FOR AMUSEMENT ONLY: What is with Brookings lately? Another strange piece, this one from an NCCU person on cross-strait relations. A few observations in it are dead on, but..... My favorite sentence is the reference to the "present euphoria" with regard to cross-strait relations.
WHOA: Senators Webb and McCain warn China on the South China Sea. Webb recently said that the US will soon face "a Munich moment."
D'OH 1: Taiwan falling behind China in cross-strait military balance.
D'OH 2: Beijing Kitty Hawks (here) Canadian politician attempting to suck up to CCP by J Michael Cole.
TRES INTERESTING: How Japan is leveraging Taiwan expertise and firms to enter China market. The Diplomat explains why China wants the whole South China Sea. The superb James Holmes on Sen. Webb's Munich Moment remark.
_______________________
[Taiwan] Don't miss the comments below! And check out my blog and its sidebars for events, links to previous posts and picture posts, and scores of links to other Taiwan blogs and forums! Delenda est, baby.
.
ReplyDelete.
.
One of the only aspects that I liked about the Harper government (in Canada) was its resolve when dealing with China.
Looks like there is absolutely nothing to like about the Harper government now -- especially with a majority.
.
.
.
@STOP Ma It's too early to say. I suspect that Harper's cabinet is developing a somewhat more sophisticated doctrine than they had before, when it comes to dealing with China, Taiwan, etc.
ReplyDeleteJust remember: the Liberal Government kowtowed to China. If the Liberals were in power now, it would be worse. What you are seeing might just be cosmetic. For example, the PRC regime might say they will not execute white collar criminals, but then if they then go and do just that, then there is no reason the Canadian government should not go a deal directly with Taiwan, or something like that. Harper is not completely predictable. He's boring, yes, but he's also unpredictable.
Harper was a better choice than the milquetoast Liberal Ignatieff or the socialist Layton. Not that this is really saying much. In the past few years, Harper has spent my Canadian tax dollars like a sailor on a drunken binge.
P.S. J. Michael Cole's writing is awful in that Ottawa citizen article.
ReplyDeleteThe article uses tangled sentences, with comma after comma, and takes several sentences to get to the point he said he was going to make earlier. Really awful. Is his writing this bad in the Taipei Times. I am shocked that the Ottawa Citizen printed his piece. Reading it nearly gave me a flashback to when I was grading undergrad papers, 90% of which were plagiarized, 99% unreadable, plagiarized or not, and 60% of which appeared to me as if they were written by an 11-year-old.
Jack Layton would have been a far better choice. Socialists don't always spend more than their political opponents and in fact often spend more efficiently.
ReplyDelete... says the guy who on his blog manages to get both Murakami and Ishiguro's given names wrong.
ReplyDelete@Anonymous J. Michael Cole is a supposedly professional writer writing for a professional paper (The Ottawa Citizen). What I write on my blog is my own business. I am not accountable to advertisers or consumers in the same way, and I am most definitely not accountable to time-wasting trolls like you. However, I fixed the spelling. But you really are nitpicking, aren't you?
ReplyDeleteFor someone who is not getting paid, and who writes my posts very quickly, my spelling and grammar is far superior to what I've seen in most blogs. I am not bragging, I am just stating a fact. Even though I don't always agree with him, Michael Turton's writing is good, too. These are just two good examples. But there isn't much good style in writing these days.
And I can't really turn to Anonymous, (I am assuming you are one and the same). It is very easy to be a smart aleck & take potshots at people behind anonymous covers. Typical tiresome nonsense.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete"For someone who is not getting paid, and who writes my posts very quickly, my spelling and grammar is far superior to what I've seen in most blogs."
ReplyDelete@different anon What's your problem with this. Or are you too chicken to use your real name?
ReplyDelete*with this?*
ReplyDeleteAnd no, I don't believe you are really a different anon.
ReplyDeleteMichael, why do you publish these anonymous comments?
Why do I publish them? Because there are several anons who leave very good comments.
ReplyDeleteMIchael
But Michael, they could just as easily pick a pseudonym instead, like Albatross78. At least we could have "someone" to respond to.
ReplyDeleteMost of the time, what we get are these dive-bombing anonymous commenters simply leaving comments as anonymous or Other Anonymous to sabotage other, real and genuine commenters. They don't help the flow of discussion. Why not just require people to use pseudonyms, at the very least? It doesn't put anyone in danger. That argument, anyway, is claptrap, because there are always organizations out there, if they really want to, who can find our ISP or whatever.
P.S. @different anon Come on, now. This is a comments section, which is more conversational in nature. Requiring that my sentences perfectly align subject and clauses isn't as important here. What is important is that I try and make myself clear. Clarity is the most important thing in writing; clarity is what J. Michael Cole's writing lacks, at least in his Ottawa Citizen article.
ReplyDelete