The Rise of the Dragon

I personally can’t say much being an American.  Being financially corrupt is pretty much a given in politics, and presidents have been caught doing much worse.  But I also have to say that this news is pretty embarrassing for Taiwan, for Asia and especially for president Shuibian Chen.

Just check out the picture to the right.  Is President Chen 9 years old?

His presidency has been written-off as a joke by most Taiwanese as he basically did a good job at nothing other than instigating any and every fight he could with China, do nothing to help the economy, infrastructure or educational systems because he was, as mentioned above, trying to see how far he could push china before they started strafing the northern coast line with missiles.  The Taiwanese government used to proudly be able to make a claim as one of the least corrupt nations in Asia if not the world.  At least for a brief period of time during and directly following president Jingguo Jiangs run as the first freely elected president of Taiwan.  (Interesting fact being that President Jiangs father, Jiang Kai Shek as the west knows him, was one of the most corrupt leaders Asia, as well as the world has ever seen!)

I guess that is besides the fact. My favorite part of the article is when Chen “…held his cuffed hands up for journalists to see and shouted “Political persecution! Long live Taiwan!” My only response being that Taiwan would live a lot longer if people like you would stop embezzling government funds.  (Estimated at least $21 million USD)  Oh, and I am skipping the “innocent until proven guilty thing, because no one believes you are innocent regardless of what the outcome of the ensuing trial turns out to be.

See the whole AP article at cnn.com here.