Taiwan: Massive Rally Against President Ma -- UPDATED with Eyewitness Coverage

Ma just finished his first 100 days in office. Usually the first few months of any leader's time in office is a "honeymoon" period. Well, Ma woke up to realize that the honeymoon is OVER as thousands of opposition folks rallied in protest. News link includes video.

More here from IHT, reporting some 40,000 protesters unhappy about Ma's pro-China policy. Here are 2 quotes from two ordinary people out at the rally:

Protesters said they are worried that Ma is leaning toward China too quickly and that it might bring disastrous political consequences.

"Ma's unconditional embrace of the Chinese market is not good for Taiwanese people," said protester Kuo Wen-hung, 38. "If we are over dependent on China economically, eventually we will be forced to unite with China politically."

. . . Protesters, however, expressed doubts about Ma's efforts to offer peace to the mainland, saying Beijing remains hostile toward Taiwan.

"The fact that China has not withdrawn its missiles aimed at Taiwan shows its lack of friendliness toward us," 46-year-old housewife Tseng Hsin-yi said.

Hmmm. Hooray for the housewife! My thoughts exactly.

You'll recall that Ma's approval rating has plummeted by some 30 percentage points since the time he first took office.

Xie-xie to Il Barista for reminding me of this story.

PS: Ludicrous media bias alert for the IHT story. It refers to former President Chen's policy as an "aggressive anti-China stance." That's right: Taiwan's the aggressor and China the more victim! Chen the warmonger! I half-expected the reporter to shriek "Halliburton!" -- but I digress. On top of that, the report doesn't even give Chen the bare courtesy of calling him by name. In the article, he is only Ma's "predecessor." I know Chen's reputation is currently in the ditch, but come on, people. Pfffft.

TOTALLY FABULOUS UPDATE 1: Michael Turton was personally at the rally and has full blog-coverage, including many, many photos. He reports 150,000 protesters and says the "40,000" is from pan-blue media sources and is "laughable." What are you still doing here? GO TO MICHAEL'S BLOG!

Consider, if you will, how lovely it is that a bunch of citizens can go express themselves peacefully and publicly -- even express anti-government sentiment -- without being arrested, detained, intimidated, crushed, or sent to a labor re-education camp. This is what's at stake: Taiwanese democracy.

UPDATE 2: Michael has some interesting thoughts about estimating the size of crowds, since numbers for the Taiwan rally have ranged wildly from as little as 40,000 to as many as 300,000. His new post has more photos and also (joy!) video that he shot.