Daily Links, March 8, 2010

Cooking up breakfast near the Changgung Hospital in Linkou

BLOGS

• Craig on licensing your photos
  
• Steven Crook links to a great piece from Taiwan Today on Taiwan's unfair naturalization laws.
• USTDC with an article from the 1960s on US-Taiwan defense planning
• Laowiseass interviewed by Pakistan newspaper
• Fili's second in his series on cross-cultural relationships
• Jenna rips on a China-India comparison
• A Hungry Girl visits Hook.
• J Michael observes how Beijing sees culture as a weapon.
• Wild at Heart says road expansion in Kenting is destroying it.
• Ben writes on how FarEastOne attempted to circumvent the laws preventing Chinese investment in critical tech sectors, and calls for a boycott.
• Biking in Taiwan on six day ride in southern Taiwan. Awesome.
• The China Beat with excellent piece on ChinaPol, the discussion forum. Note Baum's reference to academics, who are upbeat about China's rise, and journalists, who are more skeptical.
• Drew on biking the Central Cross.
  

Hanging out on the trails above Taichung.

MEDIA

• Blue Polls: UDN poll has Hau up by 9 over Su for the year-end election in Taipei. TVBS poll has Su up by 2, with large advantage over Hau in item on who would make a better mayor. Obviously pro-Blue Taipei recognizes who is the most competent, but refuses to vote for him regardless. Fascinating display of identity politics over rationality.
• Are there really 500,000 Falun Gong believers in Taiwan? I would have thought it an exaggeration to say "500".
• The government has killed China Mobile's investment in FarEastOne. Thankfully. But can you imagine the whining that would go on about how Chen's "anti-China" policy is hurting the economy, if this had happened under the previous Administration?
• Ban Ki-moon is still a China suck-up
• China hands out junkets to US Congressmen.
• Annette Lu finds out what many of us have been saying
• Health insurance premiums could rise as early as April. Good.
• The Premier unveils plan for 36 infrastructure projects in Kaohsiung.
• This China Times editorial on why the KMT keeps losing is a classic of bad thinking, outmoded Confucianist crap, and inability to face reality. Speaking of losers, President Ma says he will continue to reform the KMT, while the rest of us are still waiting for him to start.
• China reaches the tipping point in its demographic crisis.
• China warns again on Hong Kong democracy. And how do you think they will treat Taiwan?
• Poor victimized China says poor US-China relations are all Washington's fault. If Washington would only kow-tow, things would be ok.
• How is Ma going to get elected in 2012? Absentee voting is in the cards...
• Formosa Landlocked Salmon successfully spawned in the wild!
• President calls for more cross-strait religious exchanges. Religion is an important link in the emerging cross-strait political nexus.
  

A gorge in central Taiwan.

ACADEMIC/GOVERNMENT

• Project 2049 on Taiwan's military command and communications technology
• Kurt Campbell's review at State of US East Asian policy.

DON'T MISS
Robert Kelly's superb article on Yushan in the WSJ.
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Riding the Tea farms in Nantou

Another awesome weekend of riding in the mountains of Nantou with the usual suspects, this time in the tea fields in the Xitou (Hsitou) area.

On Friday night Drew and I biked down to Jiji from Taichung. Jiji is a kitsched out tourist site overwhelmed by tourist hordes on the weekends, but on Friday night it was as dead as any small town in Taiwan. Saturday morning we headed out to nearby Shuili on a lovely ride on the ridges overlooking the river.

The road leaves Jiji as Mingsheng Rd and enters Shuili as Minquan Rd, changing names several times. There are several overlooks with excellent views along the way, this one looking west back to Jiji.

Although I generally object to hill climbing before breakfast, I was willing to make an exception for vistas like this one.

At Shuili we did all the cool things the town has to offer, like hanging at 7-11 and playing computer games at the internet cafe, while we waited for the others to appear.

The morning market was packed....

...and at the bus station some local Filipino workers waited for a bus.

We took 131 out of Shuili through the land where the gravel trucks trash rivers non-stop.

We then went up a side road and started climbing.

At the lower altitudes Nantou is the Land of Betel Nut palms.

The five of us, Drew, Eli, Michael F, and Chris, take a break. The climbing was steady for the rest of the day.

But the mountains were lovely, as always.

Slowly we climbed out of the betel nut wasteland and into the tea farms on the ridges near Xitou.

The higher we went, the lovelier the scenery.

Up into the world of tea.

The road through the land of tea.

Eli takes down an important number, just in case.

At lunch we stopped by a restaurant next to a small lake, where we enjoyed baked trout and the 921 Memorial Bathroom.

Then it was downhill to 151. 151 is the main tourist route up to Xitou, so we decided to avoid all the cars (see photos from previous ride in the area). From there we crossed the gorge and went up the less crowded but much steeper road on the other side.

With great views, of course.

As evening fell, we arrived here to overnight at about 1000 meters after a hard day of climbing. Dinner here was pretty good eating after a hard day of riding, and the conversation was well worth coming all the way to Nantou for.

As you can see, after 921 it was one of the few buildings left standing in the area. UPDATE: Nope, this pic is from Typhoon Toraji in 2001.

The morning found us eating a traditional Taiwanese breakfast, you know, the one where they serve the coffee in shot glasses.

Our goal for the day: The 12 turns on the twisty road at the bottom left there. A wonderful climb up to over 1600 meters...

First, however, we decided to go into Xitou for another breakfast. Rice porridge is ok, but doesn't cut it as a riding food. Here the signs warned to watch out for bicyclists...and elves.

The town was already starting to get crowded as we rode up to the Ultimate Family Mart in Xitou town for coffee and snacks. Thus, for the second day in a row, I found myself climbing before breakfast was finished.

Then the climbing began.

Michael F stands next to a sign naming the curve. Each curve is named after an astrological sign.

Rounding a curve. The road was long but the grade was easy.

Shot this caterpillar grabbing a snack.

The road fogs over quickly and by 11 it was pretty well socked in.

Drew and Chris leave the traffic in the dust.

Four kilometers short of Shanlinxi, we turned onto this incredible road, Nantou 49, which falls 26 kms to Jhushan.

We took a short break here.

The road dropped steeply through the tea fields, with the fog revealing tantalizing vistas from time to time.

It was lined with closed buildings.

Drew captures a tea farm.

Steep, curvy, and fogged in, this descent was one long clenched sphincter. The concrete surface was uneven and occasionally unpaved. A sheen of dust and gravel frequently covered the road, and my fingers ached from braking. And if you misjudge, there is the precipice on your left. I do not recommend this descent unless you have fat tires and excellent life insurance. The shot at the top of this post is also from that descent.

After nine kms of brutal descent, we came to paved road.

Even at lower altitudes the views were astounding, and the descent became a blast, rocketing down steep slopes with sharp curves and mountain walls all about us.

Finally, we arrived in Jhusan, where we parted ways, Drew and I biking on to Taichung. Special congratulations to Eli, who finished his first long ride in the mountains, a difficult one for a new rider. Very impressive!

An amazing ride. Hope to see you on the next one!
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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!

Year End Elections Musings

Paul Lin pointed out the obvious today, without directly referring to it:

However, running in Taipei also carries a greater risk. Opinion polls show that Su would stand a good chance of defeating any
KMT candidate in Sinbei, while at the moment he doesn't seem to have even a 50-50 chance of winning in Taipei, although his chances could improve. Regardless, apart from Su, no pan-green candidate seems capable of winning
Sinbei.

The DPP brain trust has seen the same polls. Clearly they must think that Su can't win. So it is obvious that they don't want Su to win in Taipei. They just want him to run and perform well, while losing so he can run for President. This will keep his name out in front of the public, while garnering a moral victory. They might also be setting him aside for 2016.

As I outlined in the post below, things might well be closer than they think and this strategy should backfire. Su should be preserved for 2012, and his tremendous energy and popularity used for campaigning on behalf of DPP candidates in contested areasin December. Instead, as many people have commented, the Taipei election, if it really cannot be won, should be used for developing a younger politician with a promising future.

As editorials pointed out today (see Liberty Times), the KMT's policy of selling out the island to China is at the root of the vast discontent with the KMT and Ma, yet party elders still publicly argue that the problem is communication. In fact after the last election loss KMTers were claiming, dorkishly, that the public was upset because they were too slow in going after Chen Shui-bian!! Since this year we are likely to see the ECFA signing and early harvest agreements which will trash jobs in local areas across Taiwan as the market floods with cheap Chinese goods and local Taiwan factories close, it is likely that despite modest economic growth this year many will find themselves unemployed and angry. And either not voting, or voting DPP....

The Taipei Times pointed this out today:

Ma is in it for himself and his cronies. KMT legislators were under orders to force through the Local Government Act (地方制度法), and now he wants an economic cooperation agreement to be signed, binding Taiwan to China. You've got officials of Taiwanese nationality carping on about not signing and, as the economy goes down the drain overnight, you have KMT legislators absolving themselves of all responsibility for oversight. And as this is going on, no one gives a damn about how unpopular the policy is.

I don't read Ma as being in it for himself and his cronies. I read him as a True Believer Ideologue who is surrounded by people, including the Old Guard, who are using his beautiful faux Confucian Facade to further their own ends in the China dialogue. But the Taipei Times has put its finger on the problem that the ECFA sellout is creating for Ma: it is a wedge that splits the KMT Old Guard, with its children now moving into positions of power in the new CCP-KMT axis, from its servitors at the local level who are ensconced in the traditional construction-industrial state system and bound to the KMT by flows of cash, not ideology and access to the emerging cross-strait power system. Most of the local KMTers will see their constituents take massive hits from the flood of Chinese products. It will be interesting to watch how the Mainlander core of the KMT attempts to keep the local legislators in line.
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Daily Links:

• UDN poll says that current and very popular Taichung Mayor Jason Hu crushes any DPP contender.


• WSJ reports on development of rules for PRC dominance and control of investment in Taiwan's financial industry. Meanwhile upcoming agreement to open market to 1300 currently banned industrial products. Good-bye Taiwan industry: the main beneficiaries of these agreements are going to be financial industry kingpins and organized crime kingpins.


• China confronts India as US power in Asia is in decline. Good thing we're making Afghanistan safe for Chinese expansion.


• Developers of Central Taiwan science park ignore court order to stop.


• Quake centered in Jiasian, where Morakot wiped out Hsiaolin village in August

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Su to run for Taipei mayor in December

Su speaks at a DPP rally in 2008 (post with more pics).

It pretty much became official today that former Premier Su Tseng-chang, the popular DPP politician, will run for mayor of Taipei at the end of the year. The formal nominating process remains to be completed, though it is all but certain Su will be the man. Su is widely considered the only DPP politician popular enough in the north to compete for either the Presidency, the mayoralty of Taipei, or the mayoralty of the new municipality, New North City (Xinbei), which comes into existence at the beginning of next year. Hence, there had been much media speculation about which post he would pick. If he wins the Taipei mayor election, he will be mayor, but it is generally held that Taipei is Blue and he will likely lose, leaving him free to run for president in 2012, and still keeping him in the public eye for months during the Taipei City election season.

I don't approve of this move at all. I had been hoping they would save Su to stump for the candidates in the two municipalities, and run him against Ma in 2012. It is absolutely imperative to defeat Ma in 2012. The municipalities are important, but Ma must go.

Below I've collected the vote counts for the mayor elections in 1994, 1998, 2002, and 2006.

2006
KMT 692,085 (53.81)
DPP 525,869 (40.89)
Other 68,135 ( 5.30)

2002
KMT 873102 (64.1)
DPP 488811 (35.9)

1998
KMT 766377 (51.1)
DPP 688072 (45.9)

1994
KMT 364618 (25.9)
DPP 615090 (43.7)
New 424905 (30.2)

Turnout was 64% in the most recent election, it had been around 70% previously. The current mayor, Hau, is lackluster and does not bring out Blue voters like Ma Ying-jeou did.

As you can see, the Blue vote typically runs 51-55% of the total vote, except for the anomalous 2002 election when Ma won a crushing victory. The DPP typically gets 40-45%. This means that if 5% of the votes shift from the KMT to the DPP, the DPP has a good shot at a win. If 10% of the Blue vote stays home, the DPP will win -- and Blue voters are staying home in droves at present. If the logic of this move is to keep Su in the game for 2012, then it is a gambling on the whim of 5% of the electorate.

Another way to look at is look at the DPP vote peak in 1998 -- 688K, and the KMT vote last time around, 692K. That is a difference of just 4,000 votes. Hau Lung-bin, the current mayor and probable candidate, lacks the popularity Ma enjoyed, and there is no reason at present to think we will see a significant gain in KMT voters for this election. If Su reaches the DPP high, and the KMT performance is lackluster, just a couple of thousand voters have to switch to make Su the mayor. And the DPP has been doing well lately.....
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Daily Links

• Manny Ramirez and the Dodgers coming to Taiwan this month
• Taiwanese-American.org talks to the lovely and talented Janet Hsieh, the host of the Discovery Channel's Fun Taiwan show.
• After FTA with China, Indonesia suddenly discovers its industries are being crushed and wants to renegotiate. But don't worry, the ECFA cargo cult will grind on regardless. If we just sign ECFA, there will be a chicken in every garage and a car in every pothole. Or something. Whatever.
  
• Apple Daily editorializes on gangster interference in city council elections.
• What? China totally hypocritical on its island claims? Who could have imagined it?
• The CNA translates several local editorials on the government's decision to halt land sales in Taipei city in a bid to bring housing prices down.
  

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Kaohsiung port takes a hit

I was reading this fascinating article today on wooden molds for making parts for the old Taiwan steam railway trains, when my friend Thomas flipped me a link to the latest blow to Kaohsiung port....it seems that the Danish shipping firm Maersk is pulling out of Kaohsiung:

A Danish giant's decision to pull out of Kaohsiung is seen as a huge blow to the port's future as China gains ground.

The world's largest boxship player has denied it is abandoning its operations in Taiwan in order to concentrate on the growing Chinese market.

Maersk Line told TradeWinds that the decision to pull out of Kaohsiung Port was made as part of a global strategy, which considers each port as a "unique situation".

Tensions have been running high at Kaohsiung since APM Terminals handed over control of piers 76 and 77 to South Korea's Hanjin Pacific at the end of January.

The existing Maersk contract expires in May, and workers at the docks actually struck this month in an attempt to get better severance pay. Maersk is strenuously denying that the decision has anything to do with its investments in China. But as this report observes:

The DPA report in the Liberty Times said Maersk last year stopped the lease on two of its four container terminals at Kaohsiung Port and would not renew the lease for the two remaining terminals when it expires. The reason being is the carrier aims to increase its investment in mainland's Port of Xiamen.

Ranked the world's third busiest container port in the 1980s, Taiwan's largest port has seen its container throughput decline from 10.3 million TEU in 2007 to 8.5 million TEU in 2009. Kaohsiung's demise in recent years has been blamed on the expansion of neighbouring ports, particularly those across the Taiwan Strait on the mainland.

The fall in the global ranking of Kaohsiung port is keenly felt in Taiwan, where international rankings on any scale are an object of much local anxiety. Another report adds (the graph below is from that report):

Indeed, there is evidence that Kaohsiung's share of the East Asian container shipping market has gradually been eroded by the emergence of rival ports in the region over the past few years. The growth of China's port sector has surpassed that of Taiwan as manufacturers have shifted their focus to the Chinese market. The development of Chinese facilities has been aided, in large part, by government tax incentives and low labour costs, which have left their Taiwanese counterparts struggling to compete. As the island's largest port, Kaohsiung has suffered the brunt of the changes and, having been the world's third-largest container port in the 1980s, saw its ranking slip to 22nd in 2008.

World rank of Kaohsiung port in TEUs handled

Kaohsiung has been in a long-term fall-off as Taiwan's factories have moved to China. Another problem for Kaohsiung in maintaining its ranking is that other ports are coming online, including the new port of Taipei in Bali, and the port in Anping in Tainan, a satellite of Kaohsiung. Taiwan currently has seven international ports: Kaohsiung, Anping, Suao, Keelung, Taipei, Hualien, and Taichung. The ROC Yearbook for 2009 says that in 2008, around 74,000 ships visited Taiwan's ports, handling a total of 12.98 million TEUs. The Port of Kaohsiung handled 9.68 million TEUs of cargo, followed by Keelung with 2.06 million TEUs. Since Keelung is being phased out in favor of the new Port of Taipei, which is five times the size of Keelung, it is obvious that Kaohsiung's share of the island's container traffic (which has increased slightly even though Kaohsiung's traffic has decreased) will continue to decline.
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Even More Daily Links

• A majority say they will vote for Hau over Su Tseng-chang if Su runs in December against Hau for Taipei mayor, but then a majority says they think Su will win.
• Ma's approval ratings now at 29 in pro-KMT UDN poll.
• China Times goes hysterical on climate change. No wonder the public doesn't know what to think.
• Taichungers: March 9 is the AmCham Taichung Happy Hour at Leble'dor Restaurant in Taichung, starting at 7
  

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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!

Daily Links, March 1, 2010

In Fengyuan the other day, I found this small noodle factory drying its products by the side of the road.

What's hung on the blogs today?

• Drew expounds on the Bicycle and National Identity
• Dignified Rant on the need for F-16s
• Just Recently rounds up information on the recent elections here.
• Frozen Garlic says the new redistricting doesn't make for an unfair KMT advantage in the legislature.
• Taiwan Matters! on the election win for the DPP.
• Taiwan Photographers: Kaohsiung
• J Michael looks at the media coverage of the recent DPP election victories. And don't miss this post on news suppressed at China's request (?).
  
• Youtube: from Sean Su: "On 2/26 a KMT supporter threatened and started rushing March for Taiwan just after they marched from the 2/28 Memorial (for the KMT led massacre on Taiwan). When she fails to suppress freedom of speech, she gets pushed away and calls her 'friend at the Investigative Bureau'."
• Stocks and Politics on DPP victory.
• Letters from Taiwan on ECFA and the politics of fear.
• Michael C on our trip to Vang Vieng with many pics. Laos is a blast -- I can't wait to go back. Michael K with more excellent pics of same.
  
• The Former Native Speaker with notes on the publication of Formosa Betrayed.
• A-gu with excellent coverage of the recent proposals to pump up Chinese history in the curriculum. Speaking of education, the Taipei Education Bureau circulates memo warning on "unhealthy gay social activities". Speaking of unhealthy, how about those school workloads?
  
• Save the Dolphins on the Central Science Park EIA, voided, and that decision now upheld.
  

MEDIA:

• A positive Review of Formosa Betrayed. Rotten Tomatoes has a compilation of largely negative reviews. Jon Adams with the report on the film and the White Terror.
  
• China misread by Bulls and Bears alike (Carnegie Foundation)
• One good thing about the electoral defeats the KMT is suffering: the western media is actually printing negative information about Ma Ying-jeou. However, criticism of ECFA is still untouchable -- negative commentary is always sanitized by framing it as an alternative opposition viewpoint against which ECFA is presented as the default correct position. It is impossible to understand the public's disappointment with Ma without understanding that Ma/KMT China policies are not popular. Note how the Taiwan News' local explanation focuses on ECFA.
  
• How the nuke parts reached Iran through Taiwan.
• Yet another criticism of Taiwan's insane educational workloads. Note the low math scores.
• Heritage calls for F-16s for Taiwan.
• Meeting Taiwan's Defense Needs (Eurasia Review)
• South Korea: same pattern of women, marriage, and birth as Taiwan.
• MOEA plans more meetings on industrial trade policy with China.
• Jewel thief in Taipei 101 case held in Korea.
• It's flower season on Yangmingshan again.
• Land Bank says no construction loans for land over $6 million a ping, market just too overheated.
• The pro-KMT China Post report on the election loss. In this case, the explanation is that the nominated candidates were out of touch scholars. Yet the DPP's Hsinchu candidate appealed to the predominant educated demographic precisely because he has a scholarly background.
• Water shortages expected for after April in southern Taiwan.
• Taiwan's first graduate of VMI, now an officer, busted for tongue kissing male and female subordinates.
  

SPECIAL:

• Why is the public so horribly informed about science? RealClimate points out the awful state of science writing at a major UK paper.
  
• Asia Times with a provocative piece on how the Maldives and Seychelles are sinking themselves.
• Roy Berman on freethinkers in the Philippines.
  

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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!