Government is for the people
On Monday night I visited Lin I-hsiung (
I was amazed as I looked on. Lin and seven others were sitting still and silent. And I could feel the weight of their cause. Although cars were passing by, it felt silent and intensely earnest. Some of you might ask, why fast? I think that it sends a message loud and clear that this matter is not trivial.
Elected officials have to understand that the government is for the people. It does not exist to give them a thrill of power or to fill their bank accounts with cash. They must be accountable to the people who elected them.
I hope all Taiwanese will refuse to vote for anyone who remains in the old KMT way of thinking. I hope they remove from office all those who have shown themselves to be false. And if you want to see a contrast, please go out and visit Lin and others on the sidewalk fasting in front of the Legislative Yuan.
Joel Linton
Taipei
(Editor's note: Joel Linton is Lin I-hsiung's son-in-law.)
Taiwanese identity not new
It has been repeated recently by the Western media that "a sense of a separate Taiwanese identity has emerged" ("Taiwanese identity in the spotlight," Mar. 2, page 4). The Western media may be discovering the existence of a Taiwanese identity now, but it is not one that has recently emerged, just as the Americas existed before Columbus laid eyes on them.
Almost all Western news media are either ignorant of or simply forget about the history of the Taiwanese identity: We used to be many groups of people (Aborigines and pioneer immigrants alike) co-existing on a Pacific island without a sense of "us"; then, for the first time, in 1895, we came together under the banner of "Taiwan Republic" (the first call for a republic in Asia) to deal with a sudden collective-existence issue. In the 50 years that followed, we further fought for our collective rights under Japanese rule.
The Taiwanese identity was born and grew between 1895 and 1945. Social, cultural, philosophical and political debates among us were much more active and livelier then than between 1945 and 1990. For instance, the first "[Taiwanese] homeland literature debate" occurred between 1930 and 1933, resulting in the sense shared among the intelligentsia that "One lives under the Taiwanese heaven and stands on the Taiwanese soil, one cannot realistically write about anything other than the people of Taiwan and their life."
The "emergence" of the Taiwanese identity that the Western media are witnessing now is really a "re-emergence," a coming out of the closet after hiding for many years under the Chiang family's terror.
We would give the thumps-up to the first Western media outlet that stops the practice of regularly regurgitating in their reports about Taiwan the mantra that "Taiwan split from China at the end of a civil war in 1949."
We existed before 1949; as ourselves, Taiwanese.
Sing Young
Taoyuan City
In their recent op-ed “Trump Should Rein In Taiwan” in Foreign Policy magazine, Christopher Chivvis and Stephen Wertheim argued that the US should pressure President William Lai (賴清德) to “tone it down” to de-escalate tensions in the Taiwan Strait — as if Taiwan’s words are more of a threat to peace than Beijing’s actions. It is an old argument dressed up in new concern: that Washington must rein in Taipei to avoid war. However, this narrative gets it backward. Taiwan is not the problem; China is. Calls for a so-called “grand bargain” with Beijing — where the US pressures Taiwan into concessions
The term “assassin’s mace” originates from Chinese folklore, describing a concealed weapon used by a weaker hero to defeat a stronger adversary with an unexpected strike. In more general military parlance, the concept refers to an asymmetric capability that targets a critical vulnerability of an adversary. China has found its modern equivalent of the assassin’s mace with its high-altitude electromagnetic pulse (HEMP) weapons, which are nuclear warheads detonated at a high altitude, emitting intense electromagnetic radiation capable of disabling and destroying electronics. An assassin’s mace weapon possesses two essential characteristics: strategic surprise and the ability to neutralize a core dependency.
Chinese President and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Chairman Xi Jinping (習近平) said in a politburo speech late last month that his party must protect the “bottom line” to prevent systemic threats. The tone of his address was grave, revealing deep anxieties about China’s current state of affairs. Essentially, what he worries most about is systemic threats to China’s normal development as a country. The US-China trade war has turned white hot: China’s export orders have plummeted, Chinese firms and enterprises are shutting up shop, and local debt risks are mounting daily, causing China’s economy to flag externally and hemorrhage internally. China’s
US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) were born under the sign of Gemini. Geminis are known for their intelligence, creativity, adaptability and flexibility. It is unlikely, then, that the trade conflict between the US and China would escalate into a catastrophic collision. It is more probable that both sides would seek a way to de-escalate, paving the way for a Trump-Xi summit that allows the global economy some breathing room. Practically speaking, China and the US have vulnerabilities, and a prolonged trade war would be damaging for both. In the US, the electoral system means that public opinion
RSS