Economist turns in another laffer, ATM thieves caught + links

A lovely butterfly from a recent trip

The police captured the fugitives allegedly involved in NT$83 million heist from ATMs recently. According to local news reports, one of the men was in Dong-ao having a meal at a local restaurant when an off duty policeman came into the restaurant and spotted him. Apparently the majority, though not entirety, of the money has been recovered. Good news!

The Economist turns in another of its uniformly crappy articles on Taiwan, this one on Kawaii culture...

The craze is about more than infantile consumerism: Hello Kitty has become an unlikely token of Taiwanese identity. She is part of a wider embrace of Japan’s kawaii, or “cuteness”, culture. And this is a way for the Taiwanese to define themselves as different from China, which lays claim to their island, by cleaving to Japan, their former coloniser.

Yes, that's right, everything relates to China! The article wrong attributes the Hello Kitty craze to McDonald's in 1999, but that is incorrect. YM Ko, who wrote several articles on Hello Kitty culture in the early 2000s, has a good history and review from 2000 when Hello Kitty was already super popular, as I knew from having lived in Taiwan at that time (I have a running joke in all my classes about Hello Kitty since I started teaching at universities in the 1990s)...

Hello Kitty was released after W.W.II in Japan and has always been very popular. In Taiwan, it was expensive in the early days and could only be found in a few boutiques. Not until the 80s were the economical conditions of Taiwan able to afford Hello Kitty; in many department stores Hello Kitty became a popular commodity. In the 90s, counterfeits of Hello Kitty could be spotted in night markets and vendor stands. At first Hello Kitty targeted at the teenage girl market, only in recent years did its consumer age move onward to mid-aged females. Amongst the animation cartoon figures‘ products, Hello Kitty is the only one that successfully developed a mid-aged female market.

Since this is the second article you hit in Google Scholar if you search 'hello kitty culture taiwan' it is hard to see how The Economist could get everything so wrong. Well, it isn't hard, actually. The Ko piece concludes:

Hello Kitty has different roles: the popular culture, the night market counterfeit, the conspicuous consumption, the residue of colonialism, the elite and mass distinction, the sabotage of gender politics. Hello Kitty doesn't invent new cultural identity or meaning. The fact is, the latent social politics and relationships, antagonistic or not, seize Hello Kitty as their vehicle to surface. Various meanings are attached onto the object-sign Hello Kitty and thus consumed.

Yeah, nothing about China in that paper, because Hello Kitty has nothing to do with redefining Taiwan against China. *sigh*

Instead, Hello Kitty mania is related to the larger Japanese drive to market itself during the 1980s and 1990s across Asia...

Since the 1990s, Japan-mania has swept East and Southeast Asian countries and brought inbound tourism to the rescue of Japan’s stagnant economy. In 2003, guided by then-Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, Japan launched an international ‘Visit Japan’ campaign [Yokoso! JAPAN]. Except for some affluent Western countries, the campaign mainly targeted Korea, Taiwan, China and Hong Kong – markets heavily influenced by Japanese popular culture. Yoshino Kimura, a Japanese actress, was appointed as Goodwill Ambassador for Japan. The tourist initiative regards the ‘globalization of economy’ as a way to revitalize local regions in Japan (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, Japan, 2005). Its goal of ‘making Japan more attractive’ evidences an attempt at nationbranding at a time when Japan seeks to reposition itself in the global economy. It also turns the spotlight of international tourism from modern Tokyo to other localities that have reinvented themselves as representatives of traditional Japan.

This marketing drive included pop music, TV, movies, food, and tourism. Taiwan is part of a regional context of Japanese success at marketing itself as a hybrid culture of modernity and tradition and Asian-ness, according to the Huang paper. But I guess under the Economist's rubric, Japan-mania in China is also an example of the Chinese wanting to differentiate themselves from the Chinese...

I needn't go into Taiwan's old Japan links, and the mutual love affair between the two nations. But the Huang piece referenced above points out that Japan-mania has been followed by Korean-mania, widely accepted across Asia for the same reason that Japanese culture was: it is a hybrid of modernity and Asian-ness, slickly marketed and tweaked for local conditions. Korean marketers, noting Japanese success, deliberately copied Japanese marketing approaches. Huang notes:

If strategic hybridism means adapting foreign cultures to the local context, Taiwanese hybridism makes the local culture look ‘foreign’ – that is, Japanese and Korean. There have been sporadic criticisms of Taiwan fawning on Japan and Korea, but calls for boycotts have been rare. Four mechanisms contribute to Taiwanese acceptance of all things Japanese and Korean: (1) the marketing of Japanese and Korean culture industries, (2) the promotion of Japanese and Korean popular cultures by local media, (3) business practice in Taiwan and (4) transnational tourism. These factors emphasize consumption, but they are also relevant to cultural production.

What? No China identity issue? Say it ain't so!

All this stuff is easily accessible on the Internet, which is why The Economist couldn't find it. Because it already knew the answer: China.
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Daily Links:

• Taiwan = free trade example. Writer is clueless
• Beijing seeks loyalty of foreign passport holders of Chinese descent
• Hsieh faction takes a beating at the DPP Party Congress
• China Post review of Tsai's new southbound policy
• Was Okinawa settled from Taiwan? Japanese test the theory with straw boats
• 1 in 8 marriages 'transnational'
• Ming-yeh Rawnsley's PPT/paper on Taiwan's media
• Pro-Unification Christianity among the aborigines
• Taiwan-Japan relations likely to deepen
• James Baron at East Asia Forum: Taiwan's Friend Buying Days are over.
• Andrew Chubb argues that Beijing may have clarified the 9 dash line. Very interesting piece, though many observers see China's clarification as a reining in of expansion. I don't.
• Taiwan rules out cooperation with China on the SCS 

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[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!

MEDIAFAIL: Is there no Internet in the Economist's Offices?

Taiwan is full of lovely mountain roads.

Ah, the Economist, still carrying a torch for Ma Ying-jeou. The most recent piece, Sizing Tsai Up, contains all the journalistic tropes we know and love.

When the media lies, it usually does so by key omission, and the Economist is no exception. Consider this paragraph:

As for trade with China itself, it ballooned under the outgoing president, Ma Ying-jeou (as did Chinese tourism to the island). Indeed, Taiwan is one of very few countries to run a trade surplus with China, thanks mainly to contract manufacturing and exports of capital equipment. Yet many Taiwanese resent the relationship, along with the cross-strait trade and economic agreements that multiplied under Mr Ma. Indeed the signing of a services agreement led two years ago to the “sunflower” movement of protesters, who argued that the deal would lead to China’s exerting undue influence on Taiwan. The movement, and subsequent student occupations of the Legislative Yuan, greatly undermined Mr Ma’s presidency.

Of course everyone recognizes the first sentence, it's a common trope. Yes, overall trade grew under Ma. What none of these "journalists" ever notes is that it ballooned far faster under the Chen Administration and Taiwan businessmen did much better. The Ma Administration represented the end of the golden age for Taiwanese in China.

The trade numbers are available on the Bureau of Trade website (go to SEARCH BY VALUE, set the country to China, and select the years you want). Even writers for the Economist should be able to find them. Let's look....

First, the total trade numbers for China in billion US$ (column 2) and growth rate (column 3)(w/o HKK and Macau)(trade with Hong Kong was $33 billion in 2000, peaked at $44 billion in 2014, and fell back to $39 billion in 2015. Trade with Macao is not very large.)...

2000	10,440,540,918	47.82
2001	10,798,076,970	3.424
2002	18,495,033,007	71.281
2003	33,907,784,754	83.335
2004	53,140,562,278	56.721
2005	63,736,408,872	19.939
2006	76,590,504,462	20.168
2007	90,430,526,782	18.07
2008	98,273,497,890	8.673
2009	78,670,764,058	-19.947
2010	112,879,654,027	43.484
2011	127,555,177,571	13.001
2012	121,621,186,471	-4.652
2013	124,376,057,324	2.265
2014	130,158,219,397	4.649
2015	115,392,430,915	-11.344

Note that trade under Chen skyrocketed from $10.4 billion in 2000 to $98.2 billion in 2008, or a gain of nearly $88 billion. What happened in the "ballooning" Ma era? Trade grew from $98.2 billion and peaked at $130.1 billion. Using that peak, the best gain was just $32 billion, less than half the Chen Administration figure. Through 2015 the total net gain was a paltry $17.1 billion (115.3-98.2). To put those numbers in perspective, in the two years between 2002 and 2004, trade gained $35 billion (in fact, trade gains were larger than the entire Ma Administration in almost any two year period in the Chen Administration). Nor did the Chen Administration experience any negative trade growth.

Indeed, as my son pointed out to me as I wrote this post, trade basically stagnated during 2011 to 2014, with a net gain of just $3 billion during those 4 years, or about what a Taiwan businessman spends on drinks with his buddies during a Saturday night out in Shenzhen.

Of course, the sharp-eyed among you will note that in 2010 ECFA was signed. That's right, since ECFA came into force, trade with China has stagnated and then fallen. And that's what the Economist calls "ballooning." Well, perhaps the Economist calls it "ballooning" because there is so much hot air in its claims...

But let's look at that next omission by the Economist.

Indeed, Taiwan is one of very few countries to run a trade surplus with China, thanks mainly to contract manufacturing and exports of capital equipment.

Yes, we do run a trade surplus with China. Here are the numbers (US$billions, China only):

2000	-2,005,682,704	0.819
2001	-1,007,492,002	-49.768
2002	2,558,443,421	-353.942
2003	11,872,821,076	364.064
2004	19,557,486,938	64.725
2005	23,550,236,834	20.415
2006	27,025,853,070	14.758
2007	34,402,295,404	27.294
2008	35,492,565,742	3.169
2009	29,825,438,414	-15.967
2010	40,989,496,995	37.431
2011	40,363,622,351	-1.527
2012	39,806,327,025	-1.381
2013	39,199,232,438	-1.525
2014	34,080,427,333	-13.058
2015	27,026,406,849	-20.698

What the Economist doesn't say is screamingly obvious: since ECFA was signed the trade surplus has plummeted. Compare: the 2015 trade surplus is nearly identical to the 2006 trade surplus. ECFA is clearly "working as intended".

If you mention the trade surplus and Taiwan in the Ma Administration, but omit that it has fallen since Ma's centerpiece legislation was signed and all but two years during the Ma Administration... no need to complete that sentence.

The article constantly attempts to position the Ma Administration as economically successful, but opposed by those "hardline" Taiwan independence types solely for political reasons. It never mentions that the anti-ECFA and services pact forces were motivated by the economic effects of increased integration with China. Once it had committed to the lie that trade was awesome, it was inevitable that it could only explain opposition to increased integration in terms of independence politics. Sad.

Once again, Economist, you have my gratitude. It is because of lazy, trope-ridden, pro-China reporting like this that my blog and other Taiwan-centered websites continue to be useful for and popular with academics, analysts, and media workers. Thanks, guys!
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Daily Links:

• New Bloom: Why is nobody in Taiwan talking about the fish die-offs in Vietnam?
• Great Taiwan 1970 photo album on Flickr. 23 photos from 1966 visit here.
• The Ma Administration, even in its last days, continues to troll SE Asian nations on the South China Sea, in this case with an invitation to Manila to visit Itu Aba.
• Meanwhile Beijing continues to set the stage for war
• Zika reaches Singapore

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[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!

History and the Economist *sigh* Banyan can't get anything right

Another trip to Lanyu last week, which is why I've not been blogging....

Banyan at The Economist wrote on former President Lee Teng-hui's epic trolling of the KMT the last couple of weeks... let's take a look....

A 92-YEAR-OLD politician may be inured to insults, however outrageous his alleged transgression. Even so Lee Teng-hui, Taiwan’s president from 1988 to 2000, may have been taken aback by the hostility to comments he made to a Japanese magazine this month. [A total misreading -- Lee was trolling and well aware of how the KMT would react: in a way that put them outside Taiwan's mainstream.] He criticised efforts by Taiwan’s present government to mark the 70th anniversary this year of Japan’s second-world-war surrender as meant to “harass Japan and curry favour with China”. Taiwan, he argued [Lee "argues" but Lee was not arguing, he was stating historical fact], had been part of Japan: its young men had fought not against the Japanese empire, but for it (the “motherland”, he called it). Ma Ying-jeou, the current president, led a chorus of outrage in Taiwan. [Note the pro-KMT construction: Ma did not lead a chorus of outrage in Taiwan -- he led a chorus of outrage from the KMT] In China the press heaped scorn on his “absurd remarks”. The angry derision was perhaps all the more intense because, historically, Mr Lee had a point.[Note that no one from the pro-Taiwan side or a historian is permitted to speak on this issue, excepting Lee. Note also how cleverly the article fails to concretely state that the historical fact tens of thousands of Taiwanese loyally and willingly served the Japanese war effort. Instead, Banyan merely says Lee "had a point" as if there was something arguable about Lee's statements. What was that point again? Say it, Banyan.]

Although China insists Taiwan has always been an “inalienable” part of China, it has not been governed from the mainland since 1895, when it was ceded to Japan.[That is almost correct, technically, since from 1945-1949 Taiwan was administrated by the KMT under the Allied occupation of what was still Japanese sovereign territory until 1952. It's astonishing to read this in the Economist, let alone in a piece by Banyan. Kudos!] When Taiwan returned to China in 1945,[Taiwan was never "returned to China." This is shameful.] it became the last redoubt of the Nationalist or Kuomintang party, the KMT, as it lost mainland China in its civil war with the Chinese Communist Party. Mr Lee was later the KMT’s leader. But after he left the presidency, the party expelled him for his support of Taiwan’s formal independence from China.[Note the misleading "from China" which implies incorrectly that Taiwan is part of China. Independence supporters want independence, period.] Since then the KMT has tended to regard him as an embarrassment—like a gaga elderly relation given to relieving himself in public [What a vile and unnecessary comment.]. Mr Lee’s fondness for Japan is well-known. His elder brother is among those honoured at Yasukuni, a controversial shrine in Tokyo for Japan’s war dead, including some convicted of war crimes. Mr Lee’s views, however, though baldly expressed, are not uncommon in Taiwan. Nor, across Asia, is Mr Lee so unusual in his ambivalent feelings about Japan’s colonial past.

As everyone knows, Taiwanese love Japan, and many in Lee's generation still identify as Japanese in some way, speaking and reading Japanese amongst themselves. Several old men I know can still sing the Japanese national anthem and explain what the words mean. Lee correctly noted that while a few locals headed over to China to oppose Japan (though many more immigrated here during the interwar period, and many who headed to China were looking for work opportunities in the Empire or in China), tens of thousands of Taiwanese troops served in the Imperial Japanese Army as soldiers, laborers, prison guards, or in other capacities. For example, there was a corps of Taiwanese "military farmers" sent to central China to engage in farming in devastated areas under Japanese control, while others were sent as instructors to south China. Still other Taiwanese served as semi-skilled workers in government. For males, the pay was several times what they could make in Taiwan. The enslaving of women for sex began in Taiwan in 1938, and some Taiwanese girls were conscripted as nurses. The draw was so great that labor shortages began occurring in Taiwan after 1941 (for more, see this book).

The erasure of these veterans -- their absence from public discourse, their lack of public notice on the ubiquitous and vile "Martyrs' Shrines" and other memorials, is deliberate, of course, part of the KMT's overall goal of erasing Japan from Taiwan's historical memory. The KMT wishes Japan exists only as a caricature of evil, the "wretched colony" of current presidential candidate Hung Hsiu-chu's fantasies, and like any colonizer, to substitute its own identities for existing identities.

Another key function of this public denial of their existence was that there was no formal recognized body of Taiwanese veterans with a distinct identity who might take political action against the Chinese colonizers in the formative period of KMT rule. Recall that in the 1947 uprising Tang Shouren of the Tsou people led 100 former Japanese soldiers in an assault on Chiayi, which participants reported, decades later in recounting this incident for oral histories, was apparently part of a larger vision of uniting with local Han to drive out the incoming Chinese. During the 1947 Han people across Taiwan put on Japanese clothing and uniforms and sang Japanese songs -- to this day this Japanese identity is often asserted against the faux Chinese identity of the KMT. The KMT feared Taiwanese uprisings and expended much effort in the early 1950s to eliminate weapons caches, especially in the mountains, where the aborigines made superb soldiers, and where some had even been trained as pilots. It was still executing 1947 leaders well into the 1950s -- Tang Shouren was finally arrested and murdered in 1954.
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[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!

The Economist: one drop in the tsunami of stoopid

Another lovely Taiwan riding day.

I'm blogging on this because I fear that if you read this article in which the Economist explains why China and Taiwan are divided, your IQ may plummet. Just consider this my small public service in defending the world from the ongoing tsunami of stoopid in the media. Why O why can't we have a better media?

The stoopid starts at the very beginning. With the title: "China and Taiwan are divided." But of course, China and Taiwan aren't "divided." The KMT and CCP governments wish to annex Taiwan to China, whose sovereignty over Taiwan is not supported by any international treaty. It is they who are divided. There is no division between Taiwan and China, because there was never any unity (Added: I discuss this in a post above).

The Economist simply leaves out all the issues -- the fact that for all of Chinese history Taiwan was considered to lie outside China, until the mid-1930s when Chinese expansionist thinkers began to imagine they could grab it. Or the 1895 declaration of independence. Or the island's current undetermined status under international agreements and US and UK policy. Bye-bye.

Consider also how writers on the Taiwan-China problem have incorporated the trope "province of China in the 19th century" into the way they think about Taiwan's relationship with China -- as if it actually meant something. It means precisely nada. That's one of the double standards we use in thinking about Chinese claims, which we apply to no other claims. For example, Algeria was a department of France for over a century, Taiwan a province of the Qing for less than a decade. I look forward to the Economist's next brilliant article on how Algeria and France are divided.

It always saddens me that allegedly democracy and law-supporting media organs can't clearly lay this out for the public. Instead, we just get parroting of Chinese claims when what we should get is subversion and deconstruction of them.

The Economist goes on to present "history":

... Taiwan has since become a democracy, but resentment of the KMT runs deep among many of those who were living on the island before the KMT took refuge, and the descendants of such people. Their identity with greater China is weak. Some want Taiwan to abandon any pretence of a link with China and declare independence. 

This is another common trope in the media -- downplaying support for independence. It's not "some" who want, but a comfortable majority. But for the Economist to maintain the fiction that China and Taiwan "divided" -- it's actually the KMT and the CCP which are divided -- it must downplay support for independence in Taiwan. But it gets worse -- the Economist actually treats democracy as if it were a bad thing. It urks up:

But perhaps an even bigger reason why the Chinese and Taiwanese presidents have yet to meet is that the Chinese civil war is not officially over. The government in Beijing does not recognise the government in Taipei, and thus does not accept that it has a president. Although the two sides stopped lobbing shells at each other in the 1970s and began talks in the early 1990s, progress has been slow. Discussions were held only through intermediary bodies, while Taiwan’s democratisation soon intervened. Taiwan’s then president and KMT leader, Lee Teng-hui, organised the island’s first direct presidential elections in 1996. In an appeal to native Taiwanese, he shifted his government’s rhetoric to talk not of "one China" but of two states. This effectively granted recognition to the government in Beijing, but it also infuriated it. The Communist Party feared a slide towards Taiwan’s formal declaration of independence and tensions flared. China lobbed unarmed missiles into the Taiwan Strait; America sent aircraft carriers to warn it off. The victory of Mr Lee in the presidential elections, and of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party in two subsequent ones, stymied further progress in cross-strait talks.

The brilliance of this paragraph lie in its author's utter blindness to what he is writing -- he opens by saying that the issue between the KMT and CCP is the Chinese Civil War, which is rank nonsense. The Chinese Civil War is a dead letter. The real issue is that -- as he bass-ackwardly identifies further on -- the people of Taiwan don't want to become part of China. If Taiwanese supported annexation to China at the same levels they now support independence, then we would have become part of China decades ago.

The only reason the CCP even talks to the KMT is because the KMT represents its best shot at annexing Taiwan without a war. "Resolving" the Chinese Civil War is actually a rhetorical cover that the CCP and KMT use to justify their talks on how best to annex the island to China and what the take-home for the KMT will be. Thanks, Economist, for repeating that bit of propaganda as if it actually meant something.

Indeed, the only reason we're having a China-Taiwan discussion is because China threatens to maim and murder Taiwanese if it doesn't get to annex Taiwan. Otherwise the Taiwanese would be ignoring Beijing, Chinese Civil War or no.

But look at how the Economist treats democracy -- first it "intervenes" in the glorious progress of annexing Taiwan to China and then it "stymies further progress." That rotten democracy! How dare it!

Read it again -- the author of the piece is lamenting the fact that a democratic island of 23 million people with close relations with the western democracies whose economy is of global importance was not making progress in being annexed to China.

Does it get any more stoopid than that?

The reason we can't make "progress" in cross-strait talks isn't anything that happens in Taiwan -- it is because China is completely belligerent and inflexible. Instead of clearly pointing this out, the Economist puts forth a series of common tropes here

-- false equivalence: Taiwan resistance and Chinese aggression are treated as if they were two equal sides of the same issue.

-- that China is provoked and infuriated and has no agency of its own in the Taiwan-China relationship. Poor China, stop it before it shrills again!

-- that "tensions flare" on their own, like Immaculate Conceptions, without the intervention of human agency. As my readers know, tensions flare because China chooses to ramp them up. Tensions are a policy tool for China. D'oh.

-- that President Ma is a "less confrontational" president (because he and Beijing are allied in annexing Taiwan to China! D'oh!): a common media trope is to assign the adjective "confrontational" or "provocative" to Taiwan while ignoring China's belligerence...

...because when you demand that a territory annex itself to your nation, point your military at it, and say that you will plunge the region into war if you don't get your way, you're not being confrontational, you're being statesmanlike. And when you resist that, you're confrontational.

*sigh*

Divided? The real division is between the people of Taiwan and the democracy they cherish, and the Chinese nationalists on both sides of the Strait who desire to suppress that democracy and annex Taiwan to China. But it appears that we will never see any discussion of that in the Economist...
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Daily Links:

• Minimum wage might go up...4%
• Military budget down slightly, investing in local arms makers
• Hong Kong university survey on how HKKers view Taiwan issues. Support for independence is rising.
• PERSONAL: my sister needs your help for a survey on scientific visualization. Needs mouse, I couldn't do this on a mobile device.

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EVENT: Second World Congress of Taiwan Studies: Call for Papers

The Second World Congress of Taiwan Studies will be held at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) June 16-18, 2015. The Congress is being co-organized by Academia Sinica and the SOAS Centre of Taiwan Studies.

Click on READ MORE...

Economist at it again

The Economist's blatant favoritism toward the KMT was on display again this week. Consider the first paragraph:

....When [Lin I-hsiung] began his vigil, he said he would fast to death if necessary, until the government (a reformed and elected KMT) reversed a national energy policy that sees nuclear power as vital for the island. Not wanting to have a martyr on its hands, the government caved in. On April 30th Mr Lin ended his fast. The country’s nuclear policy lies in tatters.

"The country's nuclear policy lies in tatters." This pro-KMT remark sets the tone for the entire piece. We learn that the anti-nuke movement swelled after Fukushima, and then again after the street protests. We are given the KMT line -- the President "argued that Taiwan’s economic future needed nuclear power." The KMT line gets another repeat in the next paragraph, where we are told via quotes that the President is 100% right but no one is listening. The steady drumbeat of KMT talking points is so hypnotic, the reader may be forgiven for not noticing that the writer of this prose poem in favor of the Ma Administration never stops to inform the reader of why the opposition to the plant is so strong, and why they see the 4th Nuke Disaster as a really bad idea (for example, in describing Ma meeting with Su, we are told what Ma said, but not Su). The opposition never speaks, except tellingly, at the end, when Tsai Ing-wen is quoted to make another negative point about the street protests.

Its entire construction hinges on the idea that the street protesters were irrational and aggressive while the Ma Administration was rational and tolerant, just one big KMT talking point. Pure comedy.

The reader is never told that Ma backed down in part because the street protests signaled the KMT chiefs of Taipei, New Taipei City, and Taichung that it could hurt the party's election chances at the end of this year, and that Ma was forced to re-organize the KMT in response (post below this one) to shore up his sagging support from within the party. Protests took place within the KMT leadership, in other words.

Indeed, someone out there should be noting that the KMT itself began this mess by offering to submit the plant to a referendum. Remember that? More than a year ago, in fact (example). At that time pro-KMT media organs began arguing that the Executive Yuan can't shutter the plant because it would be unconstitutional, only the Legislature can do that (example), the argument made when the Chen Administration tried to kill this zombie project all those years ago. The Ma Administration's decision to mothball the plant (not halt construction) may be a clever way to get around that alleged constitutional problem.

But to return to the point about the nation's nuclear policy lying in tatters, it lies "in tatters" because there was never any nuclear policy -- it started out "in tatters".There is still, after five decades of nuke plant operations in Taiwan, no place or policy for long-term storage of nuclear waste. There is no plan or place to evacuate Taipei in the event of a catastrophe at of one of the three plants that ring the city. The plant is rife with construction irregularities (Global Post). The Fourth Nuke Zombie was supposed to have a tsunami assessment performed, but this was never done. If the nuclear policy is in tatters, it is because its supporters never had one that made any sense. It was just another construction-industrial state project, building, always building, just as it is with dams, roads, and other infrastructure.

Indeed, one could point out that KMT might have begun this mess because it knows perfectly well that the Fourth Nuclear Plant construction is rife with irregularities and that its local suppliers have little or no experience. Thus, it could never be opened. The government merely waited until all the money had been spent and the thing was almost completed, as if to ensure that its patronage networks had been properly fed and watered. Since a 1994 local referendum rejected the plant by +90% vote, and the public remains opposed to it, this whole mess might be the KMT's way of getting the plant shut down without taking the blame for it, as it did when it killed that monster naptha cracker in Changhua. "Those damn street protesters! They tied our hands!" Then when electricity prices go up as they must because they are far too low, the government can blame the anti-nuke types as well. My cynical guess would be that the KMT never anticipated that things would go in this direction.

In the post below this one I pointed out the nation's massive renewable resources. Another truth about the nation's energy policy was revealed in a Taipei Times article yesterday. Experts have long contended that the 4th Nuke Disaster can be converted to safer natural gas. This writer of a TT commentary (read it all, it's great) went a step further....

The Datan [Natural Gas power] plant is a combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) generation plant with an installed capacity of 4.484 gigawatts (GW) and a thermal efficiency of 53 percent, which is quite high. Unfortunately the capacity factor was only 35 percent in 2011, only generating power for about one-third of the time, thus wasting the investment in the plant’s construction. If it could be changed into a base load power station with a capacity factor of 90 percent, it could produce 4.0GW of power, which would be enough to replace the first power plant and the Gongliao plant, which produce 1.27GW and 2.7GW respectively. It would also remove the excuse that ending construction of the fourth plant would require power to be delivered from the south of Taiwan to the north.

Wiki points out that the Datan Plant is the largest in the world of its kind.

The reason the nation's nuke policy is "in tatters" is because it is stoooopid, not because of street protesters, who merely called attention to this existing fact. Even without counting on renewables or calling for greater power conservation, the nation's power situation is such that we don't need the 4th Nuke Nightmare. The 4th nuclear plant is simply the ultimate example of a construction-industrial state run amok.

Next step: shutting down our absurd, murderous coal plants. Protesters, don't stop at nukes!
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[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!

Discourse and Ideology in the Media and the Taiwan Student Protests

Charles grabs a photo on our coast ride the other day.

One thing that's really great about the recent student protest is that it is being covered in the international media. For example, the WSJ had an article on the student leaders' rejection of Ma's offer for talks this week. Yet.... and one thing that's really terrible is the coverage in the international media. Well, actually, that's not true. When you flip through lefty media sites, this protest against a neoliberal trade pact by students and the common people, against a pact opposed by the majority of the people, including occupation of the legislature and massive international coverage, what sound do you hear?

*crickets*

Way to go, fierce defenders of the people!

Today I read Banyan at The Economist. You can't expect too much from The Economist of course, since it is basically a helpless prisoner of its pro-corporate ideologies. But the interesting thing to me about the Banyan piece is how much the positioning of Ma and the students in the discourses swirling around the occupation of the legislature is guided by Establishment economic and social tropes and above all, by outright concealment of Ma's actual position. This has two complementary results: it makes Ma look more middle of the road than he really is, and it makes the students look more radical than they are. The reality is that the middle of the road democrats are the students, and the right-wing radical is Ma Ying-jeou. One way the Economist accomplishes this is by framing:

Mr Ma sees the pact as a reward for the more conciliatory approach to China that he has adopted since he became president. The students occupying the legislature, as well as opposition parties who back them, claim that the trade deal....

Ms "sees" but the students "claim". No bias there! Think of all the other words that could be used: Ma argues and the students contend. Etc. Uncorrected is Ma's error that the police don't think it worthwhile to clear out the legislature. They don't have the authority to do that, only the Speaker of the legislature can.

Naturally Banyan (and other mainstream media writers) will never make clear that Ma is a right-wing Chinese nationalist expansionist who did his thesis on how China owns the Senkakus and appears to believe China owns Okinawa -- note that the underlying issue of the political-annexation aspects of the treaty, so important in many discussions of it, doesn't appear in this article, which presents the whole affair from his position and treats him as a sympathetic character, while focusing solely on economics. The students understand this political context, but Banyan removes it from the reader's purview. This helps make the students appear more radical than they are. In fact in another piece sympathetic to poor put-upon Mr Ma, Banyan argues that Ma is -- no, really -- defending Taiwan:

But as Mr Ma sees it, cross-strait “rapprochement” is a first line of defence against Chinese aggression, since “a unilateral move by the mainland to change the status quo by non-peaceful means would come at a dear price”.

In a way that piece is even worse...awesomely, it accuses the students of resorting to undemocratic means (because protests are undemocratic?) but fails to take note of the KMT's behavior. Space is lacking. Anyway...

The Economist piece also unloads all the neoliberal tropes that are taken up in a piece by J Spangler over at The Diplomat. First, Banyan describes:

Three days after the students began their occupation, Mr Ma argued that failure by the legislature to approve the agreement “could have serious consequences” (see Banyan). Going back on the deal, he said, could result in Taiwan being “regarded as an unreliable trade partner” by China as well other countries with which the island wants to negotiate free-trade pacts.

This trope is really common, I've been hearing it from people who both support and oppose that dog of a services pact. It's the kind of zombie insight people come out with when their brains are on media autopilot. Jonathon Spangler over at The Diplomat today squeezed a whole piece out of it. Judging from the contents of my inbox, many who read it assumed that Spangler was a pro-KMT foreigner. So did I, the first time I read it.

But on second reading I realized that Spangler's alignment with the KMT's position on the treaty, right down to repeating its rhetoric, isn't the result of him cheerleading for the KMT (it's unlikely that someone who obviously cares so much about ordinary people could be pro-KMT) but rather, is a consequence of the way Ma and the KMT have deployed neoliberal trade rhetoric as a front for their annexation of Taiwan to China by slow economic strangulation. Spangler writes:

Yet the deleterious effects of failure to implement the CSSTA would not only be domestic or bilateral; the international implications would be equally grave. Taiwanese history over the past decades has represented an arduous struggle for diplomatic recognition. Indeed, it is the foundation upon which almost all of the island’s foreign policy depends. Reneging on a bilateral agreement, such as the CSSTA, would serve as a clear indication to the international community that the local government lacks the capacity to effectively engage in international relations. The logic runs like this: If Taipei cannot succeed in fulfilling an already signed trade agreement with its closest neighbor and most significant trading partner, the risks involved for other countries in deepening economic ties with Taiwan may outweigh the potential benefits. For better or worse, international image and reputation are key to diplomatic relations. Should Taiwanese lawmakers fail to push through the agreement at this late a stage in negotiations, they are shooting themselves in the foot.

Three issues here. First, Ma and the KMT have cloaked their sellout in neoliberal trade and political science rhetoric. By doing so, they can get others to forward their propaganda for them, since these ideas are widely subscribed to in the media and academia. Second, has anyone ever examined this idea to see whether it is in fact true by looking at the way countries behave in the real world? Finally, the logic of this argument runs like this: let's f@ck the 99% so that Taiwan can look "credible" when its 1% sits down and makes big business sellout trade deals with the 1% of other countries. That's neoliberal logic at its finest: the world's nations are so many game preserves and ATMs for the 1%... Aware of this, Spangler argues that Taiwan's ordinary people can and should be protected. Good luck getting any of that done....

Does having to renegotiate treaties and other treaty issues make one less credible on the international scene? Hmmm... how many times in your life have you ever heard anyone say "China tore up the 17 point agreement with Tibet! I'm not doing a trade agreement with them!" Or how about the SALT/START talks. Salt II never ratified by US, which withdrew in 1986 (wiki). Nevertheless, Russia and the US went on to negotiate the START pacts. In fact US non-ratification of treaties is normal, other countries still seek it out to do business with. If you think renegotiating, withdrawing, and unilaterally tearing up treaties and agreements means that other countries will stop negotiating pacts with you, I suggest you type the phrase "withdrew from the pact" in Google, or a similar phrase, and start reading. It's totally normal for nations to engage in such behavior and then to move on to cut deals in the future. Either humans have the memories of pocket calculators or maybe, just maybe, nations make deals with other nations based on current and future expected issues, and not on what such and such a state did with some other state at some time in the past. Can you imagine:

AIDE: Mr President, Chile promised Peru to hold a plebiscite in 1893, but failed to do so.
PRESIDENT: Scratch Chile. We obviously can't do business with them. What about Italy?
AIDE: Sir, after they changed governments in WWII, they left the Axis.
PRESIDENT: Who can trust them now? What about Thailand?
AIDE: It took them twenty years to negotiate a mere extradition treaty with India.
PRESIDENT: Is there anyone we can do business with?

Reality? Everyone knows that Taiwan's relations with China are special and no one is going to say: "Wow! Taiwan renegotiated a pact with China! OMG WE CAN'T DEAL WITH THEM!" The US isn't going to stop trying to include Taiwan in the TPP. N Zealand and Singapore aren't going to tear up their trade pacts. Other nations aren't going to stop sitting down to talk with Taiwan, unless Beijing puts pressure on them (did we get a promise in this pact for Beijing to stop that? Hahaha).

So, to cut to the chase because I know you are tired of reading, what is the function of the "sign the pact or else no credibility?" It's mere rhetoric to bully small nations into signing those unequal pacts with larger states. It's a form of shock doctrine designed to get the population to go along with a sell out by creating fear of being weeded out (another favorite trope of Ma's). It's a club wielded by Ma Ying-jeou to bash Taiwan's people into submission.

It's not inevitable that China will swallow Taiwan (in fact I am coming to the conclusion that China's rising power is making that ever less probable), but it will certainly become inevitable if academics keep forwarding these zombie insights exploited by the KMT that are completely untrue yet cannot be killed.
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Daily Links:

• RALLY ON SUNDAY on Ketegalen Blvd
• LiveStream from Inside the Legislature: thanks, Sean Su. You're awesome.
• Wen Chi-yu on Ma Ying-jeou's communications problem. At CFR no less, usually a bastion of anti-Taiwan Establishment writing, they've had a couple of really good pieces on the rallies. 
• Fumao Today: vids of the protest
• NYTimes: China reacts to the protests
• Tea Leaf Nation: social media and the student protests
• Why did the rally happen? Academic/Activist explains.
• NPR blog: why they stormed the legislature
• Water rationing in Tainan
• Haha. KMT plans counterrallies on Saturday.
• A Ma Ying-jeou DPP ad from a previous election gets an update.
• Hundreds of Hong Kongers publish ad in Liberty Times warning Taiwan to avoid dangers of Sinicization.
• Taiwan specialist Chris Hughes responds to a misleading article about him.
• CDC warns of scrub typhus among ticks while tomb sweeping.

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[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!

Banyan on Taiwan's Commonsense Consensus

Banyan over at the Economist has had two interesting pieces on Taiwan recently. This one, entitled "Taiwan's Commonsense Consensus", has some excellent summaries of the island's situation:

Perhaps this is not so surprising. Taiwan has long behaved as a normal country in almost everything except its dealings with its large neighbour. As those become easier, the status quo seems even more desirable. And increased contact highlights points of difference as much as a shared ethnic and cultural heritage. Knowing China better makes Taiwanese even more aware of how lucky they are to be prosperous and free.

I didn't like Banyan's analysis when I first read it, as it appears pretty conventional, but I changed my mind:

China hopes economic interdependence will win hearts and minds. This will keep the more congenial KMT in power. And it will bring closer the day when Taiwan’s people fall willingly back, as China sees it, into the warm embrace of the motherland and “reunify”.

Kudos to Banyan for putting reunify in quotes. The problem is that the economic carrots have nothing to do with winning hearts and minds -- Beijing is well aware that economic carrots will have zero effect on Taiwanese sentiment. Beijing knows perfectly well what goes on in Taiwan -- they watch TV, read the papers, have people on the ground here, and collect intelligence from businessmen in China. They know that the Taiwanese want to make money off China but at the same time do not want to be annexed to the PRC. Rather, the goal of integration is threefold:

-- to build constituencies in Taiwan that are dependent on PRC monies
-- to keep the KMT in power (as Banyan notes) by directing money flows to areas where the KMT can cultivate its local networks and build new ones
-- to entangle the Chinese and Taiwanese economies together so deeply that Taiwan cannot maintain its independent existence.

Banyan surely knows this; I just wish the foreign press was more concrete about what is actually going on.

Further:

The KMT likes to portray the DPP as dangerous hotheads who might force China to carry out its threat of invasion if Taiwan declares independence. The DPP paints the KMT as a party of Chinese stooges leading Taiwan blindfold towards absorption by the mainland. In fact, the two parties are having a more sophisticated argument: not about independence or unification, but about how best to preserve a status quo most people in Taiwan cherish. The danger is how China might react as it becomes clear that present policies are bringing unification no closer. The hope is that, with so much else to preoccupy it, its leaders will enjoy the smoother relations and not ask where they are leading.

It sounds like wisdom but it is actually only conventional. KMT elites don't want to preserve the status quo -- for some Taiwan is a bargaining chip into the great game in the PRC where the real money is; others, such as the President, have a powerful ideological commitment to annexation. The party itself is ideologically committed to annexation, of course, and conventional commentary like this, in my experience, vastly underestimates the extent to which old-line KMTers identify with China emotionally and ideologically, and see Taiwan as an alien place of exile.

The unpopularity of annexation, as Banyan notes, is why the President keeps trying to accomplish it by stealth, chipping away at the island's independence -- maintaining Taiwan is already a part of China, curtailing Taiwan's independent diplomacy, attempting to get the public to start calling China the mainland instead of China, and so forth, even as China continues to suppress Taiwan in the international sphere.

The local public is well aware that the struggle is not over how to best preserve Taiwan's status quo -- that is merely a conventional wisdom/pro-KMT talking point that circulates in Taipei masquerading as a deep insight in the way that such cynicism always does -- but whether Taiwan will be annexed to China. The widespread perception that Ma is too close to China is an important driver of the recent shifts away from the KMT in 6 of the last 8 elections. The public knows where Ma wants to go.

For those of us who live in Taiwan and have watched this struggle for the last two decades, the sad failure of the media to report it properly is quite illuminating. Just imagine how differently this would be reported if the topic was Russia and Estonia and not China and Taiwan. Can you see: "In fact, the pro-Estonian and pro-Russian parties are having a more sophisticated argument: not about independence or unification, but about how best to preserve a status most people in Estonia cherish."

Taiwan's democracy is an important factor in slowing the rush towards China. Banyan raises the issue of what China will do when it discovers its policies don't work -- but surely Beijing already knows they are not working. A better way to see it is to ask what will happen when Beijing resolves its internal debate over what to do since its annexation policies can't succeed and they know that.

Indeed, one way to see Beijing's "economic carrot" policies is to view them as a way to put off the thorny problem Beijing created for itself when it decided to be completely intractable on the subject of annexing Taiwan. And further -- to build resentment towards Taiwan among its own citizens -- "we're so nice to them, and they are richer than us." I've heard Chinese complain about the "privileges" of Tibetans....

And that decision about Taiwan will certainly come in the context of the heightening of tensions all across Asia by China.

Brrrr.

ADDED: One longtime professional analyst and observer of Taiwan affairs told me this was easily the best piece he's seen on Taiwan in the international media for many years.
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Daily Links:

• Millions of tons of rice in China contaminated with metals. I wonder what the score is for Taiwan.
• Chen Yun-lin protests in southern Taiwan on video.
  
• In other news Chen Shui-bian Veep Annette Lu is still an idiot. Annette, please retire from public life. Tomorrow.
  
• Some interesting commentary from the US on the AIG-Nanshan sale from a former UN spokesman.
  
• New RAND study on China's air force.
• Gerrit van der Wees letter in WaPo in response to the Ma interview.
  
• Taiwan Today: Flora Expo boosts Taiwan's profile
• All Coral reefs to be gone within the lifetime of most of the people now reading this. What will it take to make our governments move on fossil fuels?
  

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[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.

The Economist Completely Blows It

No wonder people read blogs.

The Economist, in the midst of an otherwise sturdy Establishment-style article on the entirely artificial spat over the Senkakus, suddenly belched up:

China maintains that the uninhabited islands were seized by Japan when it took over Taiwan at the end of a war between the two countries in 1895. Taiwan was handed back to China at the end of the second world war, but the islands remained under the control of the Americans, who administered them as part of the Okinawa island chain. America handed Okinawa back to Japan in 1972, including the Senkakus. Japan says the islands have always been Japanese. America takes no position on the rival sovereignty claims. But it has said that its defence treaty with Japan applies to the islands.

Wow is this ever awful. I noted some of this in a comment I left there and a complaint on the site, but I am placing it here as well.

1. Taiwan was not "handed back" to China at the end of WWII. The San Francisco Peace Treaty does not name a recipient of Taiwan's sovereignty precisely because the Powers did not want either Chinese government to have the island. To this day it is the policy of the US and Japan that the status of Taiwan is undetermined. In fact a representative of Japan to Taiwan was expelled last year after reminding the KMT government of that fact. This is all available online and should be second nature. As an aside, it is astounding the number of media reps out here who do not bother to look this stuff up.

2. Taiwan was not "handed back" to China because it had never been part of any ethnic Chinese emperor's China, but had only been a colony of the Qing empire (and only part of it, at that). Until the late 1930s Taiwan was generally considered not part of China by the Chinese themselves -- just as the Senkakus were not considered part of China. By writing like this, the media abets China's drive to inflate itself out to the old Qing borders. Imagine how everyone would laugh if Ankara suddenly started to claim Jordan because both belonged to the Ottoman Empire. But that is exactly what is happening here.

3. History: Japan took the Senkakus in January of 1895 after about a decade of considering it. The treaty ending the Sino-Japanese War and conceding Taiwan was not signed until April. The Japanese did not completely occupy Taiwan for many months afterward. The seizure of the Senkakus had nothing to do with the seizure of Taiwan. It is irrelevant "what China maintains" since that is false. The media cannot strike a balance between truth and lies; no such balance exists. By repeating this falsehood without identifying it as such, and presenting it as if readers should consider it seriously, The Economist merely enhances it.

4. History: Japan does not say the islands "have always been Japanese." That is totally wrong. Japan's position is that when they were occupied in 1895, no one claimed them. See their response to Kristof, especially point 1.

5. History: until 1968 both the PRC and ROC considered the Senkakus to be Japanese and all their maps and documents said so. Suddenly, when oil was announced beneath the Senkakus in 1968, both Chinese governments manufactured a claim to them. It would be great if someone somewhere in the media actually mentioned this history aloud.

It is one thing to attempt to find a balance between Tokyo and Beijing, but it is quite another to act as though there is a balance midway between fact and fiction. There isn't one. The Economist owes it to its readers to correct Beijing's false claims, especially those made in the context of its burgeoning expansionism. What a massive fail.

The media presentations, which focus on Beijing's ire, are by default, Beijing-centric -- because Beijing is the actor that is flailing about, making noise and cutting off heads. Japan's quiet, classy response isn't presented as a positive policy, but merely means that Japan's response gets fewer mentions and less emphasis. Worse, the media acts as though "tensions" are like gravity, without human agency behind them.

In recent days tensions have risen to a point where China’s leaders refuse even to meet their Japanese counterparts and are threatening worse to come.

Imagine if The Economist had written the facts instead of giving a "balanced" presentation -- that tension occurs because human beings choose for it to occur:

In recent days Beijing has ramped up tensions a point where China’s leaders refuse even to meet their Japanese counterparts and are threatening worse to come.

...because Japan has done absolutely nothing to increase tensions. Arresting a fishing boat captain for twice ramming Japanese vessels in Japanese waters is perfectly legal.

And recall that Chinese fishing boats have been subjected to far worse by other countries, but Beijing did not put on a show like this. This is all about abusing Japan to test its relationship with the US and to score points with nationalist crowd at home, as well as perfect tactics for use in other disputes.
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[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!

The Economist Giveth, and Taketh Away

The Economist, that bastion of conservative analysis and first-rate English prose, offers up two articles this week on Taiwan, one pretty good on the WHO issue, and one on Frank Hsieh's win in the DPP primary. Speaking on the WHO issue, the Economist notes:

Exclusion from the WHO does not mean that Taiwan is a no-go zone for the organisation. But a leaked memorandum of understanding that the WHO and China agreed on in 2005 shows appalling discrimination against it. According to Martin McKee and Rifat Atun of the London School of Hygiene, writing in the Lancet, the memorandum requires all possible WHO contacts with Taiwan to be cleared with China's delegation in Geneva (the WHO’s headquarters) at least five weeks in advance; China decides which Taiwanese individuals will be contacted; communications should identify not Taiwan, but just the city from which the expert to be contacted comes, etc.

This is dangerous as well as humiliating stuff. In mid-April Margaret Chan, the WHO's director-general, who is from Hong Kong, defended the organisation’s refusal to consider Taiwan’s membership by saying its policies are set by its 193 members who "hold on very strongly to the 'one-China' principle'.

But this argument does not make sense. Not only does it ignore the 25 (24 at the time) countries that recognise Taiwan, it also assumes that members could not be persuaded to make an exception for an issue so important as public health. Japan and America, for example, have in the past backed Taiwan’s bid for observer status. The European Union, in a rare instance of foreign-policy commonality, has not.

The Economist goes on to observe that Taiwan sometimes overstates the importance of the WHO entry, quite true, and one reason that Taiwan's agitation on the issue is sometimes a turnoff.

The article on Frank Hsieh's capture of the DPP nomination shows a number of the faults of the foreign media: China frames Taiwan again (with the Economist, it's been there, done that). The article also displays the increasingly common frame for Hsieh, one that reflects the effectiveness of Beijing in influencing the discourse on Taiwan. Here are the opening two paragraphs from the Hsieh piece:

POLITICAL developments in Taiwan rarely bring cheer for China. But the ruling party's surprising choice for its candidate to fight next year's presidential elections will at least provide a little comfort to the government in Beijing. It would be happier still if he were to lose.

Frank Hsieh, a former prime minister who wants better relations with China, won the nomination after a decisive victory in a ballot on May 6th among members of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). He got 45% of the vote, compared with 33% for his main rival, the incumbent prime minister, Su Tseng-chang. This was a blow to President Chen Shui-bian, who favoured Mr Su and a tougher stance towards China.

Who is Frank Hsieh? Here's the new media frame: he is the man "who wants better relations with China." As opposed to President Chen, who apparently prefers worse relations with China. Of course, Chen too wants better relations with China (every Taiwan politician does!), but you won't find that in the Western media. As a letter writer pointed out in the Washington Times the other day, Chen has proposed military confidence-building measures, loosened cross-strait investment regulations, and even liberalized tourism rules that will allow large numbers of Chinese tourists into Taiwan for the first time ever. I can't recall the last time anyone in the western media pointed out that it is China that has refused to talk to Chen Shui-bian, not the other way around. As I observed before, I'm curious to see how long it is before the "what a disappointment Frank Hsieh has been" articles come pouring out of the western media, when it discovers that he's no different than Chen when it comes to Taiwan's sovereignty.

Meanwhile the Ma Ying-jeou International Media Lovefest '08 continues...

In the presidential election next March, Mr Hsieh's chief opponent will be the man who defeated Mr Chen in 1998, Ma Ying-jeou, the charismatic nominee of the main opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT).

Poor Hsieh: no charisma. At least the AP article last week noted that he was witty and sharp-tongued. People seem to like and respect him (does anyone actually respect Ma Ying-jeou?).

The Economist then goes on to cram several misinterpretations into one short paragraph:

Mr Hsieh owes his victory partly to the frustration of DPP members with Mr Chen's lacklustre performance. But he faces a tough battle against Mr Ma. A poll released this week by the China Times, a pro-KMT newspaper, put Mr Ma nine points ahead of Mr Hsieh, although he led by 20 points before the primary.

The article had to get in a hack at the "lackluster" performance of Chen Shui-bian -- how about a mention of the opposition-dominated legislature that has blocked a dozen major bills and paralyzed at least three branches of our government? Naw. That would complexify things, and besides, it would not be a Beijing Approved Frame. Better, like a purse snatcher on a scooter, just to take a swipe at Chen and move on. Gotta love how the Economist references a Blue poll, which everyone knows are hopeless -- though at least it says it is from a pro-KMT paper.

Unfortunately for the Economist, they are forced to report that the good Mr. Hsieh has spoiled the nice neat "wants better relations with China" frame -- he wants Taiwan to be a "normal" country:

Like President Chen, Mr Hsieh is a former lawyer who in the past defended dissidents under the authoritarian rule of the KMT. Unlike Mr Chen, who takes an uncompromising stance towards China, Mr Hsieh has called for “coexistence and reconciliation”, though he has also called for constitutional revisions aimed at making Taiwan a "normal country"—a goal that has caused considerable anxiety in both Beijing and Washington, DC.

Imagine if the first thing the article mentioned about Hsieh was his defense of dissidents in the authoritarian era, not the last. Imagine if the article had run with the dissident frame and noted that Ma Ying-jeou had served the regime, allegedly as a student spy, then as secretary to the dictator and murderer Chiang Ching-kuo, and later as head of one of its policy-making bodies, the RDEC. You'll never see any of that history in the western media, however. Want the real measure of a man? It is what he does when faced with oppression. Hsieh fought it. Ma served it.

Try that frame, Economist.

[Taiwan] [China] [Economist] [DPP] [Taiwan Independence] [KMT] [media] [Frank Hsieh]