Four months after the presidential elections in Taiwan, there is a big difference when comparing the aftereffects of the elections in 2008 to those in 2012.
Four years ago, there was a sense of crisis over the situation surrounding the Strait of Taiwan. Now the question for Taiwan is how to survive the peace, particularly the propaganda wars in the United States.
In the aftermath of the elections in 2008, much alarm was heard. Many people worried that China would not miss this precious chance after two successive Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) regimes. Many had the worst-case scenario in mind: China would use force or threaten to use force; the Taipei government would accept certain Chinese demands that the DPP government would never have accepted; the decision would be made quickly enough so that the U.S. would not have the time to consider intervention. That would practically in the end free Taiwan. The probability of this was not high, but they were braced for and scared by even the remotest possibility.