News summary on the way home from work, Subsletter Evening.
The official election campaign for the 20th presidential election begins tomorrow (15th).
The race will be held for 22 days until the 8th of next month, the day before the election, and the issue of unification has been ignited by Ahn Cheol-soo, a candidate of the People's Party, ahead of the race.
However, since this is a higher-order equation, it is not easily solved.
Let's take a look inside.
Ahn Cheol-soo's side "Hado unified, unified..."
Aides have explained the background of Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo's unification proposal.
Lee Tae-gyu, head of the National People's Party's election committee, appeared on CBS radio and spoke to the effect of 'to unify and unify the surrounding area, we preemptively took out a head-to-head card to remove the tag'.
He also said, “The primary goal is to become a single candidate and complete the race, and if the people’s power does not want to unite, they can complete it independently,” he said. I drew a line.
◆ Lee Tae-gyu> 'We have to put this unification tag on first' But now, before the main election, Pastor In Myung-jin, who declared support for former National Assembly Speaker and Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo, and these people continued to come out like this after issuing statements calling for unification.
Then, if you do not clarify the unification part at the time of candidate registration, it is more likely that you will be trapped in this unification frame.
Then, no matter how much Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo says that he will declare the completion due to our current political culture and composition, reporters keep asking when will the unification be done, so if this cannot be avoided, it would be better to break through it head-on.
Then, if you make a preemptive proposal and respond to it, you leave everything to the people's judgment and just draw a conclusion on unification.
If you refuse there, it would be better to just finish the race, so you decided like this.
◇ Moderator> So, should I understand that 'I didn't originally want to unify, but the people around me were unifying and unifying, so I threw a card'?
◆ Lee Tae-gyu> Yes, so, if you don't clarify this issue, if you don't make it clear, you'll be locked up in a frame like 'Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo will be unified someday'.
(..)
◇ Host> So, you are saying, 'The intention to finish is clear', and you are going right now.
◆ Lee Tae-gyu> So, you suggested unification.
So, the primary goal is to become a single candidate and finish the race.
Choi Jin-seok, chairman of the permanent election of the People's Party, also opposed the demand for concession or resignation of Candidate Ahn from some of the people's power. I have no intention of narrowing it down. I just made a last suggestion."
Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo is in the same position, saying, "It's the only suggestion I can make and I have nothing more to say."
Let's look again at the press conference that Ahn Cheol-soo announced yesterday (13th).
Because you can understand the background of the unification proposal.
First, after promising to jointly announce and implement the next government's national vision and innovation tasks in front of the people, a single candidate is selected through public opinion polls and national primaries. can.
(..) The reason I am making this suggestion is that even if I keep saying that I will finish it, I am tenaciously trying to attach a single tail. I decided that going would be a change of government in the name of Ahn Cheol-soo.
It's similar to what my aides explained, and I'm going to remove the unification tag by preemptively suggesting unification.
After throwing the first card, Candidate Ahn is taking the 'My Way' strategy by digesting the schedule.
I plan to continue my visit to the Gyeongbuk region tomorrow (15th), the first day of the official election campaign.
"If you don't, you will win" "Need a great unification"
The power of the people, who took over the ball of unification thrown by Candidate Cheol-soo Ahn, immediately rejected the unification of the opinion polls.
There is also an atmosphere of downplaying Ahn Cheol-soo's proposal.
However, such a reaction should be seen as part of the struggle for favorable unification.
Representative Lee Jun-seok appeared on YTN and said, "Now is not the time to talk about unification, but as Ahn Cheol-soo, chairman of the People's Party, has said so far, everyone should make an effort to finish the race. Asking to negotiate the rules of the poll now is missing the policy election. It seems to be intended to shake the election board in order to raise awareness and raise awareness.”
Then, when asked if he thinks that candidate Yoon can win without unification, he said, "I think he can win. I think that candidate Ahn is looking for an escape route from a situation where it is difficult to continue the election."
Kwon Young-se, head of the election campaign division, insisted, "I have no choice but to express my concerns about the polling method.
'Great unification' is read to mean a political agreement through one-on-one negotiations, and furthermore, the voluntary resignation of Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo.
In fact, they are pushing Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo's 'withdrawal'.
Candidate Seok-Yeol Yoon also indirectly expressed a negative position, saying, "I will think about it, but there are also regrets."
There were also aggressive remarks that undermined Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo's proposal for unification, and Kim Jae-won, a member of the Supreme Council, compared it to 'stealing a gold medal' on YTN radio.
Commissioner Kim said, "The decision to conduct a separate opinion poll even though the rankings have already been established is likely to look like the Winter Olympics in which gold medals are taken away by ranking manipulation, so it is an argument that is far from the general opinion of the people. "It's a way that distorts the chances of getting the votes and is far from the way people want candidates to be elected," he said.
In unifying opinion polls... "No" VS "No Concessions"
Let's take a closer look at why the two candidates are sharply opposed to the unification method.
On the side of the People's Power, there is a clear trend against unification based on opinion polls for reasons such as 1) a large gap in approval ratings between Candidate Seok-Yeol Yoon and Cheol-Soo Ahn, 2) insufficient time to negotiate the primary rules, and 3) concerns about adverse selection.
So, I want to unify by winning concessions from Candidate Ahn through political negotiations.
In an interview with the JoongAng Ilbo recently, Candidate Seok-Yeol Yoon said, "We do not negotiate by creating a committee to promote unification. If we trust each other and the direction of regime change is right, it can be finished in just 10 minutes, while drinking a cup of coffee." I once suggested unification of the expression, and this statement is also in the same vein.
But the People's Party has no intention of making concessions.
Lee Tae-gyu, head of the general election campaign headquarters, said, "The method proposed by Candidate Ahn is not the method we demand. It is a method used by the people's power. Last year, the two parties applied this method to the single candidate for Seoul mayor and was selected as the people's power candidate Oh Se-hoon. . So, we're going to do it the way Ahn lost."
Regarding adverse selection, he said, "We keep talking about adverse selection, but the fact that there is no provision to prevent adverse selection is the people's power method. Through that method, candidate Yoon Seok-yeol became a presidential candidate and Lee Jun-seok also became the party leader. You can apply it mutatis mutandis, and to say something else, I think it is a matter of sincerity."
Could the Kuomintang argument be a negotiating argument?
I think the people's power can do that.
Articles are coming out that they are grasping the true meaning of Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo, but the People's Power says that it is necessary to provide an 'exit' so that Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo can take care of his cause and profit, so that a political debate is not possible.
In that regard, there is a view that predicts the possibility of making an unconventional proposal to Candidate Ahn.
That he could propose a responsible prime minister or a coalition government.
"It is difficult to achieve unification"... Democrats in check
The Democratic Party is nervously watching the development of the unification discussion, and today (14th) gave many predictions that unification would not happen.
Woo Sang-ho, head of the Election Committee's general election division, said on TBS radio that "I feel that Ahn Cheol-soo's proposal does not mean that he will unify, but that he will not do it."
► Moderator: Do we really want to unify?
Or does it mean to shake the approval rating once?
How do you read?
▷ Woo Sang-ho: Well, it has the character of a proposal for unification, but in reality, I felt like a blocker of unification.
Because it's a conditional proposal like the last time Seoul mayor's election.
So, I feel that it is not an active unification negotiation proposal because it was proposed with such a nuance that 'the other party will not accept this'.
As expected, did not the power of the people reject the unification of the polling method?
In that respect, I don't see the possibility of success as high.
▶ Moderator: If you actually sit at the table, isn't there a possibility that the people's power will counter-propose to the prevention of adverse selection in opinion polls, that is, to conduct a poll only against the supporters of the opposition party?
▷ Woo Sang-ho: I don't accept that.
So, as I said last time, if you look at the topography of the polls now, it is such a unified method that wins and loses are too obvious depending on which floor the population of the poll is limited to.
So, for example, if a poll is conducted only on voters who want a change of government, candidate Yoon Seok-yeol has an overwhelming advantage.
Also, isn't this a situation where Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo has an advantage when it comes to the general public?
Kang Hoon-sik, the head of the Strategic Planning Division, also said on MBC radio, "It is clear that candidate Ahn wants to put an end to these problems in the final race." There is little chance of unification). Candidate Ahn completely beat Bae Bae, and in one word, the people's power was kicked."
There is a situation in which remarks that view the possibility of unification as very low continue.
The Democratic Party is also expecting that Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo completes the race and the unification problem, which is a variable in the presidential election, can be resolved.
So, the analysis of the Democratic Party that the possibility of unification is low is also read as a voice of caution against unification.
There is an opinion that even if unification is achieved, headwinds can occur without principles or vision.
In any case, the atmosphere in which the Democrats are keen to respond to how the unification discussion is progressing is evident.
Can we win if we unite?
Since unification is a joint effort between two candidates, arithmetic, it should be a 'plus' to the vote, but it is not a guarantee of victory.
The content of unification is important as to how unification is made, but if it is viewed as a banquet of 'sharing power', there will be a headwind.
Another way of giving up or incomplete unification does not produce synergy.
Consider the case of the 18th presidential election in 2012.
At that time, the Democratic United Party candidate Moon Jae-in and independent candidate Ahn Cheol-soo had a conflict in the process of unification discussion, and then Ahn resigned.
However, the 'half unification' that did not lead to chemical bonding eventually led to opposition from Ahn's supporters, and the then-Saenuri Party candidate Park Geun-hye's victory put an end to the presidential race.
No one knows if the game would have changed if it had been a complete unification, but you can read the implications of the unification's gains and losses.
a piece of the day
This is a photo of the 'Beautiful Mask' launch event.
This mask was released a day before the official election campaign began, and the election day and slogan are printed on the mask pouch.
The event held at the mask manufacturing plant was attended by officials from the National Election Commission.