"... I am really really tired of people who say the Taiwanese are crying against corruption. If that's true why do they vote for it overwhelmingly at the local level?"I think that he has posed an excellent and awkward question. I often see politicians on the news, most notably President Ma, claiming to wish to clean up Taiwanese politics and cut out corruption. Yet, I don't know anyone who BELIEVES that he can and, even if he could, that he would do so.
Instead, I think most people accept corruption, large and small, because it facilitates relationships and business. It's the 'way things are done'. My current boss is an honorable exception to this rule which is why I like working for him.
Conclusions: Taiwanese don't want to clean up politics, they want it to serve their individual needs, whatever they happen to be at a specific time. Calls for clean politics are much like condemnation of Love Motels and Bing Lang Girls - it's politically correct and 'safe' to bash them publicly to project oneself as morally superior but no-one is really interested in doing away with them, partly because that means stepping on gangster's toes and no-one wants to get involved with their business or get in the way of their operations.
Same for corruption in Taiwan - its too ubiquitous and too many benefit for it to be logical or rational for a majority to rise up against it.
Stockholm syndrome indeed.
