Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Frank Hsieh (
Buoyed by President Chen Shui-bian's (
Hsieh has met figures from across the political spectrum, including those with whom he has seemingly little in common, such as New Party Chairman Yok Mu-ming (
Hsieh has also been shooting off policy ideas with gay abandon, and while his new found freedom must be refreshing to DPP supporters worried by his hermit-like pre-Jan. 12 behavior, he will need to watch his back, as some of his ideas are likely to raise the hackles of hardcore DPP members.
Talking to Chen about shelving the referendum on entering the UN under the name Taiwan, suggesting Ma could be his premier and a softer line on cross-strait economic exchanges may all sound like reasonable propositions to many taking into account the political landscape, but they are anathema to many in the DPP.
The "independence or nothing" crowd will find it extremely hard to keep quiet if Hsieh carries on in this vein, but if they use their heads and consider the bigger picture, they will realize staying silent is the best course of action.
The DPP is still recovering from the disaster that was former chairman Yu Shyi-kun's two years in charge, when deep green elements ruled the roost and hounded dissenting voices or those who dared to criticize leaders or policy out of the party set-up. This did untold damage to the party, most notably during last year's legislative primaries, when several very capable -- but moderate -- lawmakers were labeled "bandits" and replaced with far less impressive figures, producing disastrous results.
The party needs to relearn the value of tolerating different opinions if it is to survive, as there is no political party in the world where every member has the same view on every subject. For evidence of this it need look no further than the KMT, which over the years has seen numerous splits and spin-off parties formed as a result of factional fighting. Nevertheless, the deserters eventually came back into the fold and the KMT's success in keeping potential rebels and dissenters silent ahead of the recent legislative polls arguably contributed to its performance.
Hsieh has done well since he took the helm, but he has just 58 days to achieve his goal. To do that he will need the full support of the whole pan-green camp in his battle against a revitalized KMT.
Hsieh knows the DPP cannot and will not win the presidential election by continuing to appeal only to its core supporters -- the 40 percent who will back the party come rain or shine. It needs to win back voters put off by the party's recent excesses if it is to stand any chance of victory in March.
Maximizing the party's appeal in such a short time while keeping dissenting voices in check will be a tough task, but Hsieh has got to perform if he wants to extend his political career into April.
Monday was the 37th anniversary of former president Chiang Ching-kuo’s (蔣經國) death. Chiang — a son of former president Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石), who had implemented party-state rule and martial law in Taiwan — has a complicated legacy. Whether one looks at his time in power in a positive or negative light depends very much on who they are, and what their relationship with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is. Although toward the end of his life Chiang Ching-kuo lifted martial law and steered Taiwan onto the path of democratization, these changes were forced upon him by internal and external pressures,
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅?萁) has caused havoc with his attempts to overturn the democratic and constitutional order in the legislature. If we look at this devolution from the context of a transition to democracy from authoritarianism in a culturally Chinese sense — that of zhonghua (中華) — then we are playing witness to a servile spirit from a millennia-old form of totalitarianism that is intent on damaging the nation’s hard-won democracy. This servile spirit is ingrained in Chinese culture. About a century ago, Chinese satirist and author Lu Xun (魯迅) saw through the servile nature of
In their New York Times bestseller How Democracies Die, Harvard political scientists Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt said that democracies today “may die at the hands not of generals but of elected leaders. Many government efforts to subvert democracy are ‘legal,’ in the sense that they are approved by the legislature or accepted by the courts. They may even be portrayed as efforts to improve democracy — making the judiciary more efficient, combating corruption, or cleaning up the electoral process.” Moreover, the two authors observe that those who denounce such legal threats to democracy are often “dismissed as exaggerating or
Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Acting Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) has formally announced his intention to stand for permanent party chairman. He has decided that he is the right person to steer the fledgling third force in Taiwan’s politics through the challenges it would certainly face in the post-Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) era, rather than serve in a caretaker role while the party finds a more suitable candidate. Huang is sure to secure the position. He is almost certainly not the right man for the job. Ko not only founded the party, he forged it into a one-man political force, with himself
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