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Dec 31, 2009

KMT wants to become an election machine

Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Secretary-General King Pu-tsung (金溥聰) discussed the party's plans to sell of its remaining assets & investments and switch itself, "like a Transformer," into an "election machine" (his words, not mine).

What I love about this "strategy," besides the Transformers reference and the fact that it will doubtlessly enrich some KMT friends while avoiding responsibility for ill-gotten assets and gains, is that the KMT suffers from such long-running local factional splits exactly because it already is an "election machine" -- one that local elites use to gain greater power, and which can normally accommodate multiple moneyed interest groups at the same time -- but local factional leaders will abandon the party at the drop of a hat to run as independents. One would think the KMT would rather have more loyal politicians than ramp up the "election machine" message.

(Moreover, voters may read King's message as an endorsement of the "eternal election" model which leaves actual governing by the way-side -- and that does not play well with voters.)

The KMT plans to live on "donations" for political campaigns in the future. And we all know how transparent the financial laws are for political donations (hint: you need only report what you spend, not what you take in). Perhaps this is all really just a shell plan to create more flexible slush funds.

Back in 2000 and 2004, one of the great hopes of green guys like me was that the KMT was about to collapse. As financial interests -- not ideology -- holds the party together, we hoped that the moneyed interests would say, "these guys aren't winning again," and go their separate ways.

That didn't happen. But it stands a better chance of happening the other way around, with a newly poor KMT being gutted of its previous moneyed interest support, who may go run their own show.

Either that, or the party may become corporate property for a new set of sponsors.

Dec 30, 2009

KMT head fake

The KMT's solution (well, President/Chairman Ma's anyway) to its property problem is to sell its property -- valued at NT$20billion by its own estimates, and suspected by DPP estimates to be even more -- but this does nothing to correct or account for the unjust methods by which that property was obtained and the practices that were involved in increasing its value.

Dec 29, 2009

Two for the show...

I bought yesterday's World Journal, an American Chinese-language newspaper published by the United Daily News Group, the pro-blue Taiwan media group.

The newspaper included a monthly insert this particular Sunday, and you can see the titles of all the articles here. I took objection to Chen Shiyao's article titled "What will the two sides of the [Taiwan] Strait do for the next several decades?"

Chen's argument can be summarized, I think fairly, as below: Ma Ying-jeou has continually ricochet between endorsing ultimate unification with the "mainland" in a distant future and promises to maintain Taiwan's de facto independence. Ma is walking this tight rope because he desires to keep Beijing in a favor-giving mood, even as the Taiwanese voting public has no interest in unification. In other words, Ma is trying to please all, and trying to garner the votes of both the light-greens and KMT loyalists, as Lee Teng-hui managed to do before.

This "greening" of the KMT's position already threatens to shatter the silent agreement between Beijing and the KMT that unification is the eventual goal of negotiations. And at any time, Beijing could reverse its position on a number of policies that are net-favorable to Taiwan, and oculd seriously threaten Taiwan's relationship with its remaining allies and hurt Taiwan's economy through a retraction of the current set of carrots. Both Ma's reelection and Taiwan's livelihoods would then be under threat.

To maintain good relations between Taiwan and the "mainland" over the next several decades, the KMT must avoid the siren call of de facto independence and give time for the political atmosphere in Taiwan to accommodate the pro-gradual unification crowd's voice; they can then establish a political foothold. At the same time, the mainland must give Taiwan more carrots and hide the sticks behind their backs a little better, or they will lose the chance to win the hearts of the Taiwanese.

Chen makes special note that a recent Global Views Monthly poll shows that while only 57% of Taiwanese insist that negotiations with the "mainland" be conducted on a fully equal footing, a stronger 64% believe that important cross-strait agreements should go through a referendum for public approval. Chen labels the referendum a Pandora's box that must not be opened, as it may trigger an attack from China, and so the KMT must remain resolute on not allowing the referendum process to infringe on cross-strait affairs.

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I don't believe Chen is very right about Ma's pro-de facto independence credentials. Here's the WSJ quote from Ma's interview that Chen opens with to make his case:

"Whether there will be reunification as expected by the mainland side depends very much on what is going to unfold in the next decades. This is a question no one can answer at this stage. But as the president of this country, I believe that the 23 million people of Taiwan want to secure one or two generations of peace and prosperity so that people on either side of the Taiwan Strait can have sufficient time and freedom to understand, to appreciate, and to decide what to do."
Several days later, Chen notes,

In a private meeting with professor Winston L. Y. Yang from Seton Hall University of the United States, Ma also clearly said that "there is little support in Taiwan for unification with China." ([UDN,] Dec. 16, 2009)

The KMT reports on that meeting in more depth:
Yang said that, during their conversation, he had asked President Ma whether “the maintenance of the status quo meant to maintain Taiwan’s status quo of de facto independence,” and the President had not denied it. Furthermore, President stated that the majority of the people on Taiwan expressed support for the maintenance of status quo in various public polls and surveys when given the choice of unification, independence, or the status quo.

Yang went on to ask President Ma if Mainland China became more democratic, would conditions of unification improve for the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. To that the President replied, “It will depend on the mainstream opinion among the people of Taiwan.”
So you see, Ma didn't actually say that he considers the status quo to be de facto independence; in fact, Ma himself and the KMT leadership has repeatedly stated that the status quo is a Republic of China, one which by constitution and legal right claims the territory of all of China. And nothing they say implies the contrary.

I believe Ma's silence is motivated by the fact that younger, lighter blue voters (that I have met) have always implicitly believed Ma maintains a pro-de facto independence position. Ma needs this sort of "rumor" to be floating around to maintain their support. But he will never endorse a truly pro-de facto independence position, and what he actually believes in will probably never be clear.

Chen identifies the major problem with the current path of negotiations with Beijing -- namely, that Beijing expects compliance from Taiwan on political as well as economic matters, and that Beijing has increasingly large leverage to hurt Taiwan with little effort if it feels Taiwan drifting from the Chinese political line. Yet his proposed solution to the problem is for Taiwan to let Beijing make her even more vulnerable to Chinese sabotage, in hopes that a non-existent "pro-gradual unification" voter block will emerge and take things happily in that direction.

Chen fails to see that in reality, Beijing has no intention of giving out carrots forever with no return in sight. They are demanding minimal compliance now (that the KMT endorse the one China principle in some form) but will demand more soon -- not after several decades of agreements favorable to only Taiwan. At the same time, the Taiwanese voting public has no intention of allowing gradual unification to happen; neither do they want politicians to take the choice out of their referendum ballot-holding hands. Chen's proposed solution of eternal Chinese favors in return for only minimal Taiwanese political compliance is not going to fly in either Beijing or Taipei.

Chen's most realpolitik position is on the subject of the referendum, which is indeed both anathema to Beijing and a core demand of an increasing percentage of Taiwanese voters. Hence the true bottleneck in future cross-strait development will indeed be at the point China's demand for a political resolution meets Taiwan's demand for a refrendum. The KMT hopes to postpone that point forever, but Beijing has no intention of doing so.

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Beijing knows no referendum could pass in the next several decades which would be favorable to its political objectives -- de facto independence as the status quo is indeed the common political language of young greens and young blues alike. The DPP knows this too, which is why they count the referendum as their sacred right and best defense. The KMT knows this too, which is why they avoid the issue entirely, neither ruling out a political referendum on this subject but neither daring to imply that a referendum could or should be held ("The ECFA is an economic, not political, agreement, and so a referendum is not required...").

So we are faced with a future where Taiwan will have little leverage, China will make increasingly painful demands for political concessions from Taiwan, and the Taiwanese public will be demanding their right to self-determination. China's military will respond belligerently; the USA is unlikely to maintain much interest in the Taiwan Strait at that point. Japan will probably fall back. And we will be at a point where China has to decide if invasion is really worth the potential gain, and Taiwanese will have to decide if their liberties are worth defending. And it's very hard to tell what may happen at that time.

I don't see the basic causes of tension going anywhere any time soon, unless the KMT manages a quick sell out. I increasingly think they won't be able to get away with one. So don't expect tensions to really relax across the Taiwan Strait any time soon.

Dec 24, 2009

CNA continues downward spiral

CNA reported the other day that by order of the very brave and decisive President Ma Ying-jeou, the travels schedule of Chen Yunlin, president of Chinese mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), is public knowledge.

A reporter friend of mine had this to say about the report:

This is just not true at all. Despite the concern from the Presidential Office, Chen Yunlin's schedule is still being kept as top secret. Reporters on the shuttle do not know where their next stop is until the bus stops, and the scheduled stop would be canceled if protesters begin to show up. Most of journalists were so upset that there were constant verbal clashes between them and Taichung mayor Jason Hu, as well as MAC officials.

Next time, when you see a report from CNA, try to check multiple sources...
This last comment is a reference to the increasingly pro-KMT bias of CNA, RTI and other government-sponsored media outlets. This is especially unfortunate as many foreign reproters rely on English-language CNA reports as a primary source for their data.

There's also this latest CNA article, which portrays the ever benevolent, calm and Taiwan-loving Chen Yunlin as a guy out to calm the nerves of jittery Chinese investors, who are obviously very worried about the frequency of political protests in Taiwan. *rolls eyes*

And this CNA report tells us how government officials have, one by one, "clarified" each of the publics misunderstandings about the newest three agreements.

Dec 10, 2009

Protests?

I expect violence on a similar scale to the last version at the Chiang-Chen talks. Potential protesters, I believe, feel a sense of urgency more than during the start of the Chen visit to Taipei, so will all be ready.

The police efforts to contain them, I think, are doomed to failure. And mobilization from the South may be easier since the talks are in Taichung.

Still, the talks will "succeed," as everything will be signed as per already arranged agreement. And nobody important will get seriously hurt. So it should just be a feeding fest for the media, only to be more or less forgotten a month later.

KMT mindset

Premier Wu Dun-yi revealed some of the KMT's fundamental ideas about Taiwan's future, and it has landed him in enough trouble that he's apologized for it:

His apology, however, came hours after several attempts to defend his remarks.

Wu said during an interview with the UFO Network on Tuesday: “If you want to talk about unification, nobody will support it. You don’t have the capability to unify [China] and you don’t want to be unified by it. Declaring independence is unnecessary because the ROC [Republic of China] is already an independent, sovereign nation. If you want to found a country with a different national title, it will only create division at home and stir tensions abroad. Only irresponsible people or idiots would want to seek independence [for Taiwan].”
Here were Wu's remarks in Chinese as quoted by Liberty Times: 「不負責任者或白痴,才會覺得應該搞個獨立國」 My translation: Only the irresponsible and idiotic think Taiwan should mess around being an independent country.

The Liberty Times, in a caption on that link above, notes that the KMT took out a front page ad in that paper after winning the 2008 presidential election. That ad outlined the KMT's support for maintaining the status quo of the ROC government, while noting that "Taiwan could make many choices about its future, and no matter whether that means unification, independence or maintaining the status quo, it is up to the people to decide."

Except, of course, independence supporters are either irresponsible or idiots, so that's not really a choice the KMT will give the people in the future, much less through referendum.

Finally, in Wu's defense, he's just towing a deeply held belief and the party line, that the ROC is the sovereign, legitimate government of both Taiwan and China. So there's really nothing out of line about his remarks, except that they reveal an ugly mindset which the KMT would rather keep submerged for now.

Dec 6, 2009

Results -- KMT 12, DPP 4, "Ind." 1

Taipei Times really has most of the vital information in a well-done spread. The lead article notes:

The KMT took 12 of the 17 mayor and commissioner positions up for grabs, while the DPP won four, and one went to an independent, formerly KMT candidate.

The DPP increased its share of the overall vote to 45.9 percent, up from 38.2 percent four years ago, while taking back control of the hotly contested Yilan County after losing it to the KMT four years ago.

But the DPP did very well for itself, too. Here are the results for County Commissioners:

Party Number of votes
Percentage
KMT 2,094,518 47.8754%
DPP 1,982,914 45.3245%
Hakka party
15,807 0.3613%
Total votes for parties
4,093,239 93.5612%
Non-partisans
281,693 6.4388%

That's not a bad result over all for the country, and I'm particularly surprised at how close g, Taoyuan, Penghu and Nantou were. The KMT won them all, but not by much. See great PDF spread here.

County councilmen and township governor results showed continued the trend of strong independents, often local factional leaders, presenting the only real thorn in the side of the KMT.

County Councilmen
Party Votes Percentage
KMT 1,920,086 43.9363%
DPP 1,067,010 24.4159%
Labor Party
4,736 0.1084%
Green Party
843 0.0193%
PFP 5,748 0.1315%
TSU 27,286 0.6244%
Taiwan KMT
208 0.0048%
Votes for parties
3,025,917 69.2406%
Non-partisan votes
1,344,232 30.7594%

Township Governors
Party Votes Percentage
KMT 1,865,159 48.8158%
DPP 765,816 20.0433%
Unification Promotion Party
2,257 0.0591%
Daoist Party (大道慈悲濟世黨)
7,966 0.2085%
Votes for parties
2,641,198 69.1267%
Non-partisans 1,179,612 30.8733%

Dec 3, 2009

Obama, the US, the M.E., and Taiwan

The Obama's decision to double down for a year in Afghanistan, before trying to set up SOME functional central and local governments before we inevitably and finally get the #%^@ out of Dodge, was pretty predictable. Progressives were disappointed, and Conservatives get to use the word "quagmire" for once.

But the "surge" call reinforces my belief that the US is so deeply involved in these ugly, costly wars in the Middle East that most of the East Asia agenda is on hold for now, and our priorities for that region are shifting in the mean time.

I feel that by the time the US really has the inclination to turn an eye to the Taiwan issue again, they'll have written-off the effort to maintain the island's ever-dwindling de facto independence as a lost cause.

This, of course, reinforces that the Taiwanese must actively take their destiny into their own hands. But now, they must do so with one guy aimed at them and little int he way of reinforcements. That's a delicate place to be.