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Here is the most important paragraph in that editorial, in my opinion:

"The CRS analyst also related that some former officials in the Bush administration maintained that Chen's statements and actions "fatally hurt the Chen administration's relationship with the Bush White House" and wrote that "the Bush White House at this juncture reportedly began to see the Taiwan leadership as more inclined to put personal political interests ahead of more strategic objectives and U.S. concerns."

"Personal political interests"? This is very interesting (although, not terribly surprising) insight, disclosing that either the Bush administration doesn't give a rat's ass about democratic reform in Taiwan (considering the pan-blues established anti-democratic agenda), OR, they are simply clueless.

Considering that the U.S. picks and chooses which democracies it likes and which ones it doesn't in the global village -- I would hazaard to say that concern for a democratic Taiwan is near the bottom of the U.S. interests. Especially, when juxtaposed against economic interests.

But we already knew that, right?

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As for "direct democracy" -- I think the majority of Taiwanese citizens realize that there is a thing called "a independent justice system" that must be respected for a democracy to work. And so, any attempts to bypass this institution through partisan populism (as witnessed this year and in 2004 by the pan-blues) is inherently anti-democratic.

Further educating the population about this aspect of democracy will lower the chances of "direct democracy" from continually being abused by the current opposition.
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