What do you think of people who support a different party?

[redwagon]

[quote=“Bassman”]Ok, let’s have forumosa model of the Taiwan election.

Let’s have our own forumosa election

Gus is Guo Fu CKS
Maoman is Lee Deng Hui

[/quote]
They usually refer to Sun Yat-sen as ‘Guo Fu’, CKS.

[Rascal]

In general, that is not restricted to Taiwan, I respect other peoples opinion and support of a different party unless that party is somewhat fundamentalist, criminal, racist etc., i.e. not suitable for a democratic country.
If I wouldn’t do that I would put myself on a superior position - but I don’t think anyone can claim that as a fact, and it would possibly lead to supressing others.
To me that is what democracy is partially about - accept other people’s opinion, without the need for name calling or agression, but also accept if you loose an election.

[the_bear]

ok i understand BFM continues to feel a bit isolated in this forum and understandably since we are predominantly pro-green in here. however i do hope he sticks around cos it’s no fun arguing with people who agree with you! that said i think the problem is that for most of us semi-seasoned observers of taiwan politics there is only one side to take in this election issue…this is not a simple republican/democrat tory/labor spat. it is quite simply an attempt by some very nasty and very misguided people to hijack taiwanese democracy. and i know i come across as a dpp apologist but at the end of the day it is pretty obvious who the good guys are and who the bad guys are in this particular controversy. once life goes back to normal then sure it’s each to his own vis a vis kmt vs dpp and i’ll be the first to concede the dpp has a long way to go to become an efficient, non-partisan government…but for the time being i think it’s crazy to try and defend any of the actions of the blue camp whilst they insist on being so completely unreasonable and destructive. likewise i find it very hard to “respect” anyone who doesn’t share this view. i (i don’t know if i appear extreme in this but then i guess we are all the sum of our experiences; BFM married into a waishengren family so that might explain his position. me, i’ve just met too many people who suffered under the KMT and too many fat cats and spoilt rich kids of mainland descent who prospered; so call me permanently soured against that side of taiwan)

[Big_Fluffy_Matthew]

This isn’t directed at one person in particular, just the more fundamentalist and less tolerant factions of Forumosa, niether were any warnings, not that anyone would believe me.

[quote]BFM married into a waishengren family[/quote]Half waishenren/half benshenren. And I forgot which half is which, because it doesn’t matter to me. I see them as family, not waishenren and benshenren, I don’t judge people on that, sorry if that’s very unfashionable of me.
I should have called this poll “What do you think of people who don’t support the same party as you ?” because I am not a KMT supporter, any respect I had for them they lost after the election and I have never defended them. But you still call me bad ? Sorry if being against racism and reminding you that there are 2 sides to every story makes me bad.

[quote]and I’ll be the first to concede the DPP has a long way to go to become an efficient, non-partisan government[/quote]So is anyone who agrees with you on that point a ‘retard’ ? Am I anti-democratic because I can see the bad things in all parties ? Surely the ones who defend the racist anti-democratic parts of the DPP (as well as the other parties) are the ones you should be concerned about ? Is anyone who doesn’t worship Chen Shuibian a traitor who doesn’t love Taiwan. Because my family (all of them) are very offended by those remarks. They love Taiwan as much as Taiwanese.

I thought the point of a democracy was to respect other people opinion, not call them retards or beat them up them with baseball bats. (Yes, I know that’s what the KMT does too, but we’re better than them, right?)Why can’t we all just love each other ? Bear, Mr He, gizza snog :hubba:

[Bu_Lai_En]

Without Chiang and his thugs Taiwan would most likely either have remained under American or Japanese stewardship and everyone here would be able to speak their own dialect plus at least one foreign language.

I really don’t think so. If the KMT armies had retreated to, say, the SW of China instead of Taiwan, then this island would have been ‘recovered’ by the communists, just like the rest of China. Taiwanese would have probably welcomed them at first too, just like they welcomed the KMT at first.

Neither is it fair to say that EVERYTHING the KMT did on/to Taiwan was bad. From what I’ve read, land reform was successful, as was economic strategy and the industrialisation plan (the one that built the freeway, Gaoxiong harbour, CKS airport etc).

Brian

[redwagon]

[quote=“Bu Lai En”]the industrialisation plan (the one that built the freeway, Gaoxiong harbour, CKS airport etc).

Brian[/quote]
Bare minimum of investment in basic infrastructure necessary to carry out the slash-and-burn operation… with some nice fat kickbacks going to the faithful of course.
No of course it wasn’t a complete screw up. Even the corrupt and incompetant do things right sometimes just by the law of averages. My point is that things were going pretty well (if you ignore the deforestation the Japanese were doing) on the economic and infrastructure development fronts. CKS and his boys only had to keep the ball rolling. In any case, my remarks were a bit ott, snap reaction the trolling from ac_f***wit before I saw all the other bs from him. Please ignore me as your common sense would usually dictate.

[X3M]

I’ll stand by what I said on page 1, and maybe even more so…

[Vorkosigan]

[quote=“Bu Lai En”]
Neither is it fair to say that EVERYTHING the KMT did on/to Taiwan was bad. From what I’ve read, land reform was successful, as was economic strategy and the industrialisation plan (the one that built the freeway, Gaoxiong harbour, CKS airport etc).
Brian[/quote]

Myth. The infrastructure expansion was in response to threats by foreign shippers in the late 1960s and early 1970s to boycott the island if it didn’t upgrade its infrastructure. See the addendum to Ho, The Economic Development of Taiwan 1860-1970. The KMT had to be led kicking and screaming into industrialization and liberalization, again by threats, this time from the US. Remember that the KMT government has the largest ownership of business outside the Communist bloc, and in the 1950s it did not want to permit any private businesses, especially for the Taiwanese. USAID again and again begged, pleaded, and finally threatened the government to include Taiwanese in the development programs, and in the end, to get the government to switch to an export-led growth program and carry out reforms, threatened to withhold aid (in 1960 a portion of aid was withheld because the reforms did not go far enough). See Jacoby’s US Aid to Taiwan. USAID more or less created small capitalism on the island.

The idea that the KMT had wise industrialization policies is a myth fostered beginning in the late 1970s by the KMT in a search for a new basis of legitimacy – economic success, and spread both by concentrated propaganda books like works by people like Shirley Guo, KT Li, and John C. Fei, but also by foreign academics who were essentially hoodwinked by the new legitimization strategy.

Vorkosigan

[aoi145]

Just wondering…but is there any way to add another option to this poll? I tend to think that my pro-blue classmates are “intelligent and usually amicable, but horribly misled and/or brainwashed”…

[turret]

@Bu Lai En

[quote]Without Chiang and his thugs Taiwan would most likely either have remained under American or Japanese stewardship and everyone here would be able to speak their own dialect plus at least one foreign language.

I really don’t think so. If the KMT armies had retreated to, say, the SW of China instead of Taiwan, then this island would have been ‘recovered’ by the communists, just like the rest of China. Taiwanese would have probably welcomed them at first too, just like they welcomed the KMT at first.
[/quote]

If the KMT had never retreated to Taiwan, the CCP would likely have had little interest in the island. This topic is explored in the book: Die Kommunistische Partei Chinas und Taiwan (1921-1981) by Joerg-Meinhard Rudolph.

amazon.de/exec/obidos/ASIN/3 … JBNTALRLQH

Rudolph’s research shows how the CCP viewed Taiwan as a foreign country prior to 1945, assigned the same company as Korea, Thailand, Malaya, the Phillipines, etc. Taiwan was never considered a sacred part of China as current dogma dictates. Indeed, Mao, himself said in 1938:

[quote]“…we will extend (Korea) our enthusiastic help in their struggle for independence. The same thing applies to Formosa”
[/quote]

(quoted in the 1961 edition of Edgar Snow’s Red Star over China. That last sentence was redacted in subsequent editions of Red Star over China, under prodding from the Chinese).

Rudolph shows how the first mention of Taiwan as a province of China did not appear until 1946, after the KMT troops landed on Taiwan. The presence of the KMT on the island made Taiwan a dominion to be wrenched away from their enemy, the justification for which could only be sustained if Taiwan were consigned as a territory and inseparable part of China.

An article which summarizes the points made in the Rudolph book, as well as an earlier work by Hsiao and Sullivan is given at:

groups.google.com/groups?selm=23 … put=gplain

The gist of the article is that prior to the KMT’s arrival, Taiwan was viewed as a foreign and inconsequential land.

[Bu_Lai_En]

Turret, that’s an interesting post. So maybe if the KMT had never gone to Taiwan, the PRC would have left it alone. Maybe.

But upon thought, this doesn’t change my disbelief int he idea that without CKS retreating to Taiwan, this Island may be independent (or a protectorate of the US) today. You are talking about pre-1945. CKS and the whole KMT army didn’t arrive until 1949. So maybe CKS insisting on the return of Taiwan to China at Cairo, and the subsequent KMT occupation in 1945 upon Japanese surrender, led to the PRC also thinking that Taiwan was Chinese territory. If in 1949 (or 1948 or whenever they started planning the retreat to Taiwan) CKS had decided on holing up in the SW of China instead, I still think the PRC would have taken Taiwan.

Brian

[turret]

[quote=“Bu Lai En”] You are talking about pre-1945. CKS and the whole KMT army didn’t arrive until 1949. So maybe CKS insisting on the return of Taiwan to China at Cairo, and the subsequent KMT occupation in 1945 upon Japanese surrender, led to the PRC also thinking that Taiwan was Chinese territory. If in 1949 (or 1948 or whenever they started planning the retreat to Taiwan) CKS had decided on holing up in the SW of China instead, I still think the PRC would have taken Taiwan.
[/quote]

The issue of whether the Cairo Declaration had influenced the CCP, and revised its earlier support of Taiwanese Independence is addressed in the Rudolph book. The article that I alluded to earlier summarizes Rudolph’s findings:

groups.google.com/groups?selm=23 … put=gplain

(I did not post it in its entirety, as the article is quite lengthy, but I’ll snip out the relevant portions):

[quote]b2. [Rudolph] gives the following fact to show that CCP did not
change its view to Taiwan after the Cairo Conference:

               From April 23. to June 6. *1945*, CCP held its 7th Party
               Congress. Jie3Fang4 Ri4Bao4 ["Liberation Daily"] published
               on May 1. 1945 (i.e. during the days of the Party Congress)
               a Congratulation Text which was a message of congratulation
               to the Party Congress from the party members of foreign
               nations. The Congratulation Text was signed by "Taiwan,
               the Philiphins, the Thai party member in Yan2An1, Malaya,
               the Dutch India [i.e. Indonesia], Burma".

               The congratulation text contains : "...... The 7th Party
               Congress of CCP ..... struggles for the victory of the
               Chiense Nation and all nations of the East in the fight
               against the Japanese facism and accelerates it ! It [the
               congress] strengthens the help for and the connnection with
               the brethren parties of the Pacific countries ! Long live
               the union of the peoples of the East in the fight for the
               common matter of liberation."

[/quote]Obviously, CCP still saw Taiwan as another Pacific country as
late as in May 1945, one and half years after the Cairo
Conference.

c. [Rudolph] shows that CCP’s view to Taiwan might have been revised after
that ROC’s troops moved in to Taiwan in October 1945. However, it is
unclear what kind of policy CCP had to Taiwan between 1946 and 1949.

  After ROC moved in to Taiwan in October 1945, the first time CCP called
  Taiwan a "province"  was in Jie3Fang4 Ri4Bao4 of Feb. 26 1946, CCP
  talked of "Compartiots (T`ung2Pau1/ Tong2BAao1) in the same daily of
  Aug. 23 1946. This means that the first trace of CCP gaving up its
  "indepedent Taiwan"-policy appeared as late as in February 1946.

  Furthermore, on March 26 1947, People's Daily published an article in
  which some Taiwanese soldiers in CCP commented on the events in Taiwan. 
  The article concluded with the following call:
      "Brothers and Sisters ! We don't fight on one battlefield, yet our
       gunfires are shot to the direction toward the same enemy, Chiang
       Kai-sek, and the goal of our fights are the same, to liberate
       the Fatherland, to liberate Taiwan ... Long live the liberation
       of the Chinese people ! Long live the movement to the self-
       administration of Taiwan !"

  The above suggests that CCP might have thought out a "Self-
  Administration" policy for Taiwan after "228". [Rudolph] conjectures
  that the "self-administration" policy might have been formulated in
  a hurry in order to make use of the situation in 228-Taiwan to drag KMT's
  fight. The idea of "self-administration" might have come from CCP's
  long-held position about the matter of Tibet and Eastern Turkistan
  (Hsin1Chiang1/Xin1Jiang1).

  However, People's Daily (Ren2Min2 Ri4Bao4) published on March 19
  1947 an article with the title "The Angry of the Taiwanese" which
  commented on the "228" popular uprising. The article used *quotation
  marks* for the word "Jie1 Shou1 ("take over") to refer to the take over
  of Taiwan by ROC. This shows that CCP still did not (totally) agree with
  the "take over" at that time. This also shows that the talk of "self-
  administration" later in August (see above) was an "instant noodle" and
  did not reflect a well-thought-out policy to Taiwan. The recipe for this
  "instant noodle" was taken from CCP's policy to the minorities in China.
  This means that Taiwan was still somewhat foreign and "non-Chinese" to
  CCP in 1947, although CCP had accepted that Taiwan be a part of China.

d. CCP’s view to Taiwan changed clearly and totally after Chiang Kai-sek
declared his ROC on Taiwan in 1950. The existence of Chiang in Taiwan
decisively froced CCP to hold a clear position to Taiwan, and the only
possible position is “to liberate Taiwan”. The existence of KTM in
Taiwan to PRC was like the existence of Chen4 Cheng2Kung1 in Taiwan to the Ching Empire. PRC, like Ching, had no other choice but to destroy the adversary regime; Ching had to adopt Taiwan to prevent
other adversary (“Han”) people from having a base to fight Ch`ing; PRC
too had to make Taiwan “clean” to prevent a revival of the civil war.
It was clear which position PRC chose toward Taiwan in 1950.

The following is a timeline of the CCP’s position on Taiwan:
[ul]
Prior to 1943 - The CCP supports independence for Taiwan. Taiwan not viewed as part of China (see statements by Mao and Zhou Enlai below).

November 1943 - Cairo Declaration

May 1945 - Taiwan still viewed as separate and foreign land, in the same company as Phillipines, Malaya, Indonesia, Burma, etc.

October 1945 - KMT troops land in Taiwan.

February 1946 - CCP now starts calling Taiwan a province, but attitudes indicate that Taiwan was treated as somewhat foreign territory, with status viewed as similar to autonomous minority regions.

1949-1950 - Withdrawal of Chiang Kai-shek to Taiwan, and subsequent decaration of ROC on Taiwan. CCP’s attitude towards Taiwan now harden, giving rise to claim that Taiwan is an inseparable part of China.
[/ul]
It is instructive to compare Chinese sentiments toward Taiwan, prior to the KMT’s arrival to the hardline attitudes of today.

taiwan-info.de/html/english/mao-zhou_en.htm

[quote]Mao Zedong

Edgar Snow: Is it the immediate task of the Chinese people to regain all territories lost to Japanese imperialism, or only to drive Japan from North China, and all Chinese territory above the Great Wall?

[JeffG]

I cannot find a suitable answer in your poll. A political view is a political view and should be kept only as that, it should not influence your entire life, unfortunately in Taiwan what side you are on means everything, it’s quite sad. It’s difficult for me to respect the otherside as they have caused so much chaos, but I can’t say I’d like to hit them over the head with a baseball bat.

[wolf_reinhold]

ac_dropout:

Anyways democracy and freedom are useless. You can use it to suppress anyone these days.

So what political system is preferable? Communism can suppress, as can fascism, as can dictatorship…and now democracy. What sort of system do you know about that works to ensure…whatever it is you want (seems that you are not in favor of freedom, that confining quality).
What do you want?

[ac_dropout]

wolf_reinhold,

We can discuss the acedemic virtues of any system. It is in practice which is what counts.
Just like this thread is “What are your views of opposition side.” If the side snipes in this thread are any indiction one could just easily draw the conclusion “ban” and “ignore” are the answer.

You tell me is democracy a choice of passive vs. active suppression?

[wolf_reinhold]

My political siding with the DPP is, in part, due to its advocacy of democracy. You, ac_dropout, on the other hand, seem to eschew democracy, but you also seem to dislike communism.
I mean if you dislike the KMT, PFP, New Party and the DPP and TSU, then say so. If you are just debating a side to be the devil’s advocate, fine.
I am just curious what system you prefer to live under. The US system seems to be doing you well at the moment.

[the_bear]

i sometimes wonder if marcos wasn’t right when he said that maybe democracy wasn’t the right system for asia…i mean representative democracy needs a certain maturity on the part of the politicians…and i’m sure i speak for all of us when i say i’ve seen better behaved kids in kindergartens than some of the clowns in government chambers here (not pointing fingers at any one in particular of course)…

[david]

@bear64

i sometimes wonder if marcos wasn’t right when he said that maybe democracy wasn’t the right system for Asia…I mean representative democracy needs a certain maturity on the part of the politicians…and I’m sure i speak for all of us when I say I’ve seen better behaved kids in kindergartens than some of the clowns in government chambers here (not pointing fingers at any one in particular of course)…

You have got to remember that Taiwan has only had any sort of democracy since 1992; by my reckoning, that means democracy in Taiwan has just become a teenager. Kind of explains Lien/Soong’s petulant “it’s unfair” attitude. (I wonder if they’re going to threaten to run away from home and stay with cool uncle China)

The point is, you only get mature politicians in a mature democracy - from that perspective, the election might be an important step for Taiwan. In Korea, the majority party behaved ridiculously in impeaching the president, and then promptly lost their majority in parliamentary elections a few months later; they will have to either start behaving, or become marginalised. I hope the same will happen in Taiwan - IF the public react against the recent misbehaviour of the KMT/PFP in the legislative elections, then it’s up to them to ‘grow up’, or fade away. (The same of course applies to the DPP if they start behaving stupidly again)

[RJF]

[quote=“bear64”]i sometimes wonder if marcos wasn’t right when he said that maybe democracy wasn’t the right system for Asia…
I mean representative democracy needs a certain maturity on the part of the politicians…
and I’m sure i speak for all of us when I say I’ve seen better behaved kids in kindergartens
than some of the clowns in government chambers here (not pointing fingers at any one in particular of course)…[/quote]

If you read your American history, the politicos in the US of A at the time of the forming of the republic and
thereafter behaved little differently.

Many a debate was actually settled with a duel!

[mod_lang]

[quote=“RJF”]
Many a debate was actually settled with a duel![/quote]

Yes. It would be good to keep in perspective the immaturity of young democracies: Alexander Hamilton vs. Aaron Burr. If you’re an American and don’t know that story, you should.

During one of the first legislative sessions in Arkansas’ history, there erupted a fatal knife-fight. I’m sure that wasn’t just a peculiarity to my state, either - I’m sure other state legislatures had such occurrences in the 19th century.