Media distracted by gossip
With the presidential and legislative elections over, it is a busy time for top government leaders to discuss new Cabinet members, and the handover of legislative affairs and national policies. Nevertheless, some news coverage has been out of touch, continuing to report on insignificant trivia.
For example, some media have focused on a female security guard of vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), discussing how attractive she is, while praising the woman who used to be a host of the famous military education show Twilight Garden (莒光園地) as a highlight of the nation’s armed services.
The public might be used to this kind of gossip news, but what is the point of reporting such things? Irrespective of whether a presidential or vice presidential security guard is a military or police officer and regardless of their gender, whether the person is “good-looking” has nothing to do with their job as a guard. It seems only natural that a female president or vice president would have female personnel in their security detail.
What we should really care about is the person’s professionalism and skill in protecting a president or vice president, and whether they can serve as a buffer between the president or vice president and the public.
In the past, a male security guard of President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) was dubbed “special agent Andy Lau” (劉德華) for his similarity to the Hong Kong superstar, and two female guards were nicknamed “Little Black” (小黑) and “Little White” (小白) respectively because of their skin tones. Maybe they are adored by the public because they look dashing and spirited.
However, when they are on duty, they need to be fully focused, keep an eye on the whole scene and respond to any emergencies at any time. They are not here for a personal fan meeting, and the media should respect their professionalism and allow them to do their job. No one can afford to let the security work go wrong.
Hopefully, before Tsai leaves office on May 20, the media and public can understand this, which should be continued in the era of president-elect William Lai (賴清德) and Hsiao.
Hung Yu-jui
Taichung
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
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,
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus in the Legislative Yuan has made an internal decision to freeze NT$1.8 billion (US$54.7 million) of the indigenous submarine project’s NT$2 billion budget. This means that up to 90 percent of the budget cannot be utilized. It would only be accessible if the legislature agrees to lift the freeze sometime in the future. However, for Taiwan to construct its own submarines, it must rely on foreign support for several key pieces of equipment and technology. These foreign supporters would also be forced to endure significant pressure, infiltration and influence from Beijing. In other words,
RSS