New DPP chief bothered by what Ma did not say
　

By Loa Iok-sin
STAFF REPORTER
Thursday, May 22, 2008, Page 3
　

Flanked by former president Chen Shui-bian, fourth left, and former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairmen, Tsai Ing-wen, center, is sworn in as DPP chairwoman at the party's headquarters in Taipei. PHOTO: WANG YI-SUNG, TAIPEI TIMES

Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), who was sworn in yesterday, said that she was concerned that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) talked a lot about closer cross-strait relations in his inaugural speech on Tuesday, but made no mention of Taiwan's sovereignty.

“In his entire inaugural speech, Ma didn’t say Taiwan or the Republic of China is a sovereign state,” Tsai said at her inauguration at DPP headquarters in Taipei yesterday morning.

“He didn’t even mention that Taiwan’s future should be decided by all Taiwanese people — something he repeatedly said during his presidential campaign,” Tsai said.

“It is worrying that the Chinese Nationalist Party [KMT] seems to be overlooking the issue of Taiwan’s sovereignty,” she said.

Tsai won the chairmanship election on Sunday with more than 73,000 votes — making her not only the DPP’s first chairwoman but the highest vote-getter in the party’s history.

Tsai said the DPP would strive to protect Taiwan’s sovereignty while maintaining the nation’s cultural and ethnic diversity.

“Ma’s inaugural speech made me believe that the DPP will be carrying a heavy burden,” the chairwoman said.

“We must stand united with other political parties that share our beliefs to defend Taiwan’s interests, review the party’s accomplishments and mistakes, further connect ourselves to society, work to deepen Taiwan-oriented values and defend social justice in the globalized world,” Tsai said. “Then the DPP will rise again.”

Her predecessor Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) agreed with Tsai and called on all party members to stand behind her.

Tsai also said that the DPP would develop an economic plan different from that of the KMT.

“As an opposition party with governing experience, the DPP must come up with a set of economic strategies to overcome the challenges brought about by globalization,” she said.

“The DPP’s economic policy will put equal weight on economic growth, social justice and ecological conservation,” she said.

“We must provide the people with an enjoyable life, high-quality education and a clean environment — that’s how the DPP will differ from the KMT,” she said.

Tsai got straight down to work yesterday afternoon by presiding over the weekly Central Standing Committee meeting. She asked the committee members to start brainstorming on campaign strategies for next year’s county commissioner and mayoral elections.

“We also touched on improving the party’s ability to deal with policy issues, talked about setting up a think tank and discussed some legislative bills,” she told a press conference after the meeting.
　

Ma fails the first test of grace

Thursday, May 22, 2008, Page 8

In his inaugural speech on Tuesday, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) extended an olive branch to Beijing. While the president talked in some detail about opportunities for cross-strait reconciliation, he showed little rhetorical interest in mending the political divide at home.

Ma therefore missed his first opportunity in his capacity as head of state to deal positively with the bitterness generated by an intense and divisive presidential race.

Ma’s victory in the March election was decisive, garnering 58.45 percent of the vote.

But the president could have shown a little more grace by reaching out to that substantial part of the electorate that rejected his campaign in favor of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairman Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and his running mate, Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌).

His words on Tuesday, instead, were addressed to his supporters.

Referring to the last eight years under the DPP administration, Ma said: “During that difficult time, faith in politics was low, political maneuvering was high and economic security was absent.”

These were hardly the words of a statesman looking to broaden his appeal. And the whiff of hyperbole they contained will not make Ma look very credible when the complexity of Taiwan’s economic circumstances hits home in the coming months.

On his election victory, Ma said: “The people have chosen clean politics, an open economy, ethnic harmony and peaceful cross-strait relations in opening their arms to the future.”

These statements will not diminish the skepticism of the millions of people who did not vote for him. They were words delivered by Ma the presidential candidate, not Ma the leader of a country.

The degree of Ma’s criticism of the previous administration was imprudent at a ceremony that could have been a celebration of the democratic process that installed him and of the transition from the tensions of election season.

Ma must now speak as the voice of Taiwan, bridging the partisan gap whenever possible, and not merely parrot belligerent voices in the pan-blue camp, as he has grown accustomed to doing.

It was not so long ago that pundits and politicians attacked former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) for failing to act as a president for all, despite proclaiming himself to be “the people’s president.” How rapidly their tune has changed with the recovery of executive power.

Garnering support across the political spectrum is not just about fortifying one’s political base. A major task facing Ma and his administration in the first year will be to mitigate the partisan divide that has proven so obstructive in producing legislation of substance.

Ma’s words on Tuesday may not have been a move in that direction, but the new president and his Cabinet still have time over the next few weeks to set a more positive tone in the way they conduct their affairs. The DPP is a minority party, but its support base is considerable; an executive that runs roughshod over the differing sensibilities of those supporters would find the going harder than expected.

DPP must pursue a unified vision
　

By Tseng Kuei-hi,Bob Kuo 曾貴海、郭峰淵
Thursday, May 22, 2008, Page 8

Companies with vision are not only stable, long-lasting firms but also widely respected.

Such organizations have an enormous impact on the world. The 2004 bestseller Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies, written by James Collins and Jerry Porras, says that the key to success lies in building and maintaining core ideologies.

The 18 visionary companies in the book all share certain characteristics. The first of these is transcendence. These companies transcend the restrictions of their structure and of words, as well as themselves, and they are always prepared for constantly changing challenges. In other words, a fundamental part of their ideology is that they have to keep challenging themselves.

Visionary companies never think that they are doing well enough. They continually ask themselves: How can I improve, so as to do even better tomorrow? In addition, success and defeating the competition are not their driving goals.

Second, almost all of them devoutly follow their core ideologies, and teach their employees to preserve them, creating an atmosphere and identity specific to a company that is somewhat cult-like. What really matters is not what a company’s ideology is, but whether its strategies are in line with those values.

These companies do not just ask what they should covet and pursue without the guidance of their core values.

Third, their core ideologies are based on harmony. They don’t see things in black and white, which would be detrimental to internal unity. On the contrary, they pursue co-existence and integration for the sake of stability and progress and promote their company identity while respecting their employees as individuals.

If we look at the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) incoming chairwoman, Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), and former senior presidential adviser Koo Kwang-ming (辜寬敏), whom she defeated in the party election, it is not difficult to see that Tsai aims for transcendence and hopes to realize Taiwanese autonomy through innovative ways. Koo, on the other hand, would have sought to strengthen the DPP’s unique atmosphere and beat the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) by bolstering his party’s pro-localization identity.

As for harmony, the whole DPP has failed to pursue a platform based on that ideal. In its eight years at the helm of the Executive Yuan, the party failed to transcend its pro-Taiwan independence agenda through innovation, while DPP “dummy members” discredited its identity and shifted the party toward aggression. When the party wasn’t busy scaring off moderate voters with the same old pro-independence credo, it was busy staging conflict in the name of localization. These are the reasons that the party suffered crushing defeats in the legislative and presidential elections.

As German sociologist Jurgen Habermas observed, the present is the past that is on its way to the future. From a visionary perspective, the characteristics of transcendence, a cult-like, unique identity and non-aggressive policies can integrate the past, the present and the future. However, over the past eight years, the DPP has repeatedly adjusted its ideology and policies, which has had negative repercussions for the independence agenda.

Being visionary means seeing the past not as a shameful history to bury in the archives. Instead, the DPP must pursue transcendence by reforming itself and becoming visionaries who will make Taiwan a nation of knowledge in the 21st century.

Tseng Kuei-hi is a doctor; Bob Kuo is a professor in the Department of Information Management at National Sun Yat-sen University.

Chinese cop helps quake effort — by breastfeeding

Thursday, May 22, 2008,Page 14

　

A Chinese policewoman is contributing to the country’s earthquake relief effort in a very personal way. She’s breastfeeding eight babies!

A newspaper in Chengdu, the capital of quake-hit Sichuan Province, devoted a special page to the 29-year-old woman. The newspaper called her a “hero.”

The woman from the quake-ravaged town of Jiangyou has just had a child herself, the Western Urban Daily said.

She is nursing the children of three women who were left homeless by the quake. Those women are extremely sad and are unable to give milk. She’s also breastfeeding five orphans, the report said.

The babies who lost their parents have been put in an orphanage which does not have powdered milk, it said.

Over 40,000 people were killed in the May 12 earthquake. It’s China’s worst natural disaster in a generation.(STAFF WRITER, WITH AFP)