Liberty Times: KMT's vice: colluding with gangsters It has been reported that Premier Wu Den-yih once associated closely with a mob boss who at the time was released from jail on parole.

Wu has admitted his association, but has defended himself by arguing that ex-prisoners who have turned over a new leaf should not be discriminated against.

But what the public are concerned about is not Wu's engagement with a released prisoner but the Kuomintang's (KMT's) long-term practice of colluding with gangsters during elections to cement its hold on power.

The party was founded with the help of gangsters, and the late President Chiang Kai-shek was renowned for trying to clear the KMT of their influence by stirring up fighting between them.

The KMT continued to follow its practice in Taiwan by mobilizing gangsters to support its candidates in local elections, giving these gangsters roles in local politics and leading to restlessness and chaos.

One notorious example of the party's making use of mobsters is its hiring of four mobsters to kill political dissent Chiang Nan in the United States in 1984.

In addition to mobsters, the KMT's other tool in controlling politics is its huge assets.

With these two pillars, the KMT can easily win elections and control the government, pushing policies such as a trade pact with China and U.S. beef imports, in defiance of public opinion.

Fortunately, the public has the means to check the government, which is their votes in the forthcoming elections. Whoever disapproves of President Ma Ying-jeou's policy should vote against him and his party in the elections.

Apple Daily: Parents not always infallible The Executive Yuan has come up with draft amendments to the Civil Code and the Criminal Code that will exonerate adult children from liability for taking care of their parents if their parents had subjected them to domestic violence or abandoned them as children.

Once enacted into law, the amendments will make children's liability for taking care of their parents reciprocal to parents' responsibility for raising them.

This is a deviation from Chinese tradition, which makes filial piety unconditional, and will be a step in the right direction.

China in the past emphasized filial piety as the cornerstone of society because the family was the basic unit of production and reproduction in the country and a stable society facilitated the rule of the emperors.

Now that society has changed, the family is no longer a production unit. Many people find jobs on their own rather than plying their parents' trade and might not be able to afford the cost of supporting their parents.

Therefore it is difficult and unnecessary to oblige them to take care of aging parents.

Although the abandonment of parents still constitutes a crime under the Criminal Code, it is difficult to implement the law in such cases.

China Times: Making scholars scapegoats for failing policy The stock price disturbance caused by news that the government is contemplating the levying of an energy tax calmed down after Premier Wu Den-yih said at the Legislative Yuan that the Cabinet has no intention to implement this tax at the moment.

Wu and President Ma Ying-jeou both accused scholars who were commissioned to study the tax of leaking their recommendations before the government could study them.

However, the scholars briefed the Executive Yuan about their recommendations many times and the recommendations were discussed many times at meetings of the Taxation Reform Commission before some 50 participants.

All the participants, including former officials, business leaders and lawmakers, in addition to many observers, were offered materials concerning the recommendations.

Even journalists who covered the meetings were given copies of the recommendations. The process was not secret, so why are the premier and president blaming the scholars for "leaking" the information.

The recommendations were drawn up to flesh out Ma's campaign promises, so the officials should decide whether they have the courage to translate these recommendations into policy.

If they lack the courage to carry out the recommendations and chicken out after seeing the backlash the proposals have prompted, that is all right, but do not try to shift the blame to the scholars, who simply provided their advice at the officials' request.

United Daily News: New start needed for CPBL Let Taiwan's Chinese Professional Baseball League start anew. The new start should begin with new laws and a new spirit for the players.

The new law would be intended to create a new environment for the game and tighten the punishment for bookies who dare to manipulate the results of games.

We are glad to learn that two lawmakers have motioned to amend the law to increase sentences for convicted bookmakers to a maximum 15 years and fines to a maximum NT$100 million.

The regulations governing the sports lottery should also be revised to increase the punishment for people, including the management of baseball clubs, attempting to rig games.

Players who engage in game-fixing should be punished up to 30 years in jail for each count.

Players should be taught to be conscious of their social responsibility and refrain from doing anything that could undermine the credibility of their teams.

(By Maubo Chang) enditme