If you read one thing this week, it should be Shawna Yang Ryan in the Washington Post on Taiwan, a country with a long history that is not just a diplomatic nuisance.
Lots of people wanted my thinking on the media problem this week. I was on ICRT with Keith Menconi, on a show that also includes former AIT head William Stanton, and the always intelligent Jane Rickards. Natalie Tso of Radio Taiwan International interviewed me on the media.
And finally, my third piece for Taiwan News: The Real Danger of the The Call. This was written on Tuesday, before the huge media pushback on Taiwan's behalf...
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18 comments:
As I watch this site slowly devolve into a thinly veiled propaganda mouthpiece for the incoming regime of neocons, I can't help but with great bemusement think of the scene in the Godfather where the beautiful pride of a small Sicilian village, young Apollonia Vitelli, meets the handsome stranger American Michael Corleone. The American hero wanders in, and upon seeing her becomes thunderstruck. He makes an offer he can't refuse to Signor Vitelli to arrange a meeting so they may marry. The local villagers were so pleased, the village bursting with pride and excitement. Apollonia, a liberated woman! "Tell me about America, Michael" she asked full of wonder on their wedding night.
The aunties gossiped and smiled, little knowing that everywhere the Corleone family goes, violence, death and destruction surely follow in their wake. And then one day, it's time for a little drive!
Kaboom.
It is my opinion that "seemingly lunatic tweets" by Trump is the successful tool for Trump to win support. Public opinion is no longer ruled by elite new organization like Washington Post,New York Time,etc... Social Media has much powerful influence now. To win support for policy, it is necessary to influence public opinion with "emotionally charged" tweets. It is no different than mass group rally.
Trump has proven that new way of doing politic through social media is necessary. Politician needs to adopt or fade away like Hillary. As top 1% gain more and more wealth, the problem will get worst. If we do not solve the inequality problem, authoritarian government might offer more stability than democratic government. We will end up trading freedom for stability. It has already happen in Egypt and other places in Middle East.
This is a very interesting article about China/US/Taiwan regarding Realpolitik. Taiwan needs to gear up and defend their own freedom. Depends on other people is suicide.
http://nationalinterest.org/feature/why-the-world-should-fear-thucydidean-china-18705
We have not changed much since the ancient time. How depressing.
Good listening to you on the podcast, Mike. Great opinion as usual!
2017 will be a very very interesting year:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38282825
I wonder if Taiwan can get some F35 and submarine? We will need them soon.
As I watch this site slowly devolve into a thinly veiled propaganda mouthpiece for the incoming regime of neocons,
Yes, it's always a problem for a blogger when the readers aren't as smart as he is. And lack the moral courage to leave their names, unlike the blogger.
We have not changed much since the ancient time. How depressing.
The West has changed. The rest of the world hasn't. Uncle Sam is the global offshore balancer. If the US ever pulls back from its self-appointed role, the market for weaponry will boom.
This place is a mouthpiece for neo-cons?
Do these people listen to themselves? Michael is left!
From your article...
"If and when that shift occurs, it may become identified with President Trump's circle of Republican advisers, and with Republicans in general, pulling Taiwan in along with it."
So what you are saying is that, should the incoming Trump administration shift toward greater diplomatic and military support for Taiwan than shown by the two previous administrations, then the lying, biased, misinforming, deceitful, corrupt, dishonest, chutzpah-evincing, establishmentarian you-know-whats in the U.S. media will simply claim that as evidence of Trump not knowing what he is doing and hence a U.S. political backlash against foreign policy support for Taiwan in the future. No?
But that would seem to involve the assumption that most of the U.S. media will continue to have significant future political influence after having so thoroughly and demonstrably discrediting themselves in this past election cycle.
Although perhaps I misplace my trust in the intelligence of people in California, New York and elsewhere to actually see through another round of media bullshit. After all, they were the better "educated" and better "informed" voters who laughed at the idea that Trump could actually win.
This recent quote from Trump concerns me: “I fully understand the ‘one China’ policy, but I don’t know why we have to be bound by a ‘one China’ policy unless we make a deal with China having to do with other things, including trade.” http://time.com/4597532/donald-trump-taiwan-one-china/
It sounds like he's willing to be bound by a one China policy if he can make a deal on "other things." I'm afraid he's setting Taiwan up for a fall. If he could make a big deal with China on other things would he then be willing to give up US support for Taiwan?
Taiwan should make it a precondition of cooperating with any policy change that the US must in return agree to preserve all climate agreements and take an active leadership role against global warming. Why aren't they making any demands of the US?
Also, who's paying for all this war? Trump is gonna shovel all the tax money in billionaires pockets, and there's going to be other wars to pay for. People aren't just jumping on board right away because they don't want the complete evisceration of the public sector and fear the risk of war escalating. These are reasonable concerns--if you really care about objectivity stop blaming media conspiracies against him.
Trump's advisors should have known this was going to be divisive and how media was going to react. If they didn't game plan for that, then it already shows a lack of calculation that calls their judgement into question. If they didn't factor this, what else are they going to miss down the line if/when stakes grow higher and human lives are possibly at risk?
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Mike Fagan,
The U.S. media has been discrediting itself for as long as I can remember. The illegal Iraq war was one egregious example.
And, overall, the U.S. media usually has a slant to the right of center.
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Taiwan should make it a precondition of cooperating with any policy change that the US must in return agree to preserve all climate agreements and take an active leadership role against global warming. Why aren't they making any demands of the US?
This is the most amusing comment I've read in a long string of amusing ones. And I'm not even a Trump fan (although as a Cruz supporter, I am much further right than Trump).
Brace yourself - Trump is already vetting current employees at the Federal agencies for transfer into a vast warehouse for useless mouths, where they can while their days away counting and recounting paper clips, and he's not even in office yet. Trump is operating at the speed of the private sector. Whether he can bulldoze his way through the federal bureaucracy is yet to be determined. (And I am pessimistic). But it will be fun to watch him try.
"And, overall, the U.S. media usually has a slant to the right of center."
That is only what I would expect someone on the left to far-left to say. To people on "the right", there is only Fox News and even Fox (e.g. Megyn Kelly) is occasionally to the left of them on certain issues. They see all other networks as center to far-left. To a libertarian, the left-right gap collapses and all the networks have a Statist bias - including Fox.
The difficulty in objectively delineating the political biases of the media is taking account of your own biases first, and partly this is a matter of actually familiarizing yourself with the views and arguments of those on the other side of the spectrum so that you can then have some perspective on your own. I am reminded of my first year in Taiwan living with a Canadian who confidently told me he thought the BBC was relatively unbiased and objective - which left me in temporarily stunned silence, as unbeknownst to him at the time was the fact that, with some exceptions in terms of one or two programs, the BBC was, and is, deeply despised throughout much (not all) of England. When discussion turns to how to counter BBC bias, people end up quoting Sigourney Weaver.
If you could figure out how to take off those blue-tinted glasses, you might see something rather different.
"As I watch this site slowly devolve into a thinly veiled propaganda mouthpiece for the incoming regime of neocons"
I've actually seen similar reactions on Facebook from the ultra-left. Here I am with a voting record of straight democratic presidents since 20 years ago, for gun restriction, for universal health coverage, for gay marriage, and also driving on sunlight with my EV, and I was branded a "troll" when I wrote that I'm a Hillary voter that supports Trump's call with Tsai.
And now I see Mike attacked as a propaganda mouthpiece for neocons. My goodness, I do believe Mike is to the left of me (I consider myself politically moderate). So if Mike is a neocon, then I should probably be hanging out with David Duke???
>>>Taiwan should make it a precondition of cooperating with any policy change that the US must in return agree to preserve all climate agreements and take an active leadership role against global warming. Why aren't they making any demands of the US?
>>>This is the most amusing comment I've read in a long string of amusing ones. And I'm not even a Trump fan (although as a Cruz supporter, I am much further right than Trump).
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You got the point! Donald Trump appointed the CEO of Exxon as Secretary of State. His Energy Secretary and EPA director are climate deniers. He is presently purging climate scientists. This is a loud and clear message that he is willing to kill us all as long as he enriches himself and his cronies.
Democracy, freedom, progressive values are the last thing on his mind. Yet we are being asked with a straight face to believe that trusting him or his regime is good for Taiwan? Are you serious?
"Is advocating for a more assertive Taiwan on the international stage or greasing the skids for Taipei’s possible independence more important to stability in the Pacific than preventing North Korea’s irreversible path into the nuclear club? Is it worth throwing bilateral U.S.-China relations into a crisis? And do the benefits of a deeper U.S.-Taiwan partnership outweigh the costs of the destruction of America’s North Korea policy over the past quarter century?"
-Daniel R. DePetris.
December 10, 2016.
Source: How China Could Strike Back at Donald Trump over Taiwan: Unleash North Korea
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