You’ve gotta feel for the Mayor - his own dad, stabbing him in the back! 
With support like that, he’s got an uphill battle.
[color=black]Ma’s father to kill himself if son runs against Lian[/color]
There was a bizarre incident a few weeks ago where Ma’s father gave a long, incoherent lecture about his plan for world peace and then broke down and accused Ma’s sister (I think) of not allowing him to talk to his son.
I’m no fan of Ma, but for once I’m feeling sorry for him too. It’s also an interesting case of the realities of father-son relationships in Chinese society. In theory of course, Ma should defer to his father and not run. As far as I know, there’s no proviso in Confucian doctrine that gets you off the hook if your elders are senile. In practice, Ma is going to disobey his father and run.
I’m wondering if this might get Ma a few sympathy votes. And a split with his father, a hardline unificationist of the old school, might gain Ma more votes from centrist Taiwanese voters.
Well, I suppose if he did top himself it would be one less vote for Lien that Ma would have to worry about 
This KMT election is turning into a “let’s embarass Ma Yingjiu” competition. Will he really be happy to stay in the KMT if (as seems likely) he loses the election?
Jackie Chan could probably come up with some handy campaign slogans here.
Taiwan politics = a joke!
The horse is “so handsome”. He’ll do fine.
I am amazed that it took 4 posts before this was brought up as an important point. 
This may be the longest I’ve ever seen a conversation about the good mayor go without it being mentioned that he’s really quite a dreamboat…
Oooh…let’s all go for a run to ponder this thought.
The soap opera continues…
Episode 1: 319/aftermath(comedy)
Episode 2: LienChan/Soong visit to china (comedy)
Episode 3: Ma Sr. threatens to commit suicide if son runs for kmt chair. (side act: LienChan goes to court for accepting illegal $ gifts again).
Future Episode 4: WangJerPing bows out before LienChan registers. All grand pubahs of loyal order of waterbuffulo support brother LeinChan.
Future Episode 5: Big brother LeinChan re-runs for kmt chairman to save taiwan. (comedy), Ma leaves party in disgust, kmt employees go on strike. 51%+ of Taiwan have a good laugh. kmt morale at all time low.
Future Episode 6: Ma starts new party, TIL (Trust in Leadership) nicknamed the Posse. Financed by overseas chinese, exbluebiz, (possible covert lippo group - with ties to bush/carylye group for arms, but that would be against party charter). Major theme is R.O.O.T.S. (reunification on our terms). Takes the view that reunification is possible, but only under the circumstances agreed to by the Taiwanese people if/when the time is right. Ma does not follow the idiotic KMT leadership by throwing his ace card away. (i.e. stating Taiwan can never become independent). Mainland chinese intellectuals look upon the new party creation with envy and covertly work with Ma to bring basic democracy (checks and balances) to the mainland. the dragon stirs.
Future Episode 7: Posse party sucks all forms of intelligent life out of kmt. sissy chen, diane lee, white wolf (exile), elmer fudd (from jail) and other weasels fill the void.
Future Episode 8: Ma wins election in 08 (g’day ma8!), running against Frank Hsieh and LienChan. Ma garners 60% vote. Hsieh 37%, LienChan 3%. KMT headquarters sold, becomes major thinktank for chinese/Taiwan/us/japan relations. bill of rights for chinese federation created/signed on August 8, 2008. Party assets sold off to pay for thinktank ops and also setup modest social security system. CKS statue are removed from the CKS memorial park, becomes new park for culture and history. All Kmt historical documents open to public and murders outed. Secret opium smoking room in kmt headquarter basement found.
In China people stage a mass protest during Olympic games to show the world they want freedom from a corrupt government. World (again) feels for the plight of the Chinese. Time magazine finds a catholic to exemplify.
Future Episode 9: LeinChan follows grandfather
:bravo:
All this guy has to do is keep his charisma up and there’ll be plenty seasons of this soap to come…
Good post on this issue on Michael Turton’s blog. michaelturton.blogspot.com/2005/ … inues.html
Ma has come out against independence many times. His ‘ace’ is that he will not agree to unfy unless China is a working democracy. He is also probably decent enough to put any unification deal to a vote.
Zhujianlun
[quote=“4nr”]Else he is afraid Ma is not conniving enough to deal with the powerful gangster elements to get anything accomplished (especially talks with the ccp).[/quote]I don’t think Ma is either conniving or tough enough to get the better of an average housecat. No backbone.
This is only speculation, but as Feiren said there is a distinct possibility Ma’s father is suffering from a degenerative illness. There have been one or two other reports of strange behavior in public. As politically damaging as the old general’s words might sound, I suspect that Ma’s reaction is consistent with that of a person whose parent has Alzheimer’s or something similar. Note that Ma has not done the stereotypically Chinese thing and deferred to his father’s “wishes.”
I am pleased to see that no one (as far as I have heard) has tried to publicly make hay out of this matter
Alzheimer’s seems to be a reasonable explanation without having the facts. Its just too crazy for anyone to make a statement like that. Er, well take it back, if its coming from the blue camp, nothing is too crazy.
If you look at Ma
You, my friend, need to post more often. This poor, insanely-boring thing I call “today”, which has far too much resemblance to that quasi-quantified thing I like to call “yesterday”, now has a slight high point sewn into it.
Two points:
Handsome Ma? Looks like a test tube embryo to me. So pale and that sugary smile…yuck.
Ma’s Ba kills himself? Old folks do it all the time to get what they want. Just the other day, I heard an old man threatened to kill himself if his daughter doesn’t get him a pack of cookies at 7-11.
etmag wrote:
THANK YOU!!!
Judging by that snout in your avatar you could well be Gomer Pyle.
Good call though.
Fox said:
Nah – Nabors has a much nicer smile than mine.
btw – isn’t lampooning a poster’s facial features against the rules?
If it isn’t well, then… I don’t like your BOW!!
Ma doesn’t have any quality of being a leader. He never takes his responsibility whenever his team creates problems. No matter whether he’s handsome or not, the Taipei city under his management is pretty ugly.
Yes, Taipei was so much better, cleaner, more livable and easier to navigate before Ma made it into the uncultured backwater it is today.
