While I'm complaining about the typical wire-story reporting on China and Taiwan, let me mention one more thing. There's often a tag line that says something like "Taiwan separated from the mainland amidst civil war in 1949." First, Taiwan is an island, and civil war doesn't affect tectonics! They mean, of course, that the governments separated--but that leaves out the fact that Taiwan was a Japanese colony from 1895 to 1945. So it was a separation after domestic bliss of... four years?
When they say "mainland," they mean the People's Republic of China, which was founded in 1949. Taiwan's government is the Republic of China, which was founded in 1912. Now tell me again, who broke away from whom?
(By the way, another reason I love Taiwan is it's the only place I know that celebrates a National Day commemorating a revolution that happened in another country. In 1912, Taiwan was part of Japan.)
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(Hmm, yes. The previous comment demonstrating perhaps the dangers inherent in the SEPARATION of advanced technology from morality? I think "he" flubbed the link, though. Shouldn't that be cretininc?)
Try not to blame the media too much: they're just (kow)toing the Party line.
Time now to sing along with Dick Lee and Speak Mandarin! 现在我们开始学习中文！
Those comment spammers should find out what a "no follow" tag means.
I just wish the media would listen to other parties every once in a while. However, I used to write news copy and I know sometimes it's easy to fall back on a cliche when you've got limited space (and, indeed, limited understanding).
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