KMT Minister without Portfolio Yang Chiu-hsiung has filed an application for membership in the KMT, according to news reports.
Minister Without Portfolio Yang Chiu-hsing (楊秋興) yesterday filed an application for party membership with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) amid speculation about a bid for the Greater Kaohsiung mayoral election.There have been several days of media reports that Yang plans to run as the KMT candidate for Kaohsiung city. Yang has been denying that he plans to run for mayor of K-town.
Those of you with long memories will recall that Yang left the DPP in a huff in 2010 after failing to win the nomination for the upgraded Kaohsiung municipality. The nomination process caused much complaint within the DPP and Yang was not the only DPPer rankled by it. He had been county chief, while current Kaohsiung mayor Chen Chu had been mayor at that time. However, unifying the city and county eliminated the country chief position, Yang's job. Yang ran against Chen Chu as an independent. Chen Chu won re-election while Yang, a talented and popular administrator who might have recovered a position in the DPP had he been patient, went on to become Minister without Portfolio in the current Administration.
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Daily Links:
- Aussie News: Taiwan's Youth are deserting the country. Amazing how you can talk about the economic issues yet never talk about why they are happening.....
- J Michael with a beautiful essay on why Taiwan's youth are saving the country.
- Filmmaker sneaks Chinese photographer into military base
- IMPORTANT: Warm Oolong Tea: Taiwan reportedly lobbying US congress for help getting submarines
...a number of officials inside the halls of Congress have stated that Taiwanese officials from its TECRO office in DC have approached them in recent months regarding ways in which the sale could be facilitated. The officials stated that the the talks focused primarily upon finding a third country that would be willing to transfer the blueprints and expertise to the United States, and then transferred to Taiwan, where the submarines would be built. American defense companies, most likely General Dynamics or Northrop Grumman, would be contracted to implement the weapon systems and electronics into the completed submarines.
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I particularly enjoyed this bit from the Taipei Times article [emphasis mine]:
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Yang said he had joined the KMT about 37 years ago as a student and later left because he did not agree with the party’s authoritarian rule at the time.
“The political environment has changed over the years and so has the situation in Taiwan. The KMT became an opposition party for eight years before regaining power and it is a localized party now,” he said.
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So… Yang joined the KMT during White Terror but left the party because he finally figured out they were authoritarian?!
And when he says the KMT has "localized," it sounds like he's claiming that either the China-is-motherland party has given up its "one China" dream or that Taiwan is a "locality" of China. Can you say "WTF?"
Tim Maddog
LOL.
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