As the curtains of the Beijing Olympics are a going up Friday, after seven years of waiting, angst and excitement grow with each passing day.

I have never had doubted that China will win more gold medals than any other country taking part in the Beijing Olympics next month. I am not alone in this naive conviction.

The nascent thaw in cross-strait relations, as evidenced in the much hyped inauguration of direct weekend flight across the Taiwan Strait and the arrival of mainland tourists to Taiwan, is reviving the long dormant call for “diplomatic truce” — a cease-fire between Taipei and Beijing on the diplomatic front.

Here George W. Bush did it again. Just one month before the opening of the Beijing Olympics, the U.S. president told the world that he would attend the opening ceremony on Aug. 8.

This year’s Fourth of July got a new meaning for people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. For decades, they believed in something akin to the Declaration of Independence

Michelle Obama, wife of Sen. Barack Obama who is presumed to be the standard bearer of the Democratic Party in the U.S. general election in November, is in trouble.

It was a powerful, moving, and dignified speech. It was historic, too, judging from the fact that it was America’s first woman presidential candidate making a concession speech to her country’s first African-American candidate who defeated her in a close, 16-month battle for the Democratic presidential nomination.

As a politician, Wang Chien-shien is an endangered species in Taiwan, and possibly in the world. The man of “little cannon” fame for his hard-hitting, no-nonsense combative style in fighting corruption and special interest groups, the former finance minister in the early 1990s is sorely missed by many of his admirers, including this writer.

Where is Taiwan’s Scott McClellan? People here are also eager to know “What Happened” in Taiwan during the eight years of Chen Shui-bian’s presidency.

The Sichuan earthquake has cracked open a Pandora’s Box of grave problems, not the least of which are sub-standard school buildings which have claimed the lives of 10,000 students in China’s worst natural disaster in 30 years.