Editorials

Taiwan's presidential election
was a triumph

BY turning out in massive numbers for the first direct election of a national leader in Chinese history, the people of Taiwan have demonstrated their commitment to democracy. By electing the Nationalist leader Lee Teng-hui, who has served as president through election by the legislature for the past eight years, the people gave a strong vote of confidence in Lee's policy of bolstering Taiwan's international position while rejecting calls for full independence.

The election results were a sharp rebuff for the Communist leaders in Beijing, who had tried to intimidate the Taiwan vil,16p,9p voters into rejecting Lee by firing missiles that landed in the ocean uncomfortably close to Taiwan and by staging military exercises across the Taiwan Strait. Beijing also had maintained a shrill propaganda barrage against Lee since his unofficial visit to the United States last spring.

None of that seemed to have had much of an effect on the voters. They spurned candidates favoring either a more accommodating posture toward China or total independence in favor of Lee, who has steered a middle course. Beijing fears that he is maneuvering Taiwan toward an eventual declaration of independence and is trying in the crudest ways to discourage him.

But Lee is no fool. He knows independence would risk an attack by Beijing and destroy the profitable economic relationship that has developed during his administration, with billions of dollars worth of investment in the mainland by Taiwan interests. He maintains the policy that the Nationalists have always followed, that Taiwan is part of China.

Having won this historic election, he may now choose to avoid further provocations of China through foreign visits and bids to rejoin the United Nations and let this tense situation simmer down. After all, he has made his point. China's blustering intimidated neither the people of Taiwan nor Taiwan's informal ally, the United States. By dispatching two aircraft carrier groups to the area, the Clinton administration made it clear that the United States continues to refuse to tolerate a resolution of the Taiwan issue by force.

If the Beijing leaders persist in their belligerent ways, further confrontations may be unavoidable. But for the moment China seems to have switched tactics and is proposing a summit conference with Lee - evidence that its recent threats were never intended to be followed up.

Other editorials, in brief:

Affirmative action

AFFIRMATIVE action aimed at achieving ethnic diversity on college campuses has been dealt a damaging blow. A three-judge panel of the Texas-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that minorities may not be given preference in college enrollment. College officials ought to be prepared to modify programs rather than defend policies that may no longer be acceptable. What is most important is furthering the goal of greater ethnic diversity on college campuses without infringing on the rights of others.


Assault weapons ban

THE House of Representatives has voted to repeal the ban on assault-style weapons, but the only wounds the action is likely to produce are political ones. The bill, which would eliminate provisions of the 1994 crime law, may not even be brought to a vote in the Senate, where it would face a filibuster. President Clinton has vowed to veto the measure.





Published by Liberty Newspapers Limited Partnership

Rupert E. Phillips,CEO

John M. Flanagan,Editor & Publisher

David Shapiro,Managing Editor

Diane Yukihiro Chang,Senior Editor & Editorial Page Editor

Frank Bridgewater & Michael Rovner,Assistant Managing Editors

A.A. Smyser,Contributing Editor



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