Keelung Musings

Spent this week hanging out in Keelung. Had two good days of sun, one of which I wasn't carrying a camera with me. Missed a lot of good photos that day, but did walk around in the evening and at night on wednesday. Here is a shot of one of the ships in the harbor....

Keelung is a very photogenic city. It also has another singular quality: it lives in a time warp, feeling more like Taiwan 30 years ago than any other city on the island, even Chiayi, which appears to have more foreign restaurants. Sorry Tainan lovers, but as Tainan has become a major tourist destination, the city has upscaled and changed, its tourist sites becoming more kitsch and its "traditional" foods converging on each other and on mass market styles and flavors. In Keelung, the tourist sites are undiscovered -- everyone just goes to the Miaokou Night Market, a snoozefest, to eat. But Keelung is packed with history...... its restaurants have not been taken over by the penchant for "innovation" which, as my friend Jeff Miller pointed out the other day, is slowly destroying Taiwan's traditional food flavors.

On the wooden platform facing the harbor you can take lovely pictures and watch H. sapiens at play. Near here I visited a couple of local clinics where the doctor, in his 60s, had taken over the practice from his father, who had been educated at NTU when it was an imperial Japanese university. It's Keelung.

Waiting for the man that never showed?

We had some lovely puffy blue skies this week. The harbor is always a site for great pics.

Incredibly, these junior high and high school kids were all waiting in a long line for... coffee at Starbucks.

Unfortunately some of the streets are already being done up in the faux "Old Street" style that is crushing the individuality out of Taiwan's old towns.

Lots of good food, especially seafood.

Come to Keelung, and play.
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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.

DPP's Establishment of Dept of China Affairs Media Q&A

Keelung evening.

Media Q and A with DPP Chair Su Tseng-chang on the Department of China Affairs
July 25, 2012

Q: You mention that creating the Department of China Affairs is a first step, but creating the department with the name of "China" instead of "cross Strait", is that a sort of discount to its credibility?

A: The DPP highly values China by creating the Department of China Affairs, and this is showing, as well as a first step, towards goodwill intentions. Using "China" is a neutral term, China calls itself China, and the whole world knows it as China. The DPP already made a resolution to call it by this name.

Q: Has the name of "China Committee"(the future higher ranking one) been finalized?

A: The name is not the most important issue here. We can call it China Affairs Committee or by another name, and this is a decision that I will fully respect. This is something that we can all discuss. The main objective of a Committee is to be able to invite important members of our party as well as civic organizations and members of the academia to give their opinions, gathering different perspectives on the term for China.

The Committee will serve as a platform for everyone's perspectives and to strengthen communications in order to integrate the different views and form a large consensus for the party. Then we must go through the party mechanisms to make a lasting resolution.

The most important issues here is to be consistent for Taiwan's benefit, meeting the people's interests and expectations - all in line with the fundamental values of the DPP. We wish for this Committee to remain wide open instead of boxed in from the beginning. In addition to the current resolutions already in place for the DPP, and facing with the different circumstances in China, there is certainly room for discussion.

The role of the chair is to integrate the Committee into a platform and to formulate at the end, the best policy solution. In my view, the DPP has its own stand, viewpoints and values, but towards China's transformation, the DPP's attitude, method and strategic solutions do not have limitations. The DPP has chosen to express goodwill, showing an active and confident position towards engagement with China. In regards to how China will respond, the DPP will not make any forecasts, but we hope for a mutual relationship, not just unilateral. The DPP makes this type of goodwill hoping that both sides can achieve better developments.

Q: Will he DPP go to the other side(China) to establish a fortified point?

At this stage, the DPP does not have any plans to do that, and I am afraid that the current conditions are not so simple. After all, this is a matter for both sides to discuss. The DPP is a responsible political party, and the DPP must conduct its affairs step by step once it senses there is a mature atmosphere for these kinds of planning.

Q: If any DPP public official wishes to visit China, do they need the approval of the DPP Headquarters? For China, the DPP must abandon its independent stance in order to carry out exchanges. Do you wish, after showing goodwill, that China makes any concessions?

A: There are already regulations in place for DPP public officials making visits to China. In regards to the DPP persistence in its basic standpoints, China has in the past made such demands, but China has also changed its position. The DPP has its own stands and viewpoints, which are namely to build stability for national interests and for sovereignty. However, what is different now is that the DPP in the past did not carry out any exchanges with China, but now we have gradually made more interactions, and this is a good start.
(Chinese translation below, click READ MORE)
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Daily Links:

• Five Flashpoints in the South China Sea
• Yup, China forced removal of the ROC flag from the Olympic site. As J Michael points out, the rule on national flags refers to Olympic venues, not Regent Street. Sad.
• We landlubbers are delighted to learn that James Holmes, the naval strategy specialist with an interest in Taiwan, is writing regularly now at The Diplomat.
• Condolences to James Soong, whose wife died today.

WantWant Creates Pro-China Media Monster

Hitting the seafood restaurants near the red light district in Keelung

Huge news as pro-China tycoon Robert Tsai of the WantWant Group seems set to dominate Taiwan's media markets:

The KMT news organ:

The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday approved, with a record large number of conditions, an acquisition bid by Want Want China Broadband (旺中寬頻), which is affiliated with the Want Want China Times Group (旺旺中時集團), to buy up eleven cable TV service providers owned by the China Network Service (CNS/中嘉網路), the country’s second-largest multiple-system operator, after 18 months of delays. The Want Want China Group is expected to pay NT$ 76 billion to CNS to become the largest media group in Taiwan.

....

Yesterday, NCC chairperson Su Herng (蘇蘅) and three NCC members held a press conference to explain the NCC’s decision. Some scholars and cable services providers voiced their opposition out of concern that the acquisition would limit speech and lead to a media monopoly, so they cast doubts on whether or not the affixed conditions would be able to restrict the Want Want China Times Group from becoming a media hegemon. NCC chairperson Su repeated twice, “These conditions can prevent that.”

AP has a longer report:

The decision comes as other cable stations on the island weigh the advantages of silencing anti-China commentators to help them sell Chinese language programming to the lucrative China market. In one potentially far reaching move, an outlet normally known for its pro-independence, anti-China sentiment recently pulled the plug on a popular talk show with a reputation for unrestrained China bashing. Critics said the decision reflected the outlet’s bid to try to sell Chinese-language soap operas on the mainland for many times the revenue it earned on the talk show.

With six round-the-clock cable TV news stations and three brashly partisan national newspapers — one owned by the China Times Group — media independence is a big issue on this island of 23 million people, particularly as it seeks to maintain its de facto political independence in the face of an unstinting Chinese bid to bring it under its control 63 years after the sides split in a civil war. Critics say the battle is already being lost, though Wednesday’s NCC decision suggests that such a conclusion may be premature.

AP's report has some really good reporting at the end of the story, on page 2, on how local TV stations are going soft on China reporting to in order to sell their own products in China. But then AP goes soft itself -- FT had the courage to call Tsai "pro-China" in its headline, while AP says he is "China-friendly" but then terms an opposition TV show "anti-China." It's a small point, but telling... FT's report was good and had a quote from Ketty Chen, one of my favorite analysts of local politics.

“People are extremely uncomfortable to the point of being angry at him, knowing that he has a pro-China stance and that he has publicly advocated that Taiwan be part of China,” said Ketty Chen, a political scientist at National Taiwan University. “That’s the main reason why people don’t want him to become the Rupert Murdoch of Taiwan.”

The AP's bog-standard Establishment view really came through in its comments about the National Communications Commission (NCC). To wit:

By putting strict conditions on CTG’s China Network systems acquisition, the NCC appeared to acknowledge these criticisms, while trying to forestall the emergence of a single dominant media group in Taiwan.

But the NCC can only do so much to maintain the independence of Taiwan’s media.

AP here treats the NCC as if it were a real regulatory body which is really trying to protect media freedom and the market. But of course, that is nonsense. The NCC was created in 2006 by the KMT-controlled legislature with the express purpose of getting around the DPP's control of media oversight and keep media organs reined in within KMT-established boundaries. It is difficult for me to regard the NCC as anything but a KMT tool. From an old post on the topic from a moment when the NCC showed a tiny bit of independence that the Ma Administration then moved to curb:

The irony of the move against the NCC is that the NCC was created under the Chen Administration in 2006 by the KMT controlled legislature to bring mass media under the control of the government. The Executive Branch, then controlled by the DPP, argued that it should have the authority to appoint NCC commission members, but the legislature clearly intended that it would have the last word on who the commission members were. Since the legislature was controlled by the KMT and its allies, the intent of the law was obvious: it was a legislative end-run around the DPP controlled executive branch intended to restore KMT control over the media and chill pro-Taiwan speech by centralizing control of the media oversight in KMT hands.

The NCC commissioner make-up reflects party share of the legislature -- with the KMT dominant in the legislature, the NCC is dominated by the KMT. For a taste of the NCC and other media issue, see this article from last year on claims that the NCC was being pressured to approve the merger, this one on PTS, and this one on the NextMedia case and the NCC.

The Taipei Times gave a taste of that in its article on the merger:

Lin said the party condemned the commission’s opaque, closed-door review of the merger application and demanded full disclosure of all records and video recordings of the meeting.

While the deal was neither legitimate nor urgent, it was hastily approved with one week left before the terms of the four remaining NCC commissioners ended, he said.

Recall that two Decembers ago Next Media mogul Jimmy Lai applied for new cable TV licenses in Taiwan.  Lai is disliked by Beijing. In a piece in WSJ he criticized the Administration and the NCC, observing:

We are not the only media company affected; the government of President Ma Ying-jeou has undertaken several initiatives to restrain the previously vibrant Taiwanese press. As the majority owner of Next Media, I have a strong vested interest in this particular case. However, I believe that anyone who values the free flow of information—not to mention the future of a free Taiwan—should be concerned.

In delivering its decision, Taiwan's National Communications Commission cited concerns that we might not be able to satisfy various regulations, and that we might try to circumvent existing program-rating restrictions. Most ominously of all, the NCC said it could not be sure that Next Media would "fulfill its social responsibilies as a mass media operator." These are all shockingly subjective rationales. Instead of dealing with the facts and merits of our application, the NCC is punishing us on the basis of what we might do.

....

Here it helps to remember that though the NCC is an ostensibly "neutral" body, its members are nonetheless nominated in proportion to the number of seats of political parties held in the legislature. Today the KMT has an overwhelming majority in Taiwan's legislature and holds the presidency. So one has to wonder whether the quality of reporting in Taiwan is really the driving concern here. The NCC would not undertake actions that endanger press freedom and the reputation of Taiwan if President Ma and the ruling KMT did not back their actions.

Lai attemped to purchase the China Times group, which was eventually sold to....Robert Tsai and the WantWant Group.

As I always say, the closer we get to China, the farther Taiwan moves from democracy. Growing dominance of the media by a rabidly pro-China billionaire won't be good for any aspect of Taiwan's public life.
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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.

Taiwan videos from the 40s-60s

Huge site of videos from the past, with many videos from Taiwan of the 40s, 50s and 60s.

http://www.criticalpast.com/stock-footage-video/Taiwan

Thanks to the commenter who left this. Wonderful stuff!
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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.

BREAKING: Legislature Allows Ractobeef

AP reports:

Taiwan’s legislature has passed a bill to lift a ban on U.S. beef that contains small amounts of a growth additive.

The bill was passed Wednesday. It will allow Taiwanese to import U.S. beef containing minimal traces of ractopamine, a feed additive for creating lean meat.

Lifting the ban will remove a major irritant in Taiwan-U.S relations. Despite shifting its recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979, the U.S. remains Taiwan’s most important foreign partner. It has been pushing for a removal of the ractopamine ban as a precondition for progress on trade talks.

The President has been successful in getting the legislature to accept the onus of permitting US ractobeef.

The Codex Commission undercut the position of the island's politicians when it determined that small amounts of ractopamine would be permissible, meaning that they could not cite the UN to say that no ractopamine was permitted in denying the US on the issue. Let's see what issue the KMT cooks up next to keep a burr under the saddle of US-Taiwan relations.

The US has won. Let us see how magnanimous it can be in victory. We can haz trade dealz now? But the US did not mention any trade deal in its response.
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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.

Olympic Flag goes AWOL

Images like this are flying around the net. Apparently Beijing has been able to make the ROC flag disappear from the line-up of Olympic flags in London.
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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.

Revisiting the Past + Links

Too busy to write seriously tonight, but I thought I'd dredge up this....an acquaintance mentioned the Waldron-Freeman debate on Taiwan at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) from 2000, "If Taiwan Declares Independence and China Reacts With Force, On Whom Should the U.S. Lean Harder, China or Taiwan?"

Many things are striking about it. Readers will recall that Charles Freeman nearly became NIC Chair, so his views on China and Taiwan would have been highly influential. Freeman appears to be more hardline than Beijing, reproducing a number of its propaganda lines as analysis, to the point of coming out with nonsense statements like....

 Just as in the 17th century there were 11 attempts, the first 10 defeats, before the then Ch’ing forces succeeded in taking Taiwan and re-incorporating it into Fujian province.

...except that Taiwan had never before been incorporated into Fujian province. He comes out with a line he took in several other venues....

Reunification on terms like those proposed by Beijing would threaten no American or allied interest. It would not entail a presence of the People’s Liberation Army in Taiwan. There would be no change in north-east Asian strategic alliance or balance. It would not alter Taiwan’s ability, the ability of the voters in Taiwan, to elect their own leadership and govern themselves. It would not affect Taiwan’s economy or way of life. It would not deprive Americans of any of the human ties we enjoy with people on the island. It would, however, eliminate the only conceivable cause and venue of armed conflict between the United States and China. And it would maximize the influence of the values Taiwan exemplifies on the mainland.

Both the assertions in the last two sentences are wrong, and have been overtaken by events -- China and the US now enjoy flashpoints in the Senkakus via the treaty with Japan, and in the South China Sea. As the debate makes clear, Freeman repeatedly blames Taiwan for being a victim of Chinese expansionism, while Waldron correctly notes that the source of the problem is Chinese expansionism, not Taiwan's desire to be a free and independent state.

Heh. Since China's ramping up of South China Sea tensions and Senkaku tensions, the Sellout Crowd has fallen silent. What will Foreign Affairs stuff its pages with now if its contributors can't argue that selling out Taiwan will create peace?

One also has to love his claim that President Bush's decision to sell Taiwan F-16s in 1992 was the cause of the militarization of the Taiwan issue, as if there were no rising Chinese threat -- one official rationale was, after all, the Russian sale of Su-27s to China inked the previous year.

In the Reagan-Deng agreement to which I referred, during which the United States agreed to reduce arms sales to Taiwan, was the moment at which the with-drawl of forces from Fujian began. They were present in the region in force before that. In 1992, in August 1992, out of apparent concern for the voters of Texas’ opinion of his stewardship, President Bush authorized the largest single sale in U.S. history of weapons, which was 150 F-16s to Taiwan. In no way was that consistent with the bargain. In fact, it was that, it is that, military dynamic, the replacement of a dynamic which from August ’82 to August ’92 that steadily reduced tensions, military installations and produced dialogue across the Strait.

...FAS has an extremely useful CRS report that contains the agreement on arms sales. The agreement clearly hinges on the PRC's pursuit of a policy of peaceful annexation......it was obvious to smart observers what the expansion of China's military would mean.... it also goes without saying that Beijing constantly blames US military sales for militarizing the Strait, a position reproduced by Freeman above. Sad.

Waldron is fond of pointing out that selling out Taiwan, invariably presented as a great new idea that can solve many problems, is in reality a tired old Cold War solution repeatedly recycled, a turd that won't flush constantly re-presented as bold new fertilizer for a new US-China relationship.
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Daily Links:

• Unemployment up, CIER lowers econ growth forecast to 2.36%
  
• Ben Goren rips Taichung Mayor Hu for criticizing the media attacks on Veep Wu. Lovely post.
• Haha. You knew those small shops in Shida were being run out of the alleys there to satisfy insatiable developer demand
• Photographer shoots dogs about to be euthanized in Taiwan, is mentioned in Washington Post lifestyle blog. 
• Taiwan to ship artillery, mortars, to the Spratlys
• AsiaEye with under the radar news for the week of 7.23
• JUST FOR FUN: On the set at Godzilla movies, BW pix from the 1950s and 60s

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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.

Veep Wu Den-yih Prez Hopes Toast? Discuss....

Here's a question for you addicts of Taiwan politics out there: With Wu threatening to sue media outlets, is Vice President Wu Den-yih's potential run for President in 2016 already over? Can he survive the Lin-Yi-shih scandal?

Another question: with Wu out, who is the 2016 favorite? Chu Li-lun (Eric Chu), the New Taipei City Mayor? Or will longtime KMT heavyweight and Speaker of the Legislature Wang Jyn-ping's time have come at last?

Discuss amongst yourselves.
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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.

Daily Links, Mon, July 23, 2012

My friend Klaus B passed me this picture of weirdly pro-PRC geezers from an ROC protection league protesting against the Falungong in Taiwan.

Lots of stuff happening while I was out riding this weekend.....

BLOGS:

• Chiayi snakehead sets record. No, not a gangster, a fish.
• Fagan does another reservoir, in Miaoli.  Here also is his notes on lovely Mingde Reservoir.
• Two days on Green Island with bikes
• Taiwan's South China Sea plan
• Gypsy Rose Lee visits naval hospital in Taiwan, 1969
• You'll gain weight just looking at these pics of Black as Chocolate.

The Rift Valley is endlessly beautiful. Spend some time there this summer.

MEDIA:

• Economic growth forecasts downgraded, July August output may fall.
• The Peaceful Riser to garrison the South China Sea. Lucky that war is not inevitable.
• Ben Goren's letter on corruption in Taiwan
• Taiwan to buy used tanks from US?
• Taipei Times publishes poll from pro-Green Taiwan Thinktank on front page. Yes, the Lin scandal has hurt Ma. yet it would be more credible if the poll were not so obviously rigged -- asking people to compare Next Media's anti-corruption work with the judiciary is begging for the answer they actually received. Wouldn't it be great if the effort that went into this poll had actually produced something worthwhile?
• An open letter to Ma on Chen Shui-bian's health
• Agency Against Corruption, which Ma founded when the previous investigatory apparatus had apparently become blunted by ill-use, busted for a clear conflict of interest.
• LY to vote on capital gains tax AND beef tomorrow. Gov't says either legislature or executive order will force lifting of ban on ractobeef from US.
• How the Senkaku confrontation violated ROC law.
• How grounded PRC frigate reveals things about the Chinese navy
• America's catastrophically stupid Iran policies also screwing up its relations with Korea and Japan
• SPECIAL: My adventures in Wanhua, on FTV with Michella.

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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.

Big Skies in the Big Rift

This weekend did a lovely ride on Saturday and Sunday with my partner in climb Jeff Miller (blog). Rode from Taitung city on 197 to Luye, then to Guanshan for lunch, then took the 20 to the 20甲, then followed Wanchao Rd straight to Yuli, then took the 193 to Rueisuei. Highly recommend this route -- from the turn onto the 20甲 to Rueisuei is about 50kms of downhill incline. Absolutely gorgeous day of puffy blue clouds in the Rift Valley. Bonus: as I was leaving Taitung, I saw myself on TV in the breakfast shop. A map of the route on Saturday.

It was rainy on the opening section of 197, so I didn't get many pictures.

Foggy too. In the distance the mouth of the gorge can be seen.

Farms along a river.

Clouds and fog above Luye town.

A shrine by the side of the road.

Jeff crosses the bridge into Luye.

The 9 before Guanshan. The 9 is a detestable, truck-ridden wasteland. Avoid like plague.

Still, even on the crappy 9, there are good views across the Rift. The rice was just going in so farmers were out working....

We went into Guanshan for lunch. As we arrived, the skies cleared on the west side of the Rift Valley. A gorgeous clear day began.

The cloud formations were fantastic.

From Guanshan we turned onto the 20, the southern cross-island highway.

The 20 -- the line of trees on the left -- climbs gently up to 340 meters, with excellent views down the rift to the south before it disappears into the river gorge.

Approaching the big bridge that marks the turn onto the 20甲.

Jeff crosses the bridge at the beginning of the 20甲.

From the bridge there are gorgeous views north up the river gorge that the 20 follows...

...and southeast across the rift valley.

After crossing the bridge, we went a short distance and turned north onto Wanchao Rd, which quickly became Nanxing Rd. The opening is a long downhill.....

This road goes more or less straight to Yuli, gently downhill the whole way. There are a couple of short inclines but no serious uphills. On this day it was wonderful, for the air was clean and cool -- on a hot August day it might be painful, because for most of it there is no cover.

Jeff enjoys himself.

The weather on the west side of the Rift Valley was gorgeous.....

...but on the east side of the valley it was pouring.

We stopped in one of the many farming villages that line this road for drinks. Here some local Vietnamese wives pose for a photo after exchanging pleasantries with us. One of them narrated the tale of how her sister married an American. "I could have done that, but I was already engaged to a Taiwanese." "Why didn't you just break the engagement?" one of her counterparts asked her, incredulous. "You could have gone to America!" "Those words 'break the engagement' never occurred to me," she replied mournfully.

Big skies in the big rift.

Rain in the Rift. Ominously, we were headed over to that side.

The lovely ride finished at Yuli. We headed through town, got on the 30, and crossed the big bridge to the other side of the Rift. We stopped, as always, at the 7-11 before the entrance to the 193. Here dogs wait for scraps.

From Yuli to Rueisuei is another gentle downward incline. Lovely ride....

....and the rain switched sides and left us alone.

Beautiful views along both sides of the valley.

Rain over our destination.

Pulling into Rueisuei across the bridge from the south; the river here is the one they use for rafting. We found a great old-style hotel. On the phone the proprieter told us single rooms were $600, but when he met us and found that we were cyclists, they became $500.

Sunday morning it was pouring when we got up, so we hit the train station.....

....and found that the skies cleared. We got off in Guangfu and rode the remaining 45 kms on the 9 into Hualien town, hopped the train, and were back home for dinner. A great ride, a great weekend. Wish you had been with me!
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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.

Taiwanese Independence Senkaku Nuttiness

A commentary in the Taipei Times reminds that there are quite a few pro-independence types who think Taiwan owns the Senkaku Islands (called Diaoyutai by the Chinese).

China’s sovereignty claims often refer back to the Ming Dynasty and records of a mission to the Liuqiu (Ryukyu) Islands, something that of course cannot be used by Taiwan today.

Japan’s sovereignty claims, on the other hand, often refer to a Cabinet resolution from January 1895 allowing the governor of Okinawa Prefecture to stake a claim to the islands. Even more important, in 1972, the US finally returned the Diaoyutais and the Ryukyu Islands to Japan. After that, Taiwan’s claims can only be based on geographical factors such as the continental shelf and the Ryukyu Trench.

In short, the Diaoyutais discussion is still too weak from a Taiwanese sovereignty perspective and must be further developed. During the Japanese colonial era, Taiwan belonged to Japan, but what sense would it make to say that the Diaoyutais at that time were made part of Yilan County? If, after World War II, Taiwan belonged to China, then it equally makes no sense to say that the Diaoyutais belong to Taiwan.

Only by first creating an independent Taiwan will we have a foundation on which to join this dispute.

There can be no Taiwan claim to the Senkakus. There has never been an independent Taiwanese state that owned them. Any claim based on administration by the Qing dynasty -- the Qing owned it, so Taiwan owned -- implicitly recognizes that Qing sovereignty = modern sovereignty, which means that China owns Taiwan. TIers are going to have to become sane on the Senkakus, especially since Taiwan will need Japan's support if it wants to become independent.

This kind of thinking shows that....

1. Locals understand that in Chinese nationalist minds the claim to the Senkakus and to Okinawa are intermingled. See Ma Ying-jeou, arch-nationalist, on the issue.
2. This clever little poison pill of the claim to the Senkakus shows how intermingling "Taiwan" and "the ROC" drags Taiwan into territorial issues is always to Taiwan's detriment
3. It also shows how much the DPP and other pro-Taiwan parties need to educate their people. 
4. In the end, Taiwan cannot win -- either Japan will retain the Senkakus or China will annex them, but either way Taipei can do nothing. If Beijing wins what will Taiwan do? Demand the return of the Senkakus from new Imperial state?
5. Another sad example of the way in which the rhetorical stances and behavior of Chinese Nationalists are mimicked by their opponents even when the specific claims of Chinese nationalism are being denied.

As I've noted before, an important function of the Senkakus from the PRC standpoint is that they constitute an irritant that prevents smooth Taiwan-Japan relations. TIers need to stop acting like Beijingers and claiming the territories of other nations. This hurts Taiwan independence and helps Beijing.

MEDIA: Speaking of the islands, Far Eastern Sweet Potato rips a poll claiming that majority in Taiwan and China want cooperation on Senkaku issue.

Before Taiwan sets sail for the contested islets and claims its rightful property, let’s take a closer look at the numbers and what they really say. And prior to that, it would be useful to pause for a second and restate a few caveats: The China Times is owned by the Want Want China Times Group, whose chairman — Taiwan’s wealthiest person — Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), made his fortune in China and is a known supporter of Beijing. For its part, the Global Times is affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party and has a long tradition of publishing highly nationalistic, and oftentimes militaristic, propaganda. It cannot be trusted to honestly handle an opinion poll.

Now just google to find of the completely irresponsible and unethical international media stenographic organizations that passed along that poll without warning readers of its background -- it actually should not have been passed along by any news organization. Thanks guys! As long as you simply pass this crap undigested through your system, we bloggers will always be in business.
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Daily Links:

• Premier calls for unified system of writing for aboriginal languages, such a system already exists, notes That's Impossible!
• Hahaha. US-Taiwan Business Council says F-35s unlikely to arrive soon, says FocusTaiwan on what USTBC said. Reality is US-Taiwan Business Council focused on F-16 upgrades.
• Utah leads in Mandarin teachers from Taiwan
• Taiwan's South China Sea plan
• Pravda piece on Chinese expansionism

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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.

KMT slides further into the maw of the Lin scandal

Temple Lanterns in Taitung City.

Heh. The Lin Yi-shih scandal took a dramatic turn last week and again this week, moving closer to Vice President Wu Dun-yi. A friend passed around this China Times piece from today in which a local political associate of Wu's admitted he got NT$10 million from Chen Chi-hsiang, the same businessman who allegedly bribed Lin Yi-shih, the now-disgraced former Sec-Gen of the Cabinet who resigned after revelations of the scandal. The Taipei Times recapped:

Speculations about the vice president’s involvement in the case first surfaced last week when political commentator Hu Chung-hsin (胡忠信) said a high-ranking government official was also involved in the corruption scandal, claiming that “Mr X” introduced Chen to Lin and implying that Mr X was Wu Den-yih.

......

Following accusations that Wu introduced businessman Chen Chi-hsiang (陳啟祥) to Lin, who allegedly accepted NT$63 million (US$2.15 million) from Chen to help secure contracts with China Steel Corp (中鋼) and its subsidiaries, the Chinese-language Next Magazine yesterday claimed Wu’s wife, Tsai Ling-yi (蔡令怡), had made a phone call to a family friend, Wu Men-chung (吳門忠), to complain about their relationship being exposed by the magazine.

Wu Men-chung, a major votes broker for the vice president in his Nantou County hometown, is the father of Chen’s girlfriend’s daughter-in-law.

The magazine claimed that when Wu Den-yih denied having a relationship with Chen last week, Tsai made a call to Wu Men-chung on the same day and said he should have told Wu Den-yih about his family’s relationship with Chen’s girlfriend, Cheng Tsai-mei (程彩梅), before the magazine picked up the story, prompting Wu Men-chung to publicly clarify the issue.

The magazine also claimed that Wu Men-chung’s wife had accepted NT$10 million from Chen.

More revelations are due out on this one, I predict. Ma is taking a double whammy -- in addition to this mess, which will likely drag on for some time, the economy is tanking... The Academia Sinica slashed this year's growth forecast to just 1.94%. Foreign economic analysts have been taking pessimistic views on Taiwan's growth possibilities this year as well, especially with China entering a slowdown, Europe still a mess, and American politicians apparently uninterested in the future economic health of the nation. Ma's claims that Taiwan had to have ECFA in order to get the FTAs that will prevent economic isolation have been undercut by events -- trade with ASEAN is growing, trade with China is shrinking, and Taiwan has experienced no broad benefits from ECFA. What will he turn to next?

It will also be interesting to see how the DPP handles this scandal. Too bad there are no major elections coming up soon....
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Daily Links:

• Diplomatic Space, NGOs and Taiwan from Brookings
• Tamsui's Shalun beach, where the French landed.
• Ma wants beef issued settled with US beef allowed in by the end of July. The decision by the Codex Commission of the UN to permit small amounts of ractopamine in beef really threw the locals a curve ball.
• Another Taiwan military officer selling secrets to Beijing? Officer goes missing after vacation in Thailand. Thailand traditionally is clandestine Taiwanese/Chinese meeting ground, much as Vienna was the cockpit of Cold War espionage.

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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.

Hanging....

Hanging out in the Rift Valley this week. No posts for a while yet....
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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.

Stay tuned...and some links

Traveling this week.... enjoy some links.

• Malcolm Fraser is really an idiot. I wish I had the time to give this silly piece on the Asia pivot as an election tactic the beating it deserves.
• Taiwan tests its new subhunting weapons. Yet without control of the air, those aircraft will be useless in a war with China.
• Sen Grassley continues to claim that the Ma gov't promised to open up to US ractobeef.
• The implications of US-China co-dependence, with some stern warnings about Chinese militarism.
• Lawrence Chung of SCMP claims the DPP is softening its China stance.
• China's financial system undergoing catastrophic de-leveraging
• Bloggingheads on the South China Sea and Asia (video)
• In Taiwan's urban areas, women outnumber men.
• Is this Taichung's hardest cycling climb?
• One severe problem of having relations with China is the unremitting smuggling. The hoof-n-mouth disease mess of the 1990s that devastated Taiwan's pork industry was attributed to smuggling; now dozens of birds smuggled in from China are found to have H5N1
• Nunns in The Diplomat asks whether isolated Taiwan is propping up dictators. 
• Taiwan needs 5,000 Filipino fishing crewmen

EBAY FUN: A longtime reader alerted me (thanks!!) to this collection on ebay of stuff that purports to be war loot:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/320938802622?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649#ht_1437wt_1154

http://www.ebay.com/itm/320937454302?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2648#ht_1557wt_1154

http://www.ebay.com/itm/320941620095?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2648#ht_1437wt_1154

http://www.ebay.com/itm/320941632764?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2648#ht_1557wt_1154

http://www.ebay.com/itm/221053886325?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649#ht_1437wt_1154  

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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.