That's Impossible! Politics from Taiwan

Revisiting single member districts

2012-01-16T23:53:00.000+08:00

Much to my surprise, there seems to be some rather thorough dissatisfaction in the legislature with the current single member district system. Not only has Speaker Wang Jin-pyng restated his long held belief the single member district is "not good for democracy," but the DPP is likely to introduce a constitutional amendment next legislative session, and also will ask the Constitutional Court to rule on the constitutionality of the current system.

One of the issues the media has raised is that the single member districts have turned "blue" areas bluer and green areas greener, further polarizing the country along north-south lines.

Since larger parties benefit from a single member district system, it's interesting to see them regretting a policy that has increased their own clout. We'll see what changes are actually proposed. Right now, the legislature seems just to be in the complaining phase.

What next?

2012-01-16T09:08:00.000+08:00

So the DPP loss is not unexpected, though I find it disappointing. But the big question now is how the KMT and CCP will conduct their relations over the next four years. No doubt, the closeness of this election and the uncertainty of a future KMT candidate's popularity -- combined with the fact that most non-political topics have already been discussed between the two sides -- will result in CCP intentions to "ratchet down" the '92 consensus through a written agreement and a possible peace agreement.

From Beijing's perspective, the best course of action is to lock Taiwan in to some sort of political framework before anyone else can win or lose. From the KMT's perspective, this is also beneficial, as it gives them the option of painting any non-'92 policy the DPP may advocate as "dangerous," as they've just done, but perhaps with a stronger effect. Indeed, both the KMT and CCP hope that they can ultimately force the DPP to adopt the '92 consensus and eventually the "inevitability" of political integration.

It seems nearly certain that the CCP and KMT will reach some sort of compromise on this front over the next term, leaving the DPP completely out of the discussions.

The question is, how effective will Beijing's pressure be, and how much are they willing to compromise? Similarly, to what extent can the KMT hold out from various pressures, and how much can they convince China it must accept a more Taiwanese-conscious oriented solution?

As you may know, I've long speculated on what form any peace accord could take, and mostly drew blanks, but I'm starting to believe we may see something quite modest in terms of substance but full of the same pomp you'd expect from a full blown "peace agreement." It might yet be labeled a peace agreement, but I wouldn't be surprised if it avoided such language in favor of merely declaring the basis of cross-strait discussion to be the '92 consensus, and finding a way to define that term.

Voting result breakdown by county

2012-01-15T09:34:00.002+08:00

Legislative breakdown: Apple Daily is reporting the KMT wins 64 seats, a majority; the DPP 40 seats, the PFP and TSU 3 seats each, and nonpartisans or NPSU candidates winning 3 seats. This is a relative loss of 17 seats for the KMT and an increase of 13 for the TSU.

On the presidential side, note the relative balance of areas where a party wins more than say, 55% of the vote. The DPP is not really all that dominant even in most places it wins.

2012 Presidential Elections percentages and votes

	Ma / Wu ticket	Ing / Chia ticket	Soong / Lin ticket
Taipei City	57.87%、928717 votes	39.54%、634565	2.58%，41448
Taipei County	53.72%、1245673	43.45%、1007551	2.81%、65269
Taichung City	52.15%、792334	44.68%、678736	3.16%、48030
Tainan City	39.80%、435274	57.72%、631232	2.47%、27066
Kaohsiung City	44.18%、730461	53.42%、883158	2.38%、39469
Yilan County	44.88%、115496	52.52%、135156	2.58%、6652
Taoyuan County	57.20%、639151	39.85%、445308	2.94%、32927
Hsinchu County	65.76%、190797	30.93%、89741	3.30%、9599
Hsinchu City	57.43%、134728	39.48%、92632	3.07%、7216
Miaoli County	63.84%、206200	33.18%、107164	2.97%、9597
Zhanghua County	50.58%、369968	46.49%、340069	2.92%、21403
Nanto County	54.62%、158703	42.36%、123077	3.00%、8726
Yunlin County	41.67%、159891	55.81%、214141	2.51%、9662
Chiayi County	39.04%、120946	58.57%、181463	2.37%、7364
Pingtung County	42.92%、211571	55.13%、271722	1.94%、9562
Taitung County	66.47%、72823	30.50%、33417	3.02%、3313
Hualian County	70.29%、118815	25.94%、43845	3.76%、6359
Penghu County	49.75%、22579	45.65%、20717	4.58%、2082
Keelung City	59.28%、128294	36.76%、79562	3.94%、8533
Chiayi City	46.26%、69535	51.04%、76711	2.68%、4042
Jinmen County	89.23%、34676	8.21%、3193	2.54%、990
Lianjiang County	86.60%、4507	8.03%、418	5.36%、279
Total votes	51.60%、6891139	45.63%、6093578	2.76%、369588

Re: Taishang

2012-01-14T12:56:00.001+08:00

After reading articles like this, I wonder: doesn't anyone consider whether Taishang in China will lie about their voting intentions while in China? Or even after they get back to Taiwan? After all, it's a secret ballot. Why take any risk?

watch election results LIVE

2012-01-14T00:48:00.001+08:00

Watch Taiwan election results tonight live using this link.

Just sayin'

2012-01-07T14:21:00.000+08:00

The Tsai campaign has been making some noise about a "post partisan era" that they intend to usher in. This is all well and good if you have some expectation that the KMT will cooperate, and I think the DPP is clearly aware that they wouldn't.

So why say these things as the election nears? First, and most obviously, this stance attracts middle voters who do not subscribe to the traditional blue-green divide and who yearn for cooperation and consensus, values highly treasured in Taiwan society if not in its political culture. But secondly, maybe this position is an early outreach to Soong Chu-yi and the PFP.

In some crazy world where the PFP actually manages to win enough legislative seats that it could form a coalition government with the DPP, Tsai's call to post-partisanship might be a stealth signal to the PFP. And if Soong wishes to remain relevant, he might just give legs to a "Taiwan consensus" policy by allowing the DPP to negotiate with the most viable "pro-unification" party, resulting in some sort of "One China Constitution" position that the KMT will have a great deal of trouble refuting directly.

If this scenario miraculously plays out, the question will be: does Soong love the spotlight more than his strict adherence to pro-unification principles? I suspect he loves the spotlight more.

Pressure on Tsai to name non-'92 consensus policy

2011-12-28T11:16:00.000+08:00

The Taiwan blue media (plus Apple Daily), as well as a pro-China outlet, are stepping up the pressure on Tsai Ing-wen tot explain what sort of policy she can adopt to replace the "proven" '92 consensus and prevent relations from "deteriorating." Naturally, this analysis ignores that China intentionally deteriorates relations anytime they don't get what they want, which in this case is an admission that Taiwan is part of the same country as the PRC.

Apple Daily publishes a piece by Professor Chu Yan-gui (朱言貴), who not only intentionally misidentifies the US Taiwan policy as adhering to the "One China Principle" but also mislabels "One China, two interpretations" as a policy China has adopted. But the author raises another point: just as the DPP can't give up the principle of Taiwan's "independence" [even while the real policy is self-determination], China can't give up "One China," so obviously... only the KMT can work around this problem and maintain peace and stability. This analysis ignores that China alone causes tensions, and that there was plenty of peace under Chen Shui-bian's administration. Calls to war are one-sided. The editorial fails to lay blame where it lies and also fails to admit that there can be plenty of peaceful progress without the One China principal, as there was under Chen. This progress need not sacrifice Taiwan's sovereignty.

The United Daily News asks similar questions in a signed editorial, but I found this passage most pointed:

The one character difference between "Chinese Taipei" with a national reference, as China uses and "Chinese Taipei" with a cultural reference as Taiwan uses has tortured cross-strait relations for 20 or 30 years, and that is a topic that our government disputes as it ought to. The '92 consensus of "One China, two interpretations," involved retreating one step but advancing ten; only with this could the two sides implement the three links or sign the ECFA, and this is an example of retreating when appropriate. Stating that both sides of the strait belong to One China, or that the two sides belong to the same Zhonghua Minzu is also retreating one step to advance ten. Chinese Culture is a cultural and historical concept, not a political label.

中國台北、中華台北一字之差就折騰了兩岸二、三十年，那是當爭則爭。九二共識、一中各表，退一步、進十步，兩岸才能大三通，才能簽定ＥＣＦＡ，那是當退則退。同岸同屬一個中國，抑或兩岸同屬一個中華民族，也是退一步，進十步。中華是文化和歷史概念，不是政治符號。

How does this paragraph at once acknowledge the Ma government's acceptance of Taiwan and China being the same country, and down play this threat down in favor of an entirely different "cultural and historical" model? I posit they aim to confuse the distinction, bolstering support for a political "same country" policy by trying to graft feelings people have about culture onto that "same country" model.

China Review News goes further, suggesting that the DPP hopes to identify "peace" with "unification" in order to frighten people onto the road of "independence." Their obvious conclusion, of course, is that Taiwanese Independence obviously means (to the DPP!) a lack of peace and a state of war. This nonsense needs no further elaboration on my part.

A fair question all these articles raise -- has Tsai answered these questions to the satisfaction of the electorate? Do people care enough about cross-strait policy, and if they do, will the medium voter be swayed to Tsai's side or be scared off?

We'll see.

Tsai supports TSU

2011-12-26T12:41:00.001+08:00

Just saw this! Tsai Ing-wen is openly inviting DPP-sympathetic voters to give their at large votes the the TSU. I guess Tsai imagines that the party hardcore will stick with the DPP while "independents" might be attracted to Lee Teng-hui's part. More substantially, maybe she's hoping that if any one party breaks the 5% threshold, it better be the TSU.

與民進黨守護台灣小英︰盼台聯過5％

Not sure how politically astute this suggestion is in the long run, but perhaps she's just throwing a dog a bone without any expectation that voters will change their minds and DPP strength will remain as strong as it could get anyway.

I'm a bit surprised and am not sure of the political implications, but quite pleased (emotionally) with this move.

CNA is So Not All That

2011-12-19T04:43:00.001+08:00

I checked Weibo for hits related to the Taiwan election debate, and found some interest but few overwhelmingly positive reviews. Most people felt the debates were dry or politically correct Others said it was basically interesting, and most expressing any preference said they liked Soong's performance.

But Taiwan's Central News Agency, already plagued with image problems due to KMT interference in their operations, put out a propaganda piece instead about how the "mainland" people wish they could have exactly this sort of debate!

Frankly, it looks like CNA knew the article they wanted for their preconceived headline, and sought out posts that would fit their thesis. I don't think that's good journalism.

The sloppiness doesn't start there, of course; check out CNA's recent headline "Scholarly World Supports Ma," which is really about a pro-Ma group of scholars forming their pro-Ma organization.

One of my favorite websites is NewsRumble, which contrasts news (mostly editorials) from the same paper before and after Ma's election. Mostly it's to show how these papers act as attack dogs and shields for the KMT. NewsRumble doesn't update too frequently, and they've more or less run the gamut on most issues by now (you know, who's fault the bad economy is and so on). But I still check in every now and then for the giggles.

I'll believe it when I see it

2011-12-17T12:48:00.003+08:00

I was surprised by Su Jia-chyuan's comment about the DPP's plans to classify Hakka, Holo Taiwanese and aboriginal languages into 'national languages' if elected.

I was always thrilled about how much the DPP did much to advance the treatment of these previously repressed languages (a policy which, by the way, the KMT did continue by developing input methods for both Holo Taiwanese and Hakka). And the DPP not only established the Hakka television station but also made Holo Taiwanese respectable in public settings in a way the KMT never did.

Still, I can't see how the DPP's latest gesture is much more than lip service.

I've often contended you can't revive Hakka and Holo Taiwanese by making them an elective class kids take twice a week. You can't even do it by making it a mandatory class for every year of students' education. The only way to make people competently fluent again is to force them to use it in a wide array of situations. The best way to do this would be to teach one or two core subjects in a non-Mandarin language every year -- and rotate that so that kids are exposed to all core subjects in multiple languages over the course of their education. I don't see how else you solve the problem of these languages disappearing. And this argument of mine, rather well founded in the experiences of other multilingual countries, is universally rejected in Taiwan. So either I'm completely wrong or everyone else is blind.

Some people don't even realize these languages are disappearing, and for no language is this more true than Holo Taiwanese . Native Holo Taiwanese speakers in their thirties will laugh at the idea of Holo Taiwanese disappearing, because they still speak it all the time -- all while their own children forget how to speak after their first weeks in kindergarten. And to make matters worse, they're largely indifferent to the loss of their mother tongue. "Eh, it won't help you make money," seems to be the most common sentiment. Is money the point of life, of education, of culture? Golden calf, anyone?

In any case, we'll see just how much more the DPP is willing to strengthen Hakka, Holo and aboriginal languages. We already have the television networks for Hakka and aboriginal languages; how much farther will they go? My guess is they won't manage to make more than the most shallow, symbolic gesture. And that pains me greatly.

Ma's muddling of identity

2011-12-05T08:37:00.000+08:00

Forget that Ma Ying-jeou is trying to have it both ways, calling Taiwan a "country" for the first time to gain political points, while at the same time maintaining an official policy that relegates Taiwan to one of many provinces of China.

The President himself made one mistake and one telling claim when explaining how using "Taiwan" as a moniker for the ROC mirrors international practices.

Ma noted that the Netherlands is often known as Holland abroad. It's true that English speakers use the Netherlands and Holland interchangeably; not so much the Dutch themselves. The provinces of North and South Holland account for two of that country's twelve provinces, so this is a case of pars pro toto, whereby foreigners who don't know much better take the two terms to mean the same thing. Actually, this is a very apt analogy, as Ma is trying to get people to think he's equating Taiwan with the ROC when he's really claiming Taiwan is but a small part of the ROC (which for him, includes Hong Kong, China, and parts of neighboring countries).

Ma then incorrectly formulates that England = Great Britain = United Kingdom, when in fact these are each distinct political entities. I'm sure you can look that one up yourself if you're not clear on the distinctions.

Actually for me I guess the biggest surprise was just seeing the Want Daily's news articles linked on Taiwan's Yahoo! News. That's a new development for me. As far as I know, they are not printing but just web posting (their print paper is the China Times). Their slogan of "Taiwan First, Best [paper] on Either Side of the Strait" says all you need to know about their focus.

Oddly enough....

2011-12-03T14:55:00.001+08:00

I think Soong is winning the debate.

Musings

2011-11-22T13:14:00.001+08:00

Ha! Now that Ma has sued the DPP, and the KMT has sued Next Weekly, how could this story possibly play out to the KMT's advantage? They'll be attacked from all angles now -- press freedom, freedom of speech, and of course the fundamental question about why Ma was meeting a well-known bookie ever -- and how can this possibly work out in their favor?

Desperation, I suppose. Perhaps they really are more scared than they'd like to appear.

On a side note, we've seen very little coverage of the legislative election, as others have noted, which is a function of a few things. One that gets little attention is the general lack of local news coverage of Taiwan. Almost all news is completely nationalized; news from Taipei completely dominates, with the South getting the short end of the stick unless there's a scandal or great food.

So since there are no real newspapers or media serving any single district, and with Taiwan's ultra-competitive eight cable news station, 24-hour news cycle, how can a station justify covering those individual races unless there's something scandalous enough to interest the entire country?

Another factor is that legislators are campaigning on the ground very hard, but in all the traditional ways -- visiting temples, sending trucks around, going to night markets, handing out things on street corners. And the media simply doesn't send the resources to cover these campaigns in a comprehensive way. It would be a lot of work, and basically, there's not enough money for that. The media instead follow party headquarters' announced schedules. They leave Taipei when the presidential candidates leave, for the most part, and they don't have the money to cover the local races.

Actually this is a big chance for a coordinated blogosphere effort to step in and make the coverage others can't. The traditional media could even lead the charge, if they had the sense, and do iReport style election coverage for these local races. Instead, what we see is brief biographies of legislative candidates of major news aggregation sites (mostly Yahoo, Yam a distant second), and whatever news related to their race that manages to make it into the national spotlight as links underneath.

Probably not, but

2011-11-22T12:50:00.000+08:00

Think there's any chance Sissy is telling the truth or has inside info on this?

Mixing

2011-11-22T10:02:00.000+08:00

Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) is not the only guy who looks like he's mixing governmental duties and election stuff related to the ROC 100 celebrations.

As evidence, enjoy these scans from a pamphlet I picked up from the Houston ROC 100 event. These pamphlets were distributed for free by the TECO table. Click to enlarge. They avoid being *too* overtly political, but lots of Ma butt kissing going on here.

This cookie doesn't crumble

2011-11-21T04:34:00.001+08:00

I love how Tsai pushes back under criticism. In this case, she's responding to Ma's recent comments:

In an interview with ETTV, Ma defended his integrity and said he did not meet with [Bookie] Chen on Sept. 10 during a campaign visit to Chiayi.

“The magazine made a false accusation and the DPP jumped on the bandwagon to spread the rumors. This is a vicious culture,” he said.

And in a related article:

“The foreign press has described Tsai as a Robin Hood-like heroine, but to my understanding Robin Hood should fight for justice, rather than spread rumors and set up decent people,” Ma said on Saturday.

Tsai's response?

On the evening of the 19th, DPP Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen expressed that Ma Ying-jeou had seen a person he shouldn't see [A-gu: the bookie Chen Ying-chu, who Ma admits to meeting, just not on the dates Next accused him of] and that when society suspected Ma for this behavior, Ma surprisingly attacked Tsai herself for spreading rumors and libel...

民進黨總統參選人蔡英文19日晚間在屏東表示，總統馬英九去見了不該見的人，被社會質疑時，竟批評她造謠抹黑...

Gotta give to her, she's a tough but warm, calm and collected cookie.

Pretty sure Soong just destroyed his candidacy

2011-11-19T14:51:00.000+08:00

As the 10/18 episode of 2100 pointed out to me tonight, Soong stated he's a guy from Henan Province working in Taiwan, and what's the problem with that?

Expect this to appear in the blue media especially again and again as the election approaches. The 2100 guests were universally derisive of his stance, ignoring the compatibility of that stance with KMT dogma.

Damn, I never see that banana peel.

2011-11-19T12:22:00.001+08:00

Just a month ago, [Eng | Ch], President Ma was defending his plans to increase the farmers' monthly farm subsidy by a measly NT$316 (US$10.47) over the current NT$6,000 subsidy.

The one thing you couldn't say about this plan was that it amounted to vote buying. It was more of an insult.

The DPP plan, by contrast, was for an NT$1,000 dollar increase (to a total of $7,000 per month), while some KMT legislators were calling for as much as $10,000 a month total subsidy.

Back in October, Ma made an excellent point:

The good point of systematizing the farm subsidy system is that it will prevent a populist bidding war every time an election approaches. To avoid the care of old farmers becoming a competition or a weapon between both parties is more fair and reasonable to the farmers, looking at it from the perspective of social justice.

將老農津貼制度化的好處在於，不會每逢選舉就被拿出來做民粹式喊價，使對老農的照顧不會變成政黨之間競逐或者鬥爭的一種手段，從社會正義的角度來看，這對老農也較為公平與合理。

Ma changes his mind today, adopting the DPP plan of an NT$1,000 increase in the subsidy, probably under intense pressure from the KMT legislative caucus and local faction networks. As Ma put it,

Ma said he decided to call for a meeting to discuss the issue on Thursday night after meeting with Taiwan Organization for Disadvantaged Patients secretary-general Yang Yu-xing (楊玉欣) and other civic groups earlier that day to talk about subsidy programs for civic groups.

“They told me that many social welfare subsidies haven’t been adjusted for 10 to 18 years and suggested that the government should make up for the shortfall, so that the systemized subsidy programs would help more people, and they persuaded me of their case,” he said on the sidelines of a campaign event in Taipei City.

So the Ma campaign chooses to embarrass itself and admit being wrong rather than continue to resist massive pressure come across party lines. It's probably a better decision than leaving the $316 subsidy in place, but it shows what a bad job the KMT is doing at controlling the agenda and media focus as the election closes in. This move also helps reinforce DPP criticisms of KMT indecisiveness and incompetence.

Update: Don't forget that this "new" topic will take attention off allegations that Ma took shitloads of money from an election bookie.

Next Magazine right for once?

2011-11-17T23:02:00.000+08:00

Too early to say. Obviously, the rag Next Magazine is not exactly a bastion of accuracy, but they recently had an article saying President Ma Ying-jeou had a recent secret meeting with Gambling Kingpin Chen Ying-chu (陳盈助) in Chiayi on Sept. 10 and asked for a huge donation. "According to the magazine, Chen is allegedly in charge of major underground betting activities on local elections." Read the Taipei Times coverage here.

I wouldn't have paid this story any mind at all except that Ma's office has released his schedule from Sept 10th as evidence there was no such secret meeting. Unfortunately for Ma, scrutiny of that list quickly revealed a potentially weak alibi. You can find reports in September newspapers about everything on Ma's schedule that day except for a two and a half hour "symposium with scholars" 「學者座談會」. That is to say, no media knew about the symposium; Ma will probably be asked at this point to point out who was there, what they talked about, etc.

I would have to suggest that Ma's image as a "clean" politician will require some real proof to change, but a political donation would be more believable to most than directly lining his own pockets. It's hard to say what kind of scandal this could become, but related stories are quite hot right now on the tw.news.yahoo.com site.

真是的

2011-11-16T01:29:00.002+08:00

In case you have any lingering suspicions about the Chinese definition of the '92 consensus, Politburo Standing Committee member Jia Qinglin (贾庆林) reminds us yet again in a story covered solidly by blue media so far:

賈慶林強調，推動兩岸
關係和平發展，必須把
握四個關鍵：一是堅持
大陸和台灣同屬一個中
國作為政治基礎；二是
把深化交流合作、推進
協商談判作為重要途徑
；三是把促進兩岸同胞
團結奮鬥作為強大動力
；四是要繼續反對台獨
，這是推動兩岸關係和
，平發展的必要條件。

Jia Qinglin emphasized that pushing forward peaceful development of cross strait relations necessitates protecting four key requirements: the first is to insist that the mainland and Taiwan both belong to the same "One China" as a political foundation; the second is deepening exchanges and cooperation, with emphasis on promoting discussions and negotiations; the third is to encourage compatriots on both sides of the straight to strive in solidarity, becoming a powerful force; and fourth is to continue opposing Taiwanese Independence. These are the necessary conditions for the peaceful development of cross-strait relations.

It seems China is stepping up expectations on the KMT. The second condition seems to be a threat that "talks must go on," so that when economic and cultural issues are all resolved -- aka, after the election -- then political talks must begin, if not conclude.

The third condition to me seems to be a not so veiled reference to united effort between Taiwan and China on resolving territorial disputes in the Senkaku Islands and the South China Sea. While it's been obvious for some time that China and the KMT were promoting such a policy, this is the first time I've seen China vocalize that, and certainly the first time I've seen them name it as a "necessary condition" for continued peaceful development of relations.

The fourth condition looks almost like a repeat of the first, but there is a subtle difference: one could argue, as Frank Hsieh did in his 2004 campaign, that constitutionally, like it or not, Taiwan is claiming to legally be the rightful government of PRC territory as well as Taiwan (this is called "the constitutional One China" argument 憲法一中論). This satisfies the first condition. But like Frank Hsieh, one can hold that position and also argue that the constitution does not reflect reality and that only the Taiwanese people have a right to determine Taiwan's future. That would not meet the "requirements" of condition four.

One could suggest this is an attempt to shoot down the possibility of a DPP administration reasserting old Frankie's policy, and claiming that "yes, the constitution says we're the same country" yet at the same time staving off moves toward annexation. A clever policy the DPP is pushing calls for amending the referendum law to require referendums on agreements with China (as they're doing now). So China may be trying to say this, too, is a "provocative" action that they will not tolerate.

Of course ultimately, China is just staking out the most aggressive position possible so that in the event of a DPP victory, they have a stronger position from which to begin negotiations. Still, I find this development interesting.

In other news, Ma Ying-jeou seems to be back on the "referendum before [negotiating] peace accord" train which he had seemingly jumped off of.

That's about right

2011-11-11T09:37:00.003+08:00

CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets polled 1612 folks between Nov 4th and 6th that agree with other recent "within margin of error" polls which came out of the pro-KMT China Times and TVBS : in the CLSA poll, Ma was at 44.2％ and Tsai at 43.1％.

Update: TVBS poll shows the same, with Tsai "winning" by 1%. So this one's gonna be a squeaker.

Update 2: Liberty Times poll shows the same. So polls across party lines now agree -- Ma/Tsai support is essentially tied, with Soong getting around 10% of the vote.

Hmm

2011-11-04T12:24:00.003+08:00

If you speak Chinese, please see minute 19:04 through 19:35 of this video. Here, Ma stumbles over himself, saying that all decisions he makes consider the benefit to the country and the party. The host helps him get out of the problem, immediately suggesting "but the country's benefit is most important," to which Ma responds, "of course."

In some sense, there's nothing to see here; all politicians consider the benefit of their party. But it's foolish to put these things together as equally important in a public interview.

Family Feud buzzer

2011-11-04T00:28:00.001+08:00

President Ma had a funny recollection while praising the '92 consensus:

Ma recalled that Harding had a meeting with former President Chen Shui-bian during a visit he made to Taiwan 11 years ago, at which time Chen said he would accept the "1992 consensus" if Beijing would also accept it.

Twenty-four hours later, however, then-Mainland Affairs Council Minister Tsai Ing-wen denied that Chen's statement represented government policy, Ma said.

Tsai is now the opposition Democratic Progressive Party's chairwoman and presidential candidate.

According to Ma, Tsai's continued denial of the existence of the "1992 consensus" could upset the stability of cross-strait relations in the future if she is elected.

It's such a funny recollection because it's clearly false. Chinese articles on Ma's speech say Ma said the press release about this is still on the Presidential website. So let's go find it!

If you do a search for Harry Harding's name (何漢理) we get a few hits, and sure enough one of them is from 11 years ago (or even in that time range). And in that press release, we see exactly what Ma is talking about:

President Chen expressed that the new government was willing to accept the consensus previously reached between the SEF and ARATS, which is "One China, two interpretations," but that the mainland side won't acknowledge this, instead only mentioning their "One China" policy, which considers the Republic of China [Taiwan] to be a part of the People's Republic of China. The view that "One China" means "The People's Republic of China" is a viewpoint that the people of Taiwan cannot accept, and as a result it is not possible to reopen the door to negotiations, which actually is very disappointing. We hope to restart negotiations as quickly as possible, to find commonalities in our differences, and to find a definition of "One China" that both sides can accept.We have no predetermined position, and [seek] no predetermined conclusion. We are willing to shake hands & sit down to talk with the Chinese Communist leader Jiang Zemin in a situation with a flexible format, location and topics.

總統進一步表示，新政府願意接受海基、海協兩會之前會談的共識，那就是「一個中國、各自表述」，但是大陸方面卻不承認，而另外提出「一個中國」政策，認為中華民國是中華人民共和國的一部分，所謂的「一個中國」就是中華人民共和國，這種觀點是台灣人民無法接受的，如此也導致無法重新啟開協商大門，實在令人遺憾。我們希望儘速恢復協商，存異求同，並就「一個中國」的內容，找出雙方都可接受的涵義。我們沒有預設立場，也沒有預設結論，願意在不拘形式、地點與議題的情況下，與中共領導人江澤民先生坐下來，握手言談。

I'm sure you can see the issue here. Because we've been through this many times before. The "92 consensus Ma defines as "One China, two interpretations" doesn't exist. There is no mutual non-denial. The PRC flatly denies 'two interpretations.' See for yourself. As I said back then after reading this People's Daily article:

China objects strongly to any "two interpretations" phrasing, saying that although the political content of 'One China' could be ignored, there simply was no "two interpretations" to the consensus in that November 1992 agreement (既然没有讨论，根本就没有什么“各自表述”的共识。).

Hopefully, Ma's mention of the press release on the Presidential website will help spur people with fuzzier understandings on this topic to look it up and see how he's flat out lying. I'm not so sure Ma's comments can withstand a full assault.

They said it better than I could

2011-10-25T06:49:00.003+08:00

An analytical piece from My Formosa has really caught my attention. Peace Agreement news has been flying all week, because since Ma's initial proposal Monday -- where he listed three conditions for the law:

However, Ma, who is running for re-election in the Jan. 14 presidential election, said his administration would only do so if it had strong domestic support and if such a pact met the needs of the country. Any pact would have to be supervised by the legislature, he added.

-- since making that tremendously bold political move, he's managed to make a joke of his own proposal and give the DPP not only tremendous election momentum, but huge momentum for referendum law reform.

Let me translate a couple paragraphs from the My Formosa article:

The president really ought to plan before acting on something as big as a peace agreemeent, but when Ma suddenly brought up the topic, he had left high-ranking KMT officials in the dark. Two days later [Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits Chairman] Chen Yunlin [mentioned] continuing to uphold a policy of economics first, politics later, and avoided discussing the peace agreement, demonstrating Beijing had not been in on the situation. On a topic this big, a policy decision this arbitrary and peremptory obviously attracted criticism from all sides.

和平協議如此重大，總統自應謀定後動，但馬突然拋出和平協議，國民黨高層竟一無所知；兩天後陳雲林繼續主張「先經後政」，避談和平協議，也顯示北京完全在狀況外。如此重大議題，決策如此獨斷，自然引起各界非議。

More ridiculously, due to the unsatisfactory response in public opinion on the 17th and 18th, and to reassure those suspicious that he was promoting unification, Ma made a sharp turn deep in the night of the 19th, hastily putting out a press release stating there would definitely be a referendum [before the agreement]. This stunned those in the unification faction who had been thrilled with the original announcement. By the morning of the 20th, Ma realized he had been too rash, and released yet another press release, this time changing "must" have a referendum to "do not eliminate the option of a referendum." But Chinese and Hong Kong media couldn't bear it, and began making stern warnings en masse. On the 22nd, the DPP took advantage of their position, calling for a reform of the [referendum] law such that "cross strait political agreements must be passed by referendum." Under Chinese pressure Ma again made a rapid about face, immediately responding to the DPP saying there was no need for such a change in law. The plan to hold the referendum is already stillborn.

更離譜的是，由於拋出議題後10月17-18日輿論反應欠佳，為了安撫「推動統一」質疑，馬竟在10月19日深夜急轉彎，匆忙發出「一定會先公投」新聞稿，引起原本高聲叫好的統派驚聲錯愕。10月20日早上，馬自知過於莽撞，又發出更正新聞稿，把「一定會先公投」修改成「不排除公投」，但中港媒體已經按奈不住，群起發出厲聲警告。10月22日，民進黨借力使力，呼籲朝野共同將「兩岸政治協商須經公投」納入修法，馬在中國壓力下再次急轉彎，立刻表示無此需要，訴諸公投實已胎死腹中。

Now that Ma's oficial stance is "there are other ways to gauge public opinion like opinion polls," you know that it wasn't going to be long for the Executive Yuan's Mainland Affairs Council to release a poll showing 80% support for peace talks. Check. Meanwhile, despite Ma bringing the referendum topic firmly to the center of the spotlight all by himself, the KMT legislative caucus is accusing the DPP of their old Chen Shui-bian inspired trick of "using the referendum to kidnap the election."

For those that speak Chinese/Taiwanese (find a friend who does if you don't!), watch this segment of Talking Show from the 20th. From about the 1:30 mark. It was some of my favorite commentary that night on this topic, and I watched 2100 and Talking Show just to make sure I wasn't crazy.

Hold on there cowboy

2011-10-20T22:44:00.000+08:00

So Michael Turton has covered Ma's latest public push for a peace treaty pretty well. But I want to add information on the latest twist: the KMT is going to push for a referendum related to the treaty!

But they won't actually put the agreement itself to a referendum and ask people to pass it. Instead, they're going to try to hold a referendum on the concept of the peace treaty and then begin the detailed negotiations. The administration is claiming this will satisfy the "public support" precondition that Ma attached to a peace agreement.

This strikes me as a smart political strategy -- because if you just ask "do you want peace?" without outlining actual details of the agreement, you're likely to get a positive response -- but the KMT is going to hit the road block the DPP came up against in the past of getting over 50% of voters to cast any sort of ballot on the referendum.

The good news there is the KMT could consider revising the referendum law, although I think there would be serious reservations about handling that double-edged sword.

The other danger the KMT faces is the referendum turning out "invalid" due to lack of meeting the voter threshold. Will they argue, as they have in the past, that it constitutes the same as a rejection, a win for the "no" vote, and that for at least three years the policy can't be touched again?

The DPP will find it difficult in principle to oppose the referendum, although I doubt they'll find it difficult to boycott this one, since a boycott constitutes the most effective "no" vote.

Also, I should yell "IT'S A TRAP!" but I'll leave that to others.