The Foreigner in Formosa

FYI: This Man Knows Bugger-All About Advanced Chemical Kinetic Techniques To Investigate And Manipulate The Behavior Of Chemical Reactions For Relatively Large Molecules Using Crossed Molecular Beams

He was however, a lecturer at National Taiwan Police College, so I guess that DOES count for something!

(Image of KMT legislator Wu Yu-Sheng from the Taiwanese Legislative Yuan website)

From Monday's Taipei Times:

A number of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators criticized former Academia Sinica president [and Nobel Prize winner] Lee Yuan-tseh (李遠哲) yesterday over Lee’s remark that local enterprises offered more money to the KMT’s presidential candidates than they did to those from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

KMT Legislator Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) called Lee’s remark “ridiculous” and “pointless.”

“[The remark shows] he did not deserve the Nobel Prize [in chemistry] and he failed Taiwan and its people,” Wu said.  [emphasis added]

Wu might want to remind himself that while politicians may win their seats through their expertise at excitable windbaggery, people usually win Nobel Prizes in chemistry for their contributions to the science of chemistry -- not for their political opinions.

Lee's comment is a simply verifiable claim, one way or the other.  If Taiwan has a transparent political donation system (which may be a big IF), the numbers can be crunched and Lee's hypothesis proven . . . or disproven.

As for Wu's assertion -- that Lee doesn't deserve the Nobel Prize in chemistry -- that too, can be simply verified.  All Wu has to do is peruse Lee's entire published body of chemical research, and demonstrate in an empirical manner where Lee got it all wrong.

Should be a piece of cake -- for even the most dim-witted individual with an advanced degree in chemical kinetics.

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UPDATE (Mar 18/09):  Special thanks to the commenter who pointed out an error I made in the caption.

The mistake has (very belatedly) been corrected in the post.

Ma Ying-jeou, Meet Vaclav Klaus

Klaus would be the president of a country that DOESN'T hide its national symbols -- and gets a mite tetchy when members of the Empire trample his nation's sovereignty:

The Czech Republic becomes the first former Soviet satellite to run the European Union today, as it takes over the EU presidency from President Nicolas Sarkozy after six months of dynamic crisis management.

[...]

In Prague Castle, the presidential seat, Klaus is refusing to fly the European flag for the next six months. He came face-to-face there with another verbal brawler, Danny Cohn-Bendit, the Franco-German Green. The encounter pitted the arch Eurosceptic against an ardent Euro-federalist. Cohn-Bendit accosted Klaus, unfurled the European flag and demanded to know why it was not fluttering over the castle.

"No one has ever spoken to me here in this tone. You aren't on the barricades of Paris. I have never heard anything so insolent in this hall . . . The way Cohn-Bendit speaks to me is exactly the way the Soviets used to speak."

Some nations are blessed with presidents who've got guts.  While others have presidents who are so lacking in that department that they order THEIR OWN COUNTRY'S FLAGS CONFISCATED to placate visitors from neighboring tyrannies.

(Hat tip to Ezra Levant)

Roll Out The Red Carpet

From the Dec 30th edition of the China Post:

. . . the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has accused President Ma Ying-jeou of selling out Taiwan's interests when he dashed hopes of a visit by the Dalai Lama next year.  "The Dalai Lama has visited Taiwan twice, but at the current moment, the timing isn't appropriate for that," was Ma's response.  But days later, he said the Dalai Lama was always welcome.

But that's not the end of the story.   Because what Ma does is much more important than what he says.  You wanna send a message, send a telegram.  Or better yet, a few days after issuing your "sincere invitation", demonstrate just exactly HOW welcome the Buddhist leader is -- by violating the rights of Tibetans.  Maybe it'll make him feel right at home!

From the Dec 12th edition of the Taipei Times:

More than 100 Tibetans have been staging a sit-in at Liberty Square in Taipei since Tuesday, demanding that the government grant them legal resident status or at least a work permit.

They were forcibly removed from the demonstration site and dropped off in the outskirts of the city, including Guandu (關渡), Nangang (南港) and in the mountains in Neihu (內湖) at around 3am yesterday.

[A] majority of the group — who speak little Mandarin — struggled to find their way back . . .

Mi casa es su casa, indeed.  You can spot a phony like Ma a mile away.

The Guardian Of National Dignity

From Friday's Taipei Times:

in his New Year's address yesterday, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) vowed to protect the sovereignty and dignity of the Republic of China (ROC) during the course of improving business relations with Beijing.

Those are Ma's promises; this is the reality:

The Taichung County Government's New Year's Party promised to be a raucous affair, as the county planned to have a live simulcast with revelers in China's Xiamen.

Part of the deal involved an agreement to ban the display of national flags . . .

Party on, Wayne.  Party on, Garth.

Music For A Skull-Busting New Year's Day Hangover

Don't usually go for the mellow stuff, but mmmm --  this is nice.  Chet Atkins playing Fats Waller's Jitterbug Waltz:

And here's the original, with the harmful little armful on organ.  From the early '40s, I think.

Happy New Year, all.