Matt Groening, Say It Ain’t So

From Jay Nordlinger, at National Review:

I’ve always been of two minds about China products — the majority of what Wal-Mart stocks. Globalization has unquestionably been a boon to the Chinese — ordinary Chinese — which is so gratifying. Of course, globalization has been a boon to most everyone else, too. But how do you tell which products from China are free-labor products and which are slave-labor products — items from the Laogai, or Gulag? You cannot, as far as I know.

I once interviewed a man — a Falun Gong practitioner — who, between bouts of torture, was made to manufacture Homer Simpson bedroom slippers. You placed your foot where Homer’s mouth was. He also made Christmas lights.

A slipper that looks like Homer Simpson's head. The wearer's foot goes in Homer's mouth.

(Homer Simpson slipper image from UKexpert.co.uk)

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Open The MRT Doors, HAL

A few kinks still need to be worked out on Taipei's new Neihu Mass Rapid Transit line.  Perfectly understandable, and no one's at fault for that.

Except — just a few years ago, Taiwan's High-Speed (bullet) train experienced SIMILAR growing pains.  And back then, Taiwan's pro-KMT news media fell all over themselves blaming former President Chen for the problems.

No doubt, the media's collective conscience will be stricken by the unfairness of their previous coverage, and we'll soon hear a crescendo of criticism directed at Taiwan's current KMT president about these Neihu mishaps.

(cue the crickets)

POSTSCRIPT:  As I said, no one's to blame for the Neihu MRT glitches, so I'll not ape the sleazy pro-KMT media and blast President Ma Ying-jeou for this.

One thing Mister Ma doesn't deserve a pass for though, is the Maokong Gondola, which was built on his watch as Mayor of Taipei.  Hizonner wanted a piece of infrastructure on his political resume (which always looks good when you're running for president) so he rushed the project through.

Rushed it through — without permitting an environmental impact study.

Ma's piece of crap ran for 3 whole months, then was shut down after a freak meteor strike utterly predictable typhoon-related mudslide undermined one of the support pillars.

(Typhoons in TAIWAN?  Why, whodathunkit !)

Now, bear with me for a moment.  Imagine you're an upper-middle manager in a major corporation.  You're given 39.3 MILLION U.S. dollars for a project.  A factory . . . or a gondola, let's say.  So you cut corners, finish the job, and get that big promotion.  Three months later though, your factory has to be shut down for safety reasons.  The good news is, you've got your promotion.  The bad news is, it'll take TWO YEARS to get the thing up to code.

Thanks to your fine managerial skills, the company's stuck with a 39.3 million dollar white elephant.  At least if you'd stuffed the money under a mattress, the company would still have its capital.  Better yet, if you'd put it into bonds, the company'd still have its capital, plus interest.

Instead, they've now got to throw good money after bad to fix YOUR idiotic mistakes.  Heckuva job there, Sparky.

Ma Ying-jeou sitting next to other passengers while he gives a thumbs up sign.

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Siege Perilous

Heh.  A Taiwanese columnist starts an anti-communist group, and leaves a chair conspicuously empty for Taiwan's notoriously pro-Communist president, Ma Ying-jeou.

Castle gossip has it that "Sir Ma" was unable to attend, due to a prior commitment.  Out on one of those quests of his.  One serving wench informed me he was out slaying a ferocious dragon, which I find quite improbable, given that we know Ma prefers to FEED them instead . . .

(BTW, is there a round table here, somewhere?)

An anti-communist meeting in Taiwan, with chairs left conspicuously absent for KMT President Ma Ying-jeou and other KMT luminaries.

UPDATE:  The columnist, Paul Lin, explains.

UPDATE #2:  A very funny version of "C'est Moi" from a 1982 HBO production of Camelot.  Skip forward to 6:30.  Highly reminiscent of KMT media treatment of Mr. Ma Ying-jeou.

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Beijing-Tehran Axis?

From Michael Rubin's LA Times column:

In the aftermath of [Iran's 1999 student] protests, the Chinese government supplied security consultants to Tehran. Rather than bash heads and risk protests and endless cycles of mourning, Iranian security services began photographing demonstrations, after which they would arrest participants over the course of a month when they were alone and could not spark mob reaction.

Googling this comes up with nothing; I can't find a single primary source to confirm this.  Of course, it's plausible — probable, even — that China would export its techniques of governmental repression.  That's what the CCP would call, "non-interference in the internal affairs of other states".

Until I hear of more evidence though, I'm filing this one under, "Believable, but not verified."

Former Ag Minister May Not Be As Guilty As People Think

On Tuesday it was revealed that Paul Sun, Taiwan's former Minister of Agriculture, had hired himself out as an unpaid adviser to a Chinese Communist Party agricultural organization.  The response to his conflict of interest was swift and bi-partisanly negative, and rightfully so.  The KMT is going to have to crack down hard on people like Sun, or else they fully deserve the charge of, "Sellout!" every time it's leveled at them.

Sun certainly did himself no favors when speaking in his own defense:

“We shouldn’t see agricultural technology as sensitive material; instead, it should be a public asset. China has large stretches of land and a good plant diversity, and can be seen as an extension of Taiwan’s farmlands,” he said.

About 5,900 Taiwanese farmers or businessmen in the farming industry are in China, Sun said.

“If you view it positively, you can see it as helping Taiwanese farmers become more professional. If you view it negatively, then you can make many criticisms. From the positive side, I feel it is something worth promoting,” he said.

Taiwan’s agriculture should not be shut behind closed doors. Instead, people should open their minds to what is out there, he said.

Here he seems to be saying six thousand Taiwanese farmers in China should be helped at the expense of tens of thousands of Taiwanese farmers back in Taiwan.  And for that, he deserves every bit of criticism that he gets.

However, there is one part of the story that seems to have been overlooked.  After serving as Agriculture Minister, Sun went to work as chairman of Taiwan's Asian Vegetable Research and Development Center (AVRDC), which is a non-profit INTERNATIONAL institution.  Yes, it receives money from Taiwan's national government.  But it also receives money from the Bill Gates foundation and numerous other countries as well.

Now, if the AVRDC was a national institute, this would be an open-and-shut case.  Taiwanese taxpayers contribute to fund the center, and they expect Taiwan's agricultural sector to bear the fruits of whatever research goes on there.

But since it's an international research center, the benefits of its research are supposed to be shared globally.  Its mission statement isn't, "To help Taiwanese farmers," — its mission statement is, "To alleviate poverty and malnutrition in the developing world through the increased production and consumption of safe vegetables."  And in fact, AVRDC has field offices in countries such as Thailand, Tanzania, India, Mali, Uzbekistan, South Korea, Camaroon, Madagasgar, Indonesia, Laos and the Solomon Islands.

There's another conflict-of-interest going on here, that I've just alluded to.  As Agriculture Minister, Sun's job was to strengthen Taiwan's agricultural industry.  But as chairman of AVRDC, his job is to help strengthen OTHER COUNTRIES' farm industries.  Those are two very different sets of hats.  The CEO of Monsanto has every right to quit and pursue his life-long dream of becoming the next Johnny Appleseed.  Monsanto however, has every right to be concerned that its former Chief Executive Officer may be giving away proprietary information.

Same deal applies here.  An investigation should be conducted into Mr. Sun, because during his stint as Ag Minister, he had access to techniques and cultivars developed by national institutions, which were intended to benefit Taiwanese farmers only.  If that's what he gave to China, then he's harmed Taiwan greatly.  But, if he only gave them techniques and cultivars developed by the AVRDC, then he was only doing his job of diseminating the Center's research to the world.

(And, just to reiterate, whatever the outcome of that investigation, he should still be punished for taking a job in the PRC, creating an obvious conflict of interest.)

Tales Of The Gold Monkey

No, not the old TV show.  Turns out the Los Angeles zoo built an enclosure for some golden snub-nosed monkeys from China, only to have the deal go sour.  Now the zoo is left with a 7.4 million dollar boondoggle.

I'm tempted to say that the reason is that American officials blanched when Beijing tried to designate their country, "Chinese L.A."  But the real reason is more prosaic than that:

"[The Chinese] were resentful that federal policy on importing any endangered species required that any money exchanged for that animal had to be used to conserve the habitat and wild population of that species," said David Towne, a Seattle-based consultant who helped broker the original deal.  [emphasis added]

The Chinese certainly have point here.  The zoo was supposed to pay $100,000 a year for the simians, and none of it was supposed to grease the palms of Chinese Communist Party apparatchiks?

Hey, those guys gotta eat too, y'know!

A Quick Point About That Chinese Sub / American Sonar Collision

Recall back in March, when the Chinese pounded
their chests over the U.S.S. Impeccable's presence in China's EEZ. 
You're provoking us, they said.  How dare you violate our sacred waters?

Flash forward almost 3 months to the day, when a Chinese submarine struck the sonar array of the U.S.S. John McCain.  It sounds like the collision took place in Philippino territorial waters, but it's possible it occurred in the Philippines' Exclusive Economic Zone instead.

Either way, I'm pretty sure Manilla didn't grant Beijing permission to operate there.  Which clearly demonstrates that to the Chinese, only China's naval territory is inviolable.

UPDATE:  A good explanation of the Impeccable incident over at YouTube.

The Mouse That Roared

mouse, n.  An animal which strews its path with fainting women.

— Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in white suit standing on a small, round table like a woman in a 60s sitcom, terrified of a computer mouse on the floor.

(Ahmadinejad image from the International Society for Human Rights.  via Rantings of a Sandmonkey blog)

Postscript:  I'll probably post links to favorite sources in the updates section regarding the fallout from the Iranian election.  I say fallout, because I'm not sure it's a revolution just quite yet.

To get the ball rolling, Michael Totten's been writing some good stuff (scroll down to June 2009), while over in Egypt, Sandmonkey is as interesting and entertaining as usual.

UPDATE:  Good column at the Belmont Club.  Michael Ledeen's also has some good stuff, although he's a bit more optimistic about the results of a Mousavi win than I am.

UPDATE #2:  A thorough backgrounder from the Tehran Bureau blog.  Quite a lot of info at their site.

UPDATE (Jun 20/09):  Heh.  Iran's worst clerics.

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