_Like many long-term expats he’s not necessarily kind about the land of his birth. Asked whether the US is going to be great again, or is great already, he says: “Since [Ronald] Reagan it’s been an obvious train wreck and it’s only got worse over the last 30 years … [Donald] Trump is a horror story, an extremely powerful buffoon. Hillary [Clinton] is a disaster too, she’s basically a Wall Street puppet.”http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/feat/archives/2016/03/15/2003641603_
He’s was in an unenviable position. He’s got leftist ideals but realizes the only politicians that might forward his cause are right wing conservatives. Go back and read his writing about neocons during the Iraq war. He labeled them imbeciles, morons, etc. Now read his recent writing about the same people. Somehow he found a way to overlook their flaws when during the W era he would tear them to shreds.
You can’t selectively leave out info based on your agenda. Can you ever think of a time when he called Trump, Navarro, et al out? Oh, Bolton is fine.
Once you cave in and compromise your ideals, you can’t be a credible journalist. That’s why he got tuned out. A real progressive would have said yes the cause of Democracy is great but we cannot support the current regime and they are not trustworthy. Instead he chose to call names, label everyone that didn’t defer to his inherent genius as idiots, and lost his readership.
You don’t praise yourself for futhering democracy and then write yellow biased pieces to suit an agenda at the same time. It’s why he cannot be taken seriously.
For now I would say that he was thinking and writing in context. That is what allows one to condemn a party for the Iraq war and later on praise them challenging china. These were points made in context.
I just see his ideology all over the place. He is anti-TPP and trade deals in general without realising the TPP can be seen as a great counterweight to China. Or that trade deals are great mechanisms for dispute resolution, environment, labour, etc. Likewise, his viewpoints on the Sunflower movement were super naive in the extreme and not grounded in reality.
Such articles in the Taipei Times make him sound like an old school leftist with an oversized ego. It is all about him.
I would respect him if he were a Taiwan-studies prof from Europe or the US (and less big mouthed on the issues). Or if he actually worked in government, think tank, military etc.
He is neither. He comes across as an amateur albeit a great travel bike-ride writer.
Yelling at your readership that they’re morons because they don’t trust GOP partisan hacks with Taiwan’s future isn’t going to unite anyone. Neither are ZOMG sigh mic drop zingers. I remember cracking up at one post, where he in the same post called for the importance of getting liberal support for Taiwan’s cause, then spend the next paragraph calling everyone that didn’t agree with him a moron. It’s too bad someone so insightful couldn’t resist that.
Absolutely, which is why neocons are liberals that have been mugged by reality. I don`t see Turton as being mugged by reality in any shape or form. I think he would be slightly more balanced on the cross Strait issue if he had worked for a multinational, government, etc. as many of us have. His fan club are mostly educationalists.
Gay rights parade in Taiwan: Look at how exemplary we are! Asia’s only democracy!
Response to liberals not gulliable enough to trust any of the US present advisory team: STFU, you don’t get it, don’t ask questions, these advisors know what they’re doing.
I’d trust Taiwan’s future to a Republican administration much more than I would to a Democratic one. Unfortunately, the Democrats have a terrible record on this issue.
I don’t pay attention to MSN. I do know that Taiwan has liberals to thank for the freedom to have a gay rights parade. So selectively bashing liberals and lining up behind a dictator that is shredding democracy globally and at the same time touting your own liberal credentials is a joke.
He’s not wrong about his observations. Just failed to critique politicans when he needed to cuddle up to them to advance his agenda. Talk is cheap.
Oh god fucking hell, “dictator” this and that, like I said, “you have swallowed the MSN narrative hook line and sinker like a complete sucker.” but off topic, take it to the IP if you like.
What a bunch of twats, turning on a guy because he didn’t follow a brainwashed bunch of SJW’s, no wonder he pulled his blog.
"Oh god fucking hell, “dictator” this and that, like I said, “you have swallowed the MSN narrative hook line and sinker like a complete sucker.” but off topic, take it to the IP if you like.
But a bunch of twats, turning on a guy because he didn’t follow a brainwashed bunch of SJW’s, no wonder he pulled his blog."
Thanks for proving my point for me. The smear campaign against liberals and strawman depictions like this are exactly what lost liberals that might have supported the cause for independence. Ad Hominem attacks. Assumptions. Snark. Entitled Anger. There’s a reason nobody listens to this crew anymore. I hope you’ve enjoyed the brief internet name calling, because that’s the only thing you’ll ever get out of this.
Turton is pretty laser focused on cross-strait issues, for which the Democrats have been very lame. For a lefty it can be frustrating and confusing when you can agree with people like John Bolton and Marco Rubio when it comes to the China and the asia pacific region, but not on much else.
In many ways it is what it is.
All with you there mate.