From: liaohen@cbnews.cb.att.com (Heng-Hsin Liao)
Subject: Re: more than 50% support TI
Organization: AT&T Bell Lab
Date: Mon, 28 Dec 1992 18:32:58 GMT

From article <1992Dec24.210642.20294@dec8.ncku.edu.tw>, by lws@eembox.ncku.edu.tw (WenHsiang Lin):
> In article <1ha24sINNk3@pollux.usc.edu> mcyang@pollux.usc.edu (Bien-Chao Iunn) writes:
> 
>>In article <BzKwGA.3Ht@ulowell.ulowell.edu> cshi@cs.ulowell.edu (Chunde Shi) 
>>writes:
>>>When "36%" became a "big win", I thought it was less than 50% and minority.
>>>I could be wrong. You got to be ready to hear anything when you talk to TIers.
> 
>>If we count in those votes to the main stream KMT candidates, such as Chen 
>>Jer-Nan, Wu Zee, Lin Yu-Shian, etc, who support "One China, One Taiwan" 
>>policy,  more than 50% of Taiwanese have voted for Taiwan Independence.
> 
> You are really an optimist. Some people, including I, gave their votes to
> DPP just because they wanted to add some more justice and fairness to this
> society, nothing to do with TI or Unification. Although I am not against TI,
> I don't support TI either. I believe "Time" is the best solution of the
> controveral between TI and unification.
> 
> WenHsiang Lin

Yes, I know probably the biggest percentage group of voters have the same
thought as you have. Some of them vote DPP for more fairness and balance.
Some of them vote KMT for more stability. Their votes do not speak for
independence or unification.

Speaking of "Time", the following is my opinion.

For unification, we can say "I have no problem with that but let's talk
about it say 5 or 10 years later." And after the timespan, we play the
same game and we can argue "Hey, Taiwan and China are just too different
to work things out now. Make your pace faster. We talk about it 5/10
years later." The question is how long we want to play this game? You
know the answer is controlled by China not by us.

That's the key thing. We have no (or few) control to the answer. It
could be 5 years, 10 years, 30 years, 50 years, or 100+ years. Who knows?
But what is Taiwan going to do in this timespan? Does 20 some
not-so-important countries' recognition satisfy us? Does the pace of one
important international organization every 2 or 3 years satisfy us? Don't
we care who we are and what others call us?

The same questions above should be asked to voters who neither
pro-unification nor pro-independence. No name is not a name. No policy
is not a policy. One of the major obstacles against Taiwan's stepping
toward a high-technology society is that we cannot get our fair share
because we are not able to speak for ourselves. Why? Don't ask others,
ask ourselves. As long as we stay where we are, we won't be eligible
for speaking for most of the cases. An island regime that claims China?
Not! So either get our big brother China speak for us or do something
ourselves.

For independence, it is not a matter of referendum first and things will
work out just fine. For example, will it be a referendum of declaring
independence immediately or a referendum that specify the independence
time frame? The latter gives us time for preparation. But it also gives
China time to ruin our decision. Okay, say immediate independence, how
many domestic issues and how many international issues will come up?
Constitution, laws, infrastructures, defence capability, and many more.
We won't be able to solve those in a short period of time. At the same
time, how much we need to devote to watching the reaction of China?

The questions above do not mean that I am pessimistic on independence.
What I am saying is we need to think about a lot of issues and prepare
for those before an independence referendum is held. The key thing is
this is under our own control although it won't be easy.

Yes, we need some "time." But what we need it for is to prepare for
our future instead of watching the world goes by. Sitting and watching
just won't work the issues out. Agree?


Heng-Hsin

Newsgroups: soc.culture.taiwan