原文出處 寇謐將/J Michael Cole (所有圖文版權皆屬原著作權人所有)
I maintain that this is Taiwan’s most important election because of the conjunction of the Han （韓國瑜）phenomenon and the forces that have been unleashed by Xi Jinping’s ambitions. Taiwan’s democracy as we know it simply cannot, in my opinion, survive a Han presidency; not with his anti-democratic inclinations, and not with the number of proxies who, if Han prevails, will take charge of this place. And Taiwan’s position within a fledging community of democracies would also suffer a major blow under Han.
This is my fourth presidential election in Taiwan and it is, by far, the worst. Nobody is talking policy because one side doesn’t have a policy and doesn’t want the rest of us to be discussing that subject. Instead, the environment is awash in disinformation. Day after day after day, we are subjected to reams of sheer fabrication, most of it coming from one side (I need not spell out which side that is). And disinformation has worked its disastrous magic: the two camps are split, living in isolation from each other. Corrections and facts, in response to disinformation, are in turn — if seen at all — treated as “fake news” or paid-for, by the other side. There no longer is an objective truth: one preaches to the choir, reinforcing a camp’s preconceived ideas which are religiously held to in perfect insularity. The disinformation campaign that has been unleashed upon Taiwan has yielded absurdity and caused tremendous damage to its democracy. I cannot wait for this election to be over, and can only hope that Taiwan comes out in one piece once we’re done with it.