Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) often mentions a passage from Buddhism’s Diamond Sutra: “If a Buddha clings to the notions of an ego, a personality, a being and a life, he is not a true Buddha.”
These four notions advise people to abandon their egocentric thinking, but is Ko really capable of that?
Ko uses deconstructionist thinking to manipulate symbols and names. He claims to be part of the “Chinese cultural sphere” and divides “Chinese” into three types: cultural China, which he does not reject; economic China, which he thinks can be discussed; and political China, which he rejects as impossible. This raises the question: What exactly does his “one family across the Taiwan Strait” mean?
Last year, he apologized in an interview with the Greenpeace Broadcasting Station to those who were offended by his “one family” statement, but before attending the twin-city forum in Shanghai in July, he still insisted on that view. Is this an expression of abandoning egocentric thinking?
When Ko first took office, he gained momentum by exposing the “five major corruption cases.” However, since winning a second term, he has failed to mention these still unresolved cases, saying that the phrase was not his invention and that people should not be so picky. He even suggested that the phrase could be changed to the “five strange cases.”
Ko has gradually revealed that he attaches great importance to alliances and using people and things as tools. The most obvious trick is luring pan-blue camp politicians to his side.
He has never paid any attention to the annual commemoration of the 823 Artillery Bombardment on Aug. 23, 1958, but he still attend the event with Hon Hai Precision Industry Co founder Terry Gou (郭台銘) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wang Jin-pyng (王金平).
On one hand, he says he will not run for president if Gou announces a bid, because he is not strong enough. On the other, given that his Taiwan People’s Party has failed to attract many members, he says that if Gou decides not to run, he would ask whether People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) would nominate him.
Ko calls himself a “political novice,” but if someone constantly contradicts themselves, how can he ever be believed?
If someone thinks they are better than others, they are unlikely to care too much about the welfare of ordinary people. Therefore, a more realistic interpretation of Ko’s notions of “an ego, a personality, a being and a life” is that through political maneuvers, he hopes to win the top job and achieve the ultimate life with no ego, personality, being or life except for those in his own heart. What kind of mental state is that?
As Ko does not deny that former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) is a spiritual mentor who he truly admires, do not forget that Lee once cited Japanese philosopher Kitaro Nishida’s “absolute nothingness,” saying: “I am I, in not being I.”
Through his constant self-denial and strategy of “forgetting the fishnet after catching the fish,” the self-proclaimed “dark-green” Ko is learning from Lee by luring the pan-blue camp’s politicians to divide that camp. He is trying to accomplish the historic mission given by his spiritual mentor.
Chen Fu is a professor in the School of Liberal Arts at National Ilan University.
Translated by Eddy Chang
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
As former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) wrapped up his visit to the People’s Republic of China, he received his share of attention. Certainly, the trip must be seen within the full context of Ma’s life, that is, his eight-year presidency, the Sunflower movement and his failed Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, as well as his eight years as Taipei mayor with its posturing, accusations of money laundering, and ups and downs. Through all that, basic questions stand out: “What drives Ma? What is his end game?” Having observed and commented on Ma for decades, it is all ironically reminiscent of former US president Harry