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The local government’s Department of Information and Tourism squandered taxpayers’ “life savings” after it used money from the city’s emergency secondary reserve fund, which is earmarked for emergency relief, to release a set of eight LINE stickers featuring panda cub Yuan Zai (圓仔), Taipei City Councilor Ho Chih-wei (何志偉) of the Democratic Progressive Party said on Tuesday.The stickers are for the popular communications app LINE. A set of stickers put out by the city promoting love between the Formosan Black Bear (=Taiwan) and a panda (=bombastic expansionist power) are clearly intended as political propaganda.
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The city government has taken about NT$3.33 million from the reserve fund to promote the pandas, NT$1.6 million of which went toward the sticker pack and NT$1.73 million for a 10-day outdoor art exhibition featuring 1,600 papier-mache giant pandas made by French artist Paulo Grangeon, the sources said.
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13 comments:
It's more likely they are so incompetent they do not even realize how stupid they look by doing these childish promotions.
Anyone statesman who frequently allows himself to become a cartoon avatar has no business thinking abut running a country, much less a city.
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One can not be surprised considering how much money has been spent (and is still being spent) on the 2 pandas in the Taipei zoo -- with the names of the bears combined meaning "reunion"?
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I like the French warning below the cartoon, perhaps unintentionally intended for most of the population: "Cannot be sold"
Since the fake girl singing at the Olympics opening ceremony in 2008, Beijing has begun to use the "cute" factor in its propaganda. Unfortunately, something very appealing to Taiwanese people, and I doubt if there are many people in Taiwan critical enough to see this "cute panda attack" for what it really is...
With 3.3 Million NT$ you could do something meaningfull like repare the legislative yuan. But I guess it's more important to send out Little Panda stickers. Will those people lose their job or even be in question since they wasted taxpayers money? I guess not.
That's the thing that made me give up on Taiwan self-determination. Too many Taiwanese don't care.
Other than the usual suspects among the DPP and TSU, has there been any negative response to this obvious waste of taxpayers' money?
Where's the outrage?
"With 3.3 Million NT$ you could do something meaningfull like repare the legislative yuan."
Or the cheaper option: demolish it.
I always wonder about the prices governmental agencies pay. It's about 40k Euros for the sticker pack - let's disregard what they are about for a moment - is that a fair price?
I would think that's in the range of a yearly salary for a designer - did they get a year's worth of stickers?
Speaking of wasting money. Kuo Kuan-ying is back.
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2014/04/17/2003588218
Someone should totally assassinate the zoo pandas. Wouldn't THAT make a news splash?
"What's black and white, but red all over?"
With the recent escalation of events within Ukraine, I am reminded of how difficult it is for a nation to stay intact or stay independent under the constant pressure of larger aggressive entity.
The tools employed by the larger aggressive entity to absorb and annex completely or at least part of the smaller nation have been the same time and time again. They divide and conquer via ethnic lines (Sinhalese vs Tamil), via religion (Protestant vs Catholic), via language (Russian vs Ukrainian). They roll out countless economic pressure, and they demonize independence supporters with calls of Neo-Nazism or Japanese sympathizers.
Propaganda, economic pressure, and demonization, all working to get these small nations to give up the precious freedom and independence. Not realizing once turned into part of the Borg, there is no turning back.
Despite our challenges, the Ukrainian crisis has shown that Taiwan is in a better position of defending it's sovereignty. The pragmatic middle of the road national consensus emphasizing sovereignty but holding off on formal declaration of name change means we are not going to head toward partitioning or decades of civil war.
This is a road well travelled throughout history and throughout the world, moderation (the Middle Path not taken by another Buddhist island adjacent to a giant) may ultimately be our best way out.
"What's black and white, but red all over?"
Answer: A propopanda
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