This is penny ante stuff:
The Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) reported yesterday that soccer fans have been unable to collect a complete set of World Cup pins from McDonald’s restaurants because China has confiscated the Taiwan pins, which were made by a Chinese factory.
McDonald’s restaurants in Taiwan are giving out 33 pins — one for each of the 32 World Cup countries plus Taiwan. The Taiwan pin looks the same as the other World Cup pins but is printed with Taiwan’s formal name, the Republic of China (ROC).
[…]
McDonald’s hired a Chinese factory to make the pins, the first shipment of which slipped through Chinese customs, the report said. But when China realized what was printed on the pins, it confiscated them from later shipments…
You mean McDonald’s only now discovered that communists don’t make reliable suppliers? Maybe they should have paid attention to the travails of the Taiwanese construction industry, after Beijing announced, "No gravel for you!"
(Image from the Jun 19, 2006 ed of the Taipei Times.)
It’s a pity that the communist Chinese empire can’t hold together unless kids are prevented from completing their World Cup pin collection. Forget Joe Cool and the World War I ace – now everyone’s favorite beagle has a new persona: Splittist Snoopy.
Say, does anyone remember the heat the Taiwanese government took a while back when they turned down Beijing’s panda bear offer? Various pro-communists in Taiwan tried to get the administration to capitulate, tugging on heartstrings by claiming that the children of Taiwan would weep inconsolably due to their own government’s hard-heartedness.
Just where are all those complainants, now that it’s communist CHINA makin’ the young ‘uns cry?
* Just for the record, World Cup soccer pins are actually given to purchasers of Big Macs, not Happy Meals.
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