On this morning’s Taipei Times editorial page: It’s got to be Annette Lu for 2008, a long story in favor of Annette as Taiwan’s next president.
I first thought this was a Johnny Neihu-type of joke, but the guy is dead serious, and even more surprising, he’s a foreigner! Richard Hazeldine, it says. Does anybody know this guy? Is he her English speechwriter or something?
Annette is the one leader who has escaped with her reputation unscathed over the past six years, he writes. Really? Really?
If she did, me thinks that’s largely because she’s in a largely ceremonial and powerless position, unable to cause any real damage except by saying too much. And she’s done plenty of that. Of all the Taiwanese politicians I can think of, none of them is more scary than Annette. It’s alright for her to say wacky things when she’s vice president, but imagine the damage she would do if she held real power. Annette Lu in 2008? Please retire her.
That’s a potential advantage for her. She can say, “I don’t have a wife or a son or a son-in-law to bilk money from slush funds, dabble in insider trading, or squirrel away millions of dollars in secret bank accounts and emigrate to the US.”
She’d get my vote (if I could vote that is) just so I could have another four years of hearing her uber-awesome speeches and offers of tea parties to the opposition.
Yes, 'Net gets my vote too. I was talking with a mate at work tonight about the Hazeldine fantasy - lets face it, he’s obviously hot for her - and it occured to us that the guy makes a lot of sense. Consider the counterfactual: Would old 'Net have been caught with her hand in the cookie jar the way old Greaseball was (and probably Ma Ying-jeou also)? No way; she’s far too smart for that crap. Crazy perhaps, but a straight shooter who is genuinely clean. And then there’s that hair to consider… It’s not everyone that can get their hair to stick up like that. She’s got president written all over her.
EDIT: On reflection, it occurs to me that Chen Chu has the electrified hair look as well. So that’s the 2008 DPP ticket then - 'Net for Pres and Chen Chu for VP. You know it makes sense.
When Crazy Annette was Queen of Taoyuan county, her and her family (who have been movers and shakers in Taoyuan for decades) stole plenty of taxpayer money. The idea that she is clean is bullshit.
But I do think she would be a good president. It would help round out the collection of Taiwanese presidents. We have had:
–cruel butchers married to hot numbers (CKS and “I used to look so hot in a Chi-pao” Madame Song)
–rotund dimwits who bore uncanny resemblances to Korean dictators (Chung Ching Guo)
–Neo-Taiwanese thieves with Phds. (Lee Tung Hui)
–Stupid albeit “real-deal” Taiwanese thieves (Greaseball and the Country Hag)
And to compete the ensemble we could now have a certified mentally ill president; Crazy “Hello Kitty” Annette.
I actually would vote for her, just for laughs.
Yours in Presidential dignity,
Brian
p.s. I was out at the Shihlin Courthouse yesterday (Wed.) at noon. In the “another one bites the dust category”, my prosecutor students put away some DPP city council candidate for vote buying earlier that day.
p.p.s. For foreigners who are serious about Taiwanese political science let me add this insight from a Taiwanese prosecutor I know who told me “the difference between the KMT and the DPP is that the KMT stole and generally were able to cover their tracks, the DPP steal stupidly, like kids just running into a store and grabbing some candy and running out the door”.
Yeah, I’ve heard that one a lot. Of course, it is easier to steal when you can shoot the people who point it out. The KMT wasn’t smarter than the DPP, just nastier.
That’s the first time I’ve heard this; largely because I know nothing about Annette really. I had this idea she might be like the village idiot who speaks truth to power. But there you go: she’s nuts and dirty… Come to think of it, I like my girls a bit dirty… In fact, “Net the skanky ho” has a nice ring to it, and might be marketable. Let me work on this and I’ll get back to you.
[quote=“brianlkennedy”]But I do think she would be a good president. It would help round out the collection of Taiwanese presidents. We have had:
–cruel butchers married to hot numbers (CKS and “I used to look so hot in a Chi-pao” Madame Song)
–rotund dimwits who bore uncanny resemblances to Korean dictators (Chongqing Guo)
–Neo-Taiwanese thieves with Phds. (Lee Tung Hui)
–Stupid albeit “real-deal” Taiwanese thieves (Greaseball and the Country Hag)
And to compete the ensemble we could now have a certified mentally ill president; Crazy “Hello Kitty” Annette.
I actually would vote for her, just for laughs.[/quote]
Now you’re talking Brian: it’s best just to go with the flow. In the surrealist painting that is Taiwanese politics a straight president would look, well, out of place. Fark, what a depressing reality.
Good hunting.
I used to be serious about Taiwanese political science. Indeed, I once wrote an unpublishable PhD in the area (politics of financial deregulation in Taiwan during the late 1980s - there are just three people in the world interested in this topic and all of us are very boring). And I kept the faith up until the start of this year - far beyond most of my friends/associates that are interested in this stuff. Then Chen dumped the NUC in Feb and I threw in the towel. “He’s mad” I thought, and have been increasingly disillusioned since. The thing with the son-in-law came and went, then the Sogo case, and eventually an actual indictment. I find after talking to some DPP friends that also fear the place has gone to shit, that Chen Zhe-nan and Ma Yong-cheng were invited into the fold BECAUSE they were dirty and could pull in cash - Chen Shui-bian knew all along what they were up to, but was playing a game of plausible deniability. And then I hear a quote from a prosecutor about kids and candy stores, and I’m left convinced that my decision to leave the country is justified…
But one nagging question Brian before I ditch the place and get a job writing press releases for the department of health back in Australia - the prosecutors are clean no? We all know Eric Chen is a hard core independence boy, but that indictment against Wu Shu-jen and a couple of the cubscouts was the real deal, wasn’t it (i.e. no politics, just the honest pursuit of a legal transgression)? And if it was, then maybe the place is not so fucked up after all. Give me something to believe in…
Speaking of good Annette Lu quotes, my favorite came from her spokesperson:
[quote]Vice President Annette Lu’s (呂秀蓮) spokeswoman, Tsai Ming-hwa (蔡明華), yesterday appealed to the public to believe Lu’s side of the story in the vice president’s dispute with The Journalist (新新聞) magazine.
“Don’t disbelieve Lu just because she is old and ugly. After all, even the Hunchback of the Notre Dame had a kind heart,” Tsai said yesterday.[/quote] taipeitimes.com/News/front/a … 1/10/69134
i say lets get a movie star as president of taiwan. Ronald Reagan did a pretty good job of it in the USA.
Lets get CHEN LUNG. (whos always criticizing taiwan politics) as taiwan president. Make him a taiwanese citizen and i bet he will get elected too. And i bet he would do a better job of it too.
Or maybe we need to farm out that job to the Governator of CAlif. (another movie star) good old AHnold. Taiwans China Airlines has a bunch of foreign pilots to help keep their planes in the air. Maybe its time to outsource the presidency too?
George Bush was quoted recently as saying that mexicans are filling in many jobs for which the americans are incapable of filling . And it was suggested that maybe a mexican should be president as well. HIlarious!!
HEY whos YOUR nomination as the next Taiwan president. If you could nominate anyone living on the planet today? (and not just planet TAiwan).
Hell Al Gore dont need no Taiwan, he has a mind to he can invent a whole new country to be president of. He invented many other things already.
And speaking of Chiang Kai Shek and Mei Ling, its always known that its a power marriage. That its good for Kai Shek’s ego and status and little else. That Mei Ling was not terribly successful in keeping her chastity from anyone(roundeyes preferred) but lao Chiang.
