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Lee's
"jieh ji, yung ren" or "avoid haste, use patience"
policy is essentially an illegal ban on direct commercial telecommunication,
shipping, and air passenger links with the Chinese mainland. By
means of a petty tyrant's personal diktat, Lee has squelched spontaneous
private sector activity – economic, cultural, familial –
which in the absence of calculated and heavy-handed efforts to keep
the two sides apart, would cause them to slowly drift back towards
each other like two magnets.
 WITH
THE PEOPLE ALWAYS IN MY HEART
Lee Teng-hui is renowned in Taiwan
for two slogans. The first is "Ming zhi sou yu, chang zai wo
xing" which translates as "The hopes of the people are
always in my heart." The title of Lee 's latest ghostwritten
book is "With the People Always in My Heart." The other
is "Lao bai xing shi tou jia" which translates as "The
common folk are the bosses."
But Lee Teng-hui and the Taiwan independence elite, like members
of the nomenklatura everywhere, do not really believe "the
common folk are the bosses," and have anything but the hopes
of the people always in their hearts. Rather they see themselves
as Chess Grand Masters in a wondrous, Kiplingesque "Great Game,"
in which ordinary citizens are merely expendable pawns, to be sacrificed,
perhaps with mild regret, as the need arises.
Shortly after the abominable incident in which President Lee Teng-hui's
helicopter entourage killed a five year old homeless earthquake
victim, "Mr. Democracy," incensed with the public's reaction
to his string of deadly blunders, vented his spleen at the Fourth
Estate. Chairman Lee of the KMT turned on TV news crews, many of
whom worked for KMT owned and operated networks and testily admonished
them "Just make sure you do a good job of reporting! Do a little
less criticizing!"
Trusting ROC citizens who foolishly voted for Lee Teng-hui in 1996
because they believed "he's one of us" have learned a
bitter lesson. They now know Lee and his Taiwan separatist elite
will not hesitate to sacrifice ordinary ROC citizens' lives, let
alone their economic futures, as long they are convinced that by
doing so they can realize their private agenda.
THE FLATTERED HOST
During Taiwan's recent crisis, Lee
Teng-hui flatly refused assistance from the mainland Chinese rescue
team. He also deliberately insulted the Hongkong rescue team. Why
the animosity toward Hongkong? Simple: One Country, Two Systems.
Anathema to the Taiwan separatist elite. Lee made certain the mainland
team stayed locked out, even as he welcomed rescue teams from dozens
of other nations with open arms.
On the other hand, Lee really milked the presence of Japanese rescue
teams allowed into Taiwan, staging "heartwarming" photo
ops of Japanese medical teams tending to the injuries of Taiwan
quake victims. Surprise, surprise, surprise.
Consider this "news" article from the Central News Agency
(CNA). The CNA is the ROC's counterpart to our own propaganda organs,
Radio Free Asia and The Voice of America, or mainland China's Xinhua
news agency.
A visiting Japanese politician politely flatters his attentive host,
suggesting that Taiwan's rescue team was "three times as fast"
as Japan's. A very flattered Lee Teng-hui takes it rather
too literally.
Now imagine dramatic live CNN footage of mainland Chinese rescue
teams risking life and limb to save their fellow Chinese on Taiwan.
"This
is Andrea Koppel, reporting to you live from Taipei, where heroic
mainland Chinese rescue workers, without regard to their personal
safety, have just succeeded in freeing two teen-aged brothers trapped
for 130 hours beneath the wreckage of a twelve story building. The
Taiwan public has been deeply moved by their selfless courage. Is
this the beginning of a warming in cross-Straits relations? A positive
sign for eventual reunification"
Lee Teng-hui would sooner let every last earthquake victim on the
island die an agonizing, protracted death trapped under tons of
twisted steel and shattered concrete, before permitting a scenario
like that to unfold and be seen around the world, let alone by the
ROC public.
THE PEOPLE VS. LEE TENG-HUI
Each time Lee Teng-hui has been presented
with the opportunity to demonstrate good faith regarding reunification,
Lee has exploited the occasion to deliberately provoke hatred among
Chinese on Taiwan against their compatriots on the mainland. He
then insists disingenuously that he is merely playing hardball with
Beijing to uphold the "dignity" of the people of Taiwan.
One might be more inclined to take Lee at his word, if only he showed
a little more respect for the dignity of the people of Taiwan himself.
How much respect, for example, did Lee show for the dignity of the
elderly Taiwanese woman whose tent he demolished? How much respect
did Lee show for the dignity of the five year old Taiwanese girl
whose skull he caved in? If Mr. Democracy wants a good look at the
"evildoer" who is disrespecting the dignity of the people
of Taiwan, he need only stare in the mirror.
MAN'S PLANS PALE NEXT TO HEAVEN'S PLANS
The Chinese expression for self-demeaning
sycophancy is "pai ma pi." Literally translated means
"patting the horse's ass." This expressions has roughly
the meaning as the more picturesque, but less tactful, term from
American slang: "a**-kissing."
This brings us to October 3, 1999, when patting the horse's ass
backfired and the Lee Teng-hui regime's Japanophile sycophancy backfired.
"Taiwan's
Sentiments" a regularly scheduled "human interest"
radio show on the China Broadcasting Company, a KMT owned and operated
radio network, conducted a live on air telephone interview with
a senior official from NHK, Japan's equivalent of Britain's BBC.
The radio show's host introduced him as a senior official from Japan's
NHK, who along with his colleagues at NHK, were donating a generous
sum of money to the local Red Cross for earthquake relief, and that
Taiwan was honored to have such a high-ranking journalist from Japan
visit.
The NHK official explained that he was here for several reasons.
To bring the relief funds of course as the host mentioned, but also
to report on the earthquake for audiences back in Japan.
"Your
Chinese is extremely good for a Japanese," the show's host
noted. "You have no trace of a Japanese accent. Where did you
learn Chinese?"
Laughing, the NHK official explained to the surprised radio show
host, "I'm not Japanese, I'm Chinese. I'm from the mainland,
Beijing. I went to high school in Beijing, and went abroad to Japan
for university. My wife is Taiwan Chinese, from Nantou, the region
hardest hit by the earthquake. That's another reason I came. I wanted
to see what my wife's hometown was like."
An old expression in Chinese comes to mind, "Ren suan bu ru
tien suan" or "Man's plans pale next to Heaven's plans."
APPENDIX: READING BETWEEN THE HEADLINES
Taiwan's "Jiu Er Yi Da Di Zeng"
or "921 Great Earthquake" as it is known in Chinese, has
received considerable international media attention. But many readers
may have missed the real story, namely how Mr. Democracy Lee Teng–hui's
propaganda machine played separatist politics with the lives of
Taiwan's earthquake victims. To read this story one needs to read
not the headlines but between the headlines.
Let's begin at the beginning.
Disaster
strikes. Within hours of the moment the initial shock waves struck
central Taiwan province, mainland China's expert earthquake rescue
team, honored by the United Nations, is primed and ready to go.
How does diehard separatist Lee Teng-hui respond?
Lee instructs his staff to craft an pro forma response while Lee
tries to figure out how to turn down the mainland's offer of desperately
needed rescue expertise, without looking as if he's playing politics
with the lives of ROC earthquake victims, which of course he is.
Mainland China, a Permanent Member of the Security Council and the
sole legal government for all of China including the province of
Taiwan to all but two dozen well greased banana republics, approves
the immediate entry of foreign rescue teams.
Lee welcomes anybody and everybody, except his own countrymen.
Thousands of buried victims. Rescuers overworked because they are
shorthanded. Remote regions without aid. The victims clearly need
everyone they can get. This is hardly the time for politics at their
expense.
Chinese-Americans on opposite sides of the Taiwan separatist political
divide put aside their differences for this life or death emergency.
The question is, can Lee Teng-hui?
Lee lets in US teams.
Now it begins. Lee Teng-hui pulls an hoary old trick known as 'A
thief crying "Thief!"' preemptively accusing others of
what one intends to do oneself.
Time is running out. Victims are dying of dehydration under tons
of rubble. What is Lee Teng-hui waiting for?
Unneeded for now? Maybe we should ask those trapped under the rubble?
Miraculously, more victims have survived, but every able-bodied
rescue worker is desperately needed. Despite repeated slaps in the
face, mainland China keeps its rescue team on alert, even as it
allows foreign rescue teams in and Lee Teng-hui keeps mainland China's
team out. How does Lee Teng-hui in Taipei respond?
Lee Teng-hui continues to turn away assistance from the mainland,
instead escalates his irresponsibly inflammatory political propaganda
to the next level.
The ROC's real Taiwanese still lack disaster relief. Lee
Teng-hui has always boasted of his love of the Taiwanese people.
How about letting the mainland rescue team in to help some real
Taiwanese – the Aborigines?
-
Beijing impeding aid, says Taipei – Straits Times
(09/25/99)
-
Taipei Assails China Over Aid – IHT (09/25/99)
- Taiwan
media says China rubs salt into quake wound – Reuters (09/25/99)
- HK
joins rescue efforts despite snub – Straits Times
(09/25/99)
Guess not. The Lee Teng-hui regime reiterates its obdurate refusal
of mainland disaster assistance, offered on the very same day as
the initial shock waves, even as it grumbles about the Hongkong
team showing up "a day late and a dollar short."
Still more survivors emerge, proving rescue personnel are still
desperately needed, even at this late date.
Lee keeps at it.
Lee can't conceal his administration's ineptitude in the heat of
a crisis from the Taiwan public, the common folk who are the bosses.
-
Beijing says aid remains on offer – Reuters (09/29/99)
The mainland Chinese rescue team keeps its offer open.
If all else fails, blame the messenger.
A 1997 government committee investigated emergency earthquake measures
and submitted a report. Lee Teng-hui left it to gather dust in his
in box.
Is this getting monotonous?
Wait
a minute! The Lee Teng-hui regime complains the Hongkong team is
"a day late and a dollar short" for showing up on September
25, but a Canadian team shows up eight days later on October 3 and
no problem?
Please
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