Many local friends are sharing about what’s happening today at the parliament over parliamentary reforms that are being proposed and voted on and approved in an express manner by KMT and TPP
I can’t find much information in english about what is actually happening but it doesn’t look any good.
From descriptions i’m reading in facebook, aside from the intentional manslaughter videos going around of people being thrown down from high tables headfirst into floors, it seems like a pretty mafia-like operation to pass laws that noone has read before anyone has had the time to read them.
Chung got over the podium table and grabbed and then dragged down female KMT Legislator Chen Ching-hui (陳菁徽), to whom Chung later apologized and said he accidentally stepped on paper and slipped.
I’m not condoning brawling, but as long as no one dies in these brawls, I do think they’re probably preferable to duels. In the early days of the US, dueling was the way that national-level politicians sometimes settled disputes:
Well, yes, one might think so, and maybe they have evolved, but evolution is slow, and there still seem to be these little outbreaks from time to time:
I don’t think the US Congress is a great model for anyone right now.
The key point in Taiwan’s LY is this: the KMT-led legislators are back to their old habits of trying to push through changes while not quite respecting procedural process. Remember this is what sparked the Sunflowers! After this profoundly impactful movement, the KMT became a sullen shell for nearly a decade, estranged from the executive after the Sunflower movement and then in a minority position for the duration of Tsai’s presidency (2016-2024).
And here we are in 2024, they have regained control of the LY (as long as Ko’s TPP works with them), and they are trying it again. And again it has led to protests. The key to watch is how the KMT will move on Tuesday when the LY reconvenes.
I get how Taiwan can have a robust conservative party–lots of countries do–but given (1) 228 and the White Terror, and (2) the KMT’s seeming desire for unification with despotic China, I don’t understand how the KMT has survived as long as it has.
The KMT is a complex beast, bringing together the remaining die-hard ROC nationalists; the apparently resurgent local factions (linked to the above-mentioned gangsters in the LY); some pro-business types who are now banging on about expanding nuclear power; and habitual KMT voters who hate the DPP and its policies . . .
I too would have predicted the splintering of these groups, who are not always fully aligned. And we do know that the KMT has had a habit of splintering since the New Party went its own way in the 1990s.
Will KMT leadership be able to hold things together? Will faction / gangster types like Fu continue to throw their weight around in the LY? My best guess is probably yes. We may be in for a tumultuous four years.
While both are much too extreme for my tastes, at least AOC is closer to deserving to be in her position and doesn’t spew stupid conspiracy theories ad nauseam. MTG is laughably under-qualified for her role and rose to fame seemingly from the combination of daddy’s money/connections, a penchant for spinning a good grift + looks.
AOC runs circles around MTG intellectually, politics aside. It’s not even close.
Well said, 100% true. The bar is laughably low in the US right now
@Mr_PBH you are in Taiwan, and you are posting in a Taiwan politics forum about a specific Taiwan development which took place here in Taiwan yesterday.
Stay focused, man! Sometimes not everything is about the US.