Message: I Care

Saturday's Taipei Times on Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou's refusal to tour flooded areas in southern Taiwan:

This weekend there are dragon boat races around the country, and consistent with his sporting image and past practice during his time as Taipei mayor, Ma was set to take part in a dragon boat contest in Taipei.

But politicians from both sides of the fence have expressed dissatisfaction with Ma, saying that he should be tending to the wounds of the farming industry and other sectors in the south, who are mopping up after seasonally heavy rainfall.

Ma should have known from the outset that canceling his dragon boat jaunt and touring rain-affected areas in the south was the sensible political thing to do. It seems he did not. But now that he has changed his mind and pulled out of the Taipei bash, he hardly looks any better: It is perfectly obvious that he was responding to harsh criticism and not out of a last-minute crisis of conscience.

[...]

If [Ma's] spokesperson is to be believed, the president now believes that touring disaster-affected areas poses a risk to the Constitution, given that the premier is the executive’s traditional link man in delivering onsite relief.

We can only deduce that when presidents Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) and Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) toured disaster zones during their tenure that they also came perilously close to damaging the nation’s most important document.  [emphasis added]

So, instead of either participating in the races or touring the waterlogged south, Ma is doing neither.

Chiang Ching-kuo, Lee Teng-hui and Chen Shui-bian all apparently toured Taiwanese disaster areas, but I'll do the Times one better.  Remember all the fuss the China Post made about Hu Jintao touring earthquake-stricken Szechuan province?

For all the losses, sufferings and agonies, Beijing can take some comfort from the fact that the earthquake has rallied the country behind the government, which has been constantly criticized by Western countries for human right abuses. Suddenly, such criticisms disappeared, thanks to the earthquake that prompted Premier Wen Jiabao and President Hu Jintao to respond instantly and effectively -- an evidence of their care and concern for human rights.  [emphasis added]

Guess this would have to mean, by the Post's own reasoning, that PRC President Hu Jintao cares more about human rights in China than Ma Ying-jeou cares about them in Taiwan.

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UPDATE (Sep 17/08):  President Ma decides to visit areas hard hit by Typhoon Sinlaku.

Comments

[STOP Ma]

"Suddenly, such criticisms disappeared, thanks to the earthquake that prompted Premier Wen Jiabao and President Hu Jintao to respond instantly and effectively -- an evidence of their care and concern for human rights. "

This kind of unsound logic requires the use of this fallacy:

Level of criticism = PRC's concern for human rights.

The sad thing is this unsound logic is found in the western corporate journalism as well.

[Tom the Redhunter]

Sounds like Ma Ying-jeou didn't learn anything from Bush's experience with Katrina.