Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Taiwan’s finances are in a dreamland

Chang Ruay-shiung 張瑞雄

Recently, the media has been preoccupied by news about the Taipei International Flora Exposition, the special municipality elections and the results of former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) various trials. Not too many people have been paying attention to major international events, especially the recent strikes and reform to the pensions system in France.

Under the previous French law, the retirement age was 60 and anyone who made social security payments for 40-and-a-half years could claim full pension benefits from the age of 65. However, an aging population has meant that pension and healthcare costs have increased steadily. Combined with the falling number of taxpayers — a result of falling birth rates — this made reform of the pensions system very urgent.

2010 ELECTIONS: KMT threatens lawsuit over TV show

Taipei Times

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) threatened legal action after guests on a talk show criticized President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), but the party said it was only defending its reputation against political talk show guests and comments it regarded as departing from the truth, and was not taking action against media outlets themselves.

KMT Secretary-General King Pu-tsung (金溥聰) made the remarks in response to a report published by the Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday that said the KMT would file a lawsuit against Formosa Television (FTV, 民視) over comments recently made on its political talk show Boss Talk (頭家來開講).

TV Talk Show Host Cheng Hung-yi Tells it Like it Is in Taiwan

Jerome F. Keating Ph.D.

Taiwanese, are you tired of listening to the deception and double talk of the phony pony? Are you tired of Ma Ying-joke playing by double standards? Are you tired of the hypocrisy of the KMT as they take a holier than thou attitude after they have consistently ripped the country off for half a century and their mayoral candidates continue to do so? TV Talk Show Host, Cheng Hung-yi finally told it like it is recently while speaking at a private rally last week.

Is Ma Ying-joke the son of a turtle? You be the judge. Who has consistently hid the ROC flag when representatives of China show their face on the island. Who had Taiwanese students beaten up so that Chen Yun-lin would not have to look on the ROC flag while he was in Taiwan? Who by his silence allowed referees to try and prevent students from showing the flag and sanctioned the lame name of Chinese Taipei for minor sporting events in Taiwan? No one but the turtle.

Was the judiciary independent?

J. Michael Cole 寇謐將

The ruling by the Taipei District Court on Nov. 5 finding former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and his wife not guilty in a bribery case was construed by many — including this author — as a sign that the judiciary under the Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration was beginning to reassert its independence. Reaction to the news by the pan-blue camp was so strident, and the decision so antithetical to what ostensibly has been a policy of keeping Chen in check, that the court appeared to have laid to rest fears that the judiciary had become little more than a conveyor belt for the Ma government.

Commenting on the ruling, some elements within the pan-green camp, meanwhile, said this was only part of a series of rulings that ultimately would fully exonerate the former president. Chen’s smile as he emerged from a police van on his way to court for another case earlier this week also spoke volumes about how he interpreted this unexpected development.

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