干城公園), I saw more young people than I usually notice at such events.

Horny babes - Hosted by ImageShack
Sexy babes light up the campaign merchandise
table at the March 19, 2008 DPP rally in Taichung
(Click to view full resolution image)

Frank Hsieh and Su Tseng-chang - Hosted by ImageShack
Candidates Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) between bows
(Click to view full resolution image)

Never give up. Let's see Taiwan headed towards a bright future!
Motivators: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted at 2:55 AM by: [Permalink]

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Hsieh within 3 percentage points of Ma

Finally, a green survey

Today's Taipei Times reports some good news:
Another poll released by the Southern Taiwan Society yesterday showed that Ma had the support of 41 percent of respondents, while Hsieh was backed by 38 percent.
That's within the margin of error.

Somebody also posted the info to Wikipedia, with a strange qualification:
And South News is on the extreme end of Pan-Green.
WTF? Of course, no source is there to back up that claim.

More info at South News (南方快報). Gotta post this quick.
Polling data: , , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Posted at 11:59 PM by: [Permalink]

Monday, March 10, 2008

Taiwan: Frank Hsieh & Ma Ying-jeou's second presidential debate

Televised March 9, 2008

As happened coincidentally with the first debate on February 24, I was busy with family matters, so I can't comment on the content just yet. But YouTube user ricky200708 has posted all of the videos from yesterday's debate between Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and compiled them in playlist form:


20-part YouTube playlist: "2008/03/09 第二場總統大選電視辯論會"
(Translation: March 9, 2008 Second televised presidential debate


Notice the different elements from the usual YouTube player, including the arrows that will appear at the sides of the screen when you hover your cursor over the video, the thumbnails that will appear at the bottom, and the button to the right of Play/Pause which will show/hide the thumbnails. When the thumbnail view is enabled, you will also see smaller arrows to the left and/or right of the thumbnails, allowing you to see thumbnails and titles for the previous/next group of videos.

Discuss in comments (on Taiwan Matters!).

UPDATE: Here is a report and some transcripts/translations (all English) from the debate via Monday's Taipei Times.
* Hsieh, Ma face off in last debate (report)
* Presidential election 2008: 12 days to go: Hsieh and Ma face the nation (transcript/translation) (Check out Ma's huge distortion within that transcript about the defense budget that his party blocked for 6 years.)
* Presidential election 2008: 12 days to go: Presidential hopefuls spar on critical issues (transcript/translation) (See Ma "one-China" Ying-jeou talk about a "Taiwan-centric" China policy!) [/update]
Dancing pixels: , , , , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

Labels: , , , , , , , , ,

Posted at 4:20 PM by: [Permalink]

Monday, February 25, 2008

Hsieh-Ma debate

What'd we miss?

I was busy doing family things on Sunday, so I didn't get to see the debate between Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) -- candidates in Taiwan's 2008 presidential election to be held on March 22, 2008. However, videos of the debate have been uploaded to YouTube by others.


9'03" YouTube video: "2008/02/24 總統大選電視辯論會Part.01 如何改善通貨膨漲 -蔡孟珊"
(Translation: Presidential Election Televised Debate Part 01:
How can the effects of inflation be lessened?
[question asked by] Tsai Meng-shan)


Above is part 1 of the debate, uploaded by YouTube user ricky200708. See the remaining 22 parts on his YouTube channel. I haven't had the time to watch the whole debate yet.

The next one is scheduled for March 9, 2008. Feel free to discuss Sunday's debate in the comments on Taiwan Matters!.
Buzzers and bells: , , , , , , , , ,

Cross-posted at Taiwan Matters!

Labels: , , , , , , , , ,

Posted at 3:10 AM by: [Permalink]
eXTReMe Tracker
This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?