You just criticized The Economist without giving them some credible suggestions and alternatives.
By the way, what are your credible suggestions and alternatives for mini-Ma?[/quote]
Well, first of all I am not a respected international publication calling the leader of a defacto sovereign state a bumbler. Obviously the burden of evidence and argument for such a thing should be greater than that of an semi-anonymous poster giving his opinion.
Second, it is implicit that my “credible suggestions and alternatives” for the Economist is for them to have offered suggestions and alternatives about Ma and his policies. What suggestions they would care to make would be up to them.
I do not have any sort of clear opinion on Taiwan’s economic policy at the moment. I hope to learn more on the topic. And I hope that the Economist does better in the future when covering it.
BTW, here’s a pretty detailed look at the article by Michael Turton.
Note that it is the most recent blog post as of Nov 18 at 15:35 but if someone clicks the link later they may get a different top post and have to scroll down to find the article.[/quote]
Local media is having a ball showing that even G. Bush was called a bumbler himself - same title: Bush the bumbler. All rightie, then…
Local media is having a ball showing that even G. Bush was called a bumbler himself - same title: Bush the bumbler. All rightie, then…
Turton hits a lot of spots right on.[/quote]
People in Taiwan generally don’t like W. Bush very much, so… W. Bush being called a bumbler I don’t think makes Ma look better in any light…
There’s a lot of arguments to how bumbler should be translated. I think 天兵 (Tien-Bing) probably does it pretty well… But if the definition is someone incompetent who bungles/makes blunders, then 馬英九： 無能的天兵 probably comes really close.
Local media is having a ball showing that even G. Bush was called a bumbler himself - same title: Bush the bumbler. All rightie, then…
Turton hits a lot of spots right on.[/quote]
People in Taiwan generally don’t like W. Bush very much, so… W. Bush being called a bumbler I don’t think makes Ma look better in any light…
There’s a lot of arguments to how bumbler should be translated. I think 天兵 (Tien-Bing) probably does it pretty well… But if the definition is someone incompetent who bungles/makes blunders, then 馬英九： 無能的天兵 probably comes really close.[/quote]
What makes you think W. Is not popular in Taiwan, apart from liberals arts teachers that are mostly from Canada and South Africa? Wolfowitz still heads the US Taiwan Business Council. In the circles that count, I am sure Bush is still respected.
What makes you think W. Is not popular in Taiwan, apart from liberals arts teachers that are mostly from Canada and South Africa? Wolfowitz still heads the US Taiwan Business Council. In the circles that count, I am sure Bush is still respected.[/quote]
talking about the general Taiwanese public, not the expat community. For some reason most Taiwanese media were siding with the European news media during the Iraq invasion, instead of siding with the news from the US (which at the time mostly were supportive of Bush, due to the “evidence” presented) like they traditionally do. Therefore peole of Taiwan didn’t view W. Bush with a positive light.
Actually, the media take was along the lines of “see, it’s not just us, even Bush was called that before” kind of line, if you know what I mean. They were trying to “minimize” the quip. sigh
Ma is ineffectual. If the mainland had a wet dream Ma would be its center piece. If you have ever had a wet dream and know what I am talking about please explain.
That aside, if your days as a courtier of all that was wrong about the world was wrapped in swaddling cloth and left at your door step, it would look like Ma, smell like Ma, and suck your tits dry until you cried like Ma so that your only conclusion of the world would be the vision captured on Led Zepllin’s ‘Houses of the Holy’ album cover.
Local media is having a ball showing that even G. Bush was called a bumbler himself - same title: Bush the bumbler. All rightie, then…
Turton hits a lot of spots right on.[/quote]
People in Taiwan generally don’t like W. Bush very much, so… W. Bush being called a bumbler I don’t think makes Ma look better in any light…
There’s a lot of arguments to how bumbler should be translated. I think 天兵 (Tien-Bing) probably does it pretty well… But if the definition is someone incompetent who bungles/makes blunders, then 馬英九： 無能的天兵 probably comes really close.[/quote]
Liberty Times translates bumbler as 沒用的笨蛋 (useless idiot). Hard to argue with that one.
The editor of Asia in the Economist says today that bumbler is an undecisive person, not an idiot.
Well, according to Urban Dictionary
Bumbler
A clumbsy idiot who happens to be funny looking too.
A guy with a shaved head. I.E Romer Stomper.
going down on someone while they have a shit.
As I was laying a particularly large and putrid grogan in the shitter my wife crouched before me and gave me a bumbler.
All combined, Bumbler is indeed an idiot, and is funny, and has some grotesque characteristics.
All these fit Ma pretty well.
I saw that, but you need to take everything there with a bucket of salt. Like this quote.
This is nonsense. I made a comment once before that the reason Zara never came to Taiwan was because of trade restrictions on imports from China to Taiwan. Sure enough as soon as ECFA was signed, stores started popping up, I have two companies I work closely with, one has already moved back manufacturing to Taiwan, the other is discussing plans now, both cited ECFA.
ECFA covers so many items, I’m sure the greens will find a long list if they cherry pick which are not in Taiwans favour, to claim there are “no identifiable benefits” is absurd, as I see some benefits. I would be interested in a more detailed study, not one from a DPP think tank.
Local media is having a ball showing that even G. Bush was called a bumbler himself - same title: Bush the bumbler. All rightie, then…
Turton hits a lot of spots right on.[/quote]
People in Taiwan generally don’t like W. Bush very much, so… W. Bush being called a bumbler I don’t think makes Ma look better in any light…
There’s a lot of arguments to how bumbler should be translated. I think 天兵 (Tien-Bing) probably does it pretty well… But if the definition is someone incompetent who bungles/makes blunders, then 馬英九： 無能的天兵 probably comes really close.[/quote]
Two TV new channels I watched were using 笨蛋 (idiot) for a translation, which seems to me a lot stronger than the writer had intended.
Little wonder such a fuss is being kicked up over this.
Ma joined Bush Jr in the shoe club. I heard that Ma hired a designated shoe catcher to go with him to every public appearance. Oh he also will give promotion to some bigger bumblers in his administration to more visible positions. The idea is that Ma will look wiser relative to this bumbler group.
Look at the outflow and it’s even more scary. The government seems to have given up looking for real FDI and pinned its hopes on these free trade zones where they hope to bring back polluting and low grade factories from China and avoid minimum wage laws and foreign worker restrictions.
[quote=“finley”]Taiwan in general is not renowned for Big Ideas, and I think both of the main parties are looking at The West for inspiration (as they usually do) and seeing a huge shambles. It’s beyond their ability to formulate a grand strategy for a very unique country, and the Great Unwashed wouldn’t accept such a thing anyway. They just want things to stay the same, except with cheaper electricity, lower house prices, and higher salaries.[/quote] Taiwan has been following the West’s lead very effectively: outsource everything to China. Those who move operations to China and reduce costs make out big time. Just leave the specialty work that can’t be moved to China for whatever reason back in Taiwan . The people at the top of the food chain with the capital get increasingly rich, while those in the middle and especially at the bottom get squeezed.
Just look at the US these days… A lot of top end products are ‘designed in USA’ and may even be made of US material, but it’s rare when anything is actually ‘made in USA’. It’s gotten to be pretty much the same in Taiwan and MIT ‘Made in Taiwan’ is a common term these days for a shrinking number of products.
