James Soong's potential presidential bid

[ChewDawg]

Yeah. More of that. It ain't election time in Taiwan without the crazies.

So true. Now where is Vorkosigan (Turton) and his hyper dark-green generalizations that appeal to expatriate liberal-arts-educated kindy-teachers-turned-political-activists?

[yuli]

Yeah. More of that. It ain't election time in Taiwan without the crazies.

So true. Now where is Vorkosigan (Turton) and his hyper dark-green generalizations that appeal to expatriate liberal-arts-educated kindy-teachers-turned-political-activists?

To be fair, there are a lot of different backgrounds amongst the greenies; for example, there are quite a few university professors, engineers and business owners. From what I have seen, the dominant theme for the expat greenie is taking their civics class lessons about democracy seriously and then applying those ideas here to Taiwan.

Turton may be dark green, and I often disagree with his views. But I wouldn't call him a crazy.

[Betelnut]

Good heavens, and I even threw in some sketchy info on the KMT just to try to make my sound less crazy to the totally sound Westerner who has got the entire history of modern Taiwan and China figured out without doing much original research. Why bother when you have it all figured out right? Then there's guys that read all the right books and can't figure out why people would be so upset over the former first lady getting a 5 carat Tiffany with that special fund or whatever...

Yeah. More of that. It ain't election time in Taiwan without the crazies.

[Mucha Man]

why bother when you have it all figured out right?

You are talking about yourself there, bud. I never claimed to have it all figured out. You have though. If such a claim is a sign of lunacy then you've just outed yourself.

[tommy525]

Most of us are just as capable of selecting our leaders as a flock of sheep. A lot of times seems theres just nobody whos a good candidate.

Same as in the USA, where IM pretty sure Obama is going to get re-elected.

Gingrich aint gonna make it.

[Betelnut]

Not exactly. I do research and ask the right people questions precisely because I don't know enough. Even about my own research. There is still much I don't know about the '04 presidential election and what went on behind the scenes. If you look at my writing, I say when and where I am not sure or where I am speculating.

What I mean about having it all figured out, is the general attitude I see on these forums and a lot of very rigid Westerners who live in Taiwan anywhere from 1 day to 25 years and are very sure about who is right and who is wrong in Taiwan because they have such a black and white point of view of democracy vs. authoritarian government. It's quite simple to them and they shut themselves off from any information or real life stories that might suggest otherwise.

The fact that my research or personal experiences get laughed at on a forum like this points to a mentality of "I know better than you because I know". There's plenty of people like this from all backgrounds. Westerners and local Taiwanese alike. They have 1 faction in their head and believe that it applies to real life in all situations to generalize what the truth is. When in fact, in any given national election, there are more than 10,000 voting stations in Taiwan plus the off-shore islands and a number of things can happen in all of the voting stations either on purpose or by accident and by either party or individual with all kinds of different motivations.

This is what I mean by having it all figured out in your head with a simple factoid that all voting stations have reps from both parties in the voting stations so cheating is not possible.

None of us know what happened in all of the voting stations, but we can study the data provided by the government for all of the voting stations to make certain conclusions and look at cases from each voting station.

why bother when you have it all figured out right?

You are talking about yourself there, bud. I never claimed to have it all figured out. You have though. If such a claim is a sign of lunacy then you've just outed yourself.

[Dog's_Breakfast]

Interesting commentary from Tuesday's Taipei Times:

2012 ELECTIONS: Predictions diverge on Tsai’s chances

Former DPP legislator Kuo Cheng-liang (郭正亮) said it was ironic that Tsai’s support rates were higher when she was attacked than when the DPP retaliated with an attack on Ma’s integrity in a bank merger case, which showed that negative campaigning might very well “have the opposite of its desired effect.”

I agree with Kuo Cheng-liang's assessment. I am about as fed up as can be by the unwillingness of either Tsai or Ma to discuss real issues, and just relentlessly attack each other over which side of the bed they sleep on or what brand of toothpaste they use, etc. The fact that both Tsai and Ma can't even seen how the negative campaigning is counter-productive just amazes me. It's become so mind-bogglingly stupid that I no longer consider either one of them fit to be president.

So if I were a Taiwanese, I'd probably be voting for James Soong. Not because I like him, but because it's the only chance you get to protest the clown act that substitutes for presidential debate.