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Not exactly Marcos EDITORIAL 05/16/2011

Monday, May 16, 2011

Not exactly Marcos

EDITORIAL
Click to enlarge
05/16/2011
Noynoy’s bluster is becoming too abrasive and unbearable that it is being mistaken as a character similar to that of former strongman Ferdinand Marcos.

While Marcos strikes fear whenever he issues a threat, because more than likely, he would have followed it up with immediate and determined action, as proved too many times.

Not so with Noynoy who has proven thus far that all he says including “them fighting words” as all “hot air” as an eminent former senator had said.

Although there is no doubting that Noynoy is trying hard to portray himself as a strong leader, in a bid to erase his already cemented personality as a weak, know-nothing leader..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110516com1.html

From grey to black FRONTLINE Ninez Cacho-Olivares 05/16/2011

From grey to black

FRONTLINE
Ninez Cacho-Olivares
05/16/2011
The true nature of Noynoy Aquino is finally surfacing for all to see. He too, like Ferdinand Marcos, wants to portray himself as a democrat and libertarian, but in reality, he has dictatorial tendencies, not just because he issued a threat to charge the anti-Reproductive Health (RH) bill groups with sedition, which he would find fairly impossible to implement, but because many of his past statements and acts have already shown such tendencies.

Recall that whenever Noynoy does not get what he wants, either by way of high court rulings or the ousters of certain officials he dislikes, he and his mouthpieces go all out on a demonization spree against them and paint them as the evil in society, while attempting to project himself and his Yellows as the “good.”

Now Noynoy is being portrayed by the Catholic bishops as an evil King Herod, ordering the killing of all the first born of Jewish couples..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110516com2.html

Enrile’s point C.R.O.S.S.R.O.A.D.S Jonathan De la Cruz 05/16/2011

Enrile’s point

C.R.O.S.S.R.O.A.D.S
Jonathan De la Cruz
05/16/2011
So, OK. We can understand P-Noy’s rage over the Sandiganbayan Second Division’s decision to uphold the plea bargain agreement between the Office of the Ombudsman and retired Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia. The Chief Executive fumed that the justices must be “living in a vacuum” and that the ruling itself was “unacceptable” and “legally wrong.” Certainly, there was a flaw somewhere, so this decision has earned such public outcry. But shouldn’t P-Noy and his legal advisers from Presidential Legal Counsel Ed de Mesa to Justice Secretary Leila de Lima and Solicitor General Joel Cadiz, to name just three of the legal minds who are supposed to provide him legal counsel, take pause and reflect on what really happened here. This development did not happen simply because the justices “could not get it.” No, Sir. Precisely, they had to render that decision on the basis of the records of the case and the hearings conducted over time. They are not supposed to decide on the basis of “public opinion” or the “say so” of other people no matter how powerful and influential they may be. They have to decide “in a vacuum” unperturbed by the passions of the moment or the “public pulse.” No less than Justice Baldos, the ponente, advised that the critics should simply read the decision instead of arguing in ad hominems. She then observed that as justices they are trained to set their eyes only on the facts and records of the case and the transcripts of the hearings unswayed by the cries or even hallelujahs of the crowd..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110516com4.html

To whose benefit? HE SAYS Aldrin Cardon 05/16/2011

To whose benefit?

HE SAYS
Aldrin Cardon
05/16/2011
It may have disheartened tens of thousands, but Health Secretary Enrique Ona’s advice to college freshmen to stay out of nursing schools is clearly an admission of a flawed educational system which, as students were saying even before the First
Quarter Storm of the 1970s, catered mostly to the profitable business side of college and university operations.

It would not be surprising to see a continuation of token protests against an educational system which relies mostly on private capital as government could not prioritize spending for education. Thus, it bows to the whims and demands of private school and university owners, whose primary consideration is profit.

But government has emasculated youth and student power through various means, as it has castrated labor and other forces accepting token returns like low wages. Worse, our youth now sees college education as a privilege reserved only to those whose parents can afford it..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110516com6.html

RH: Robbery holdup bill DIE HARD III Herman Tiu Laurel 05/16/2011

RH: Robbery holdup bill

DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
05/16/2011
I have not previously commented on the RH or Reproductive Health Bill since I know it is not a highly essential action that will address the poverty of this nation. First off, the Malthusian argument that population robustness equals poverty is inane, as a simple comparison easily shows:

Japan, with a population of around 130 million (the 10th largest in the world), has a per capita income of $35,500 while the Philippines, with a population of around 94 million (ranking 12th in the world), has a per capita income of only $2,000. Before the 2010 elections, where the previous lame-duck government’s spending-inflated GDP “growth” became the basis for this latest estimate by some economists, ours even hovered lower at around $1,500 to $1,700 per capita.

The point is, the pro-RH proponents’ propaganda, based on an imaginary correlation between poverty and population, is hogwash — characteristic of the pigsty that is Congress, more so when spewed from the mouths of the usual pro-FVR-Gloria Arroyo porkers.

Rep. Edcel Lagman, for one, with the help of his allied NGOs and “cost”-oriented groups, has been taking many people for a ride without revealing the highway robbery built into the RH wagon. Few people know that the original bill presented before Congress already contained a list of brands of contraceptives and other birth control paraphernalia that was only subsequently removed when certain quarters began to smell something scandalously foul.

Big Pharma all over the world, particularly in the Philippines, is well known to provide lavish commissions and paybacks to its agents, promoters, medical prescribers, as well as to political lobby clients and NGOs. Many of these NGOs beholden to foreign funding, such as those linked with Etta Rosales and other Noynoy “leftists,” are with Lagman’s campaign. Ditto the likes of pro-Big Pharma, anti-natural medicine former Health Secretary Esperanza Cabral and former (so he says) Carlyle Group director Fidel Ramos.

The transnational investment group Carlyle, which makes use not only of corporate but also global political clout in promoting its military-industrial interests, is also into pharmaceuticals in a very big way. William Shannon reports: “The Carlyle Group… manages nearly US$13 billion investments in various pharmaceutical laboratory and telecommunication, waterway transport companies.” He further calls it a “tentacular financial complex” and lists its “four most significant companies” (and their principal activities and periodic turnovers in parentheses) as: 1) Empi, Inc. (medical drugs and products, $73 million for year 2000); 2) MedPointe Inc. (drugs and condoms, $223 million estimated for 2001); 3) United Defense Industries Inc. (manufacture of tanks and armored vehicles, $1.18 billion for 2000); and 4) United States Marine Repair (the largest American company of non-nuclear warships, $400 million for 2000).

Disguised in this RH bill are the interests of Lagman and his ilk in the legislature (egged along by the similarly financially lascivious Big Pharma): automatic appropriation of the budget for their pork barrel plus government’s purchase of birth control “devices and supplies” as stipulated in Section 30 of the final draft of the RH Bill which states, “The amounts appropriated in the current annual General Appropriations Act (GAA) for Family Health and Responsible Parenting under the DoH and PopCom and other concerned agencies shall be allocated and utilized… Such additional sums… shall be included in the subsequent GAA.”
You see, more funds will have to be allocated (taken from PhilHealth), with the PDAF or pork barrel requiring additional allocation to the delight of those porkers in Congress, along with Big Pharma selling these “devices and supplies” while obtaining a declaration of such as “essential drugs,” thereby opening these to “tax free” classification.

Furthermore, according to the draft, each congressional district “shall” be provided with a “mobile health care service unit,” which will, of course, sport the names of the congressmen and maybe the NGOs working with them. Legislators say the bill will only cost P3 billion; but when you add all the other funding sources (including the Anti-Poverty Commission, which will be required to chip in), then it will run to over tens of billions of pesos!
Meanwhile, RH bill spinmasters, both foreign and local, have been very good at framing the issue as an emotional cause for “women’s rights,” as a fight for “their own bodies,” etc., which no one can argue against. However, in some women’s groups’ hysteria, what is being missed is that they, too, are being used to swindle this nation of its much fed-upon budget pie.

The Magna Carta for Women already protects women more than a chastity belt can; and even among them, many recoil from the idea of removing constraints on abortion. Moreover, nobody follows the Church diktat against the use of condoms and contraceptives anymore (except for those who are still fearful or ignorant), so what else is at issue?

This is perhaps why RH bill spinmasters have thrown in many red herrings, such as the control of HIV — even when a country such as Thailand still leads the world in HIV incidence despite its well known free condoms program. I am told that this is also the case in Bangladesh.

That said, the prevalence of HIV is a problem of values and social education, not sex education. It’s a problem of media culture too. Some young students having their OJT in my radio program have raised an upsetting problem — that of too many young girls (as young as 12) getting pregnant and selling their bodies for sex. But isn’t that a problem of poverty as well — a poverty spawned not by population per se but by a socio-economic system that is exploitative; that concentrates national wealth in an infinitesimal few; and extracts surplus out of the country in the form of unjust debt and taxes, ad nausea?

Ah, but such is the systemic cancer that the RH robbery hold-up gangs and their foreign partners, with their RH debates, would want to distract us from.

(Tune in to Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m., and Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; Talk News TV with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “The Robbery Holdup Bill”; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com and http://hermantiulaurel.blogspot.com for our articles plus TV and radio archives)

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110516com5.html

Friction certain with Roxas as chief of staff — Angara By Angie M. Rosales 05/16/2011

CHIEF OF STAFF NOT A PALACE TRADITION

Friction certain with Roxas as chief of staff — Angara

By Angie M. Rosales 05/16/2011

The plan of President Aquino to appoint his defeated running mate and Liberal Party (LP) president, former Sen. Manuel “Mar” Roxas II, as “chief of staff” in the Office of the President may only complicate the affairs of the administration rather than contribute to its output, especially if the continuing talks of so-called “factionalism” among supporters of Aquino are yet to be fully resolved, Sen. Edgardo Angara said yesterday.

Angara, himself a former executive secretary during the Estrada administration, said the continued existence of factions in the Executive could affect the decision-making of the President.

“And worse, it could also affect (decision-makings on) international relations,” he said..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/headlines/20110516hed1.html

Solon queries rush in MRT-LRT bid prior to forming of GOCC body By Angie M. Rosales 05/16/2011

Solon queries rush in MRT-LRT bid prior to forming of GOCC body

By Angie M. Rosales 05/16/2011

A Senate administration ally warned Malacañang anew against pursuing the planned privatization of two mass railway systems, saying the Executive may be perceived as engaging in a possible case of a “midnight deal.”
Sen. Ralph Recto yesterday urged the Palace to defer the bidding for the P15-billion management contract of the bundled Metro Rail Transit–Light Rail Transit (MRT-LRT) systems until Congress enacts the law setting up the Governance Commission for GOCCs (GCG).

The lawmaker said government should first have the yet to be convened commission review first the planned auction, among the powers of which is to scrutinize the operations of government-owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs) to determine if they should be abolished or privatized subject to the approval of the President..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/headlines/20110516hed2.html

Militants claim Noy carrier visit prelude to permanent US base By Mario J. Mallari 05/16/2011

Militants claim Noy carrier visit prelude to permanent US base

By Mario J. Mallari 05/16/2011

Militant groups are up in arms over the unscheduled visit of President Aquino and members of his staff to the US aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, calling it a shameless display of US subservience and part of efforts to convince the government leadership to allow the reestablishment of a permanent military facility at Subic Bay.

Some call the carrier Osama bin Laden’s hearse as it carried the remains of the al-Qaeda leader before being thrown at sea.

The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) denounced Aquino’s visit to the carrier as a “shameless display of master-puppet relationship.” Aquino was flown by a US military aircraft to international waters for an unscheduled and unannounced rendezvous to board the USS Carl Vinson. The USS Carl Vinson is one of four carriers scheduled to dock at the Manila port for four days starting yesterday..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/headlines/20110516hed3.html

Noy allies get ‘pork’ ahead of others By Gerry Baldo 05/16/2011

Noy allies get ‘pork’ ahead of others

By Gerry Baldo 05/16/2011

Amid complaints that the release of the “pork” barrel funds have been delayed, a member of the majority bloc coalition yesterday accused Secretary Florencio Abad of the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) of unduly prioritizing members of the Liberal Party (LP) in the release of the pork barrel funds.

According to San Juan Rep. Joseph Victor “JV” Ejercito, the present Aquino administration is no different from the Arroyo administration in withholding the pork barrel of the political opposition.

“I understand the situation that those belonging to the ruling political party, Liberal Party, and their closest allies received their PDAF (Priority Development Assistance Fund) earlier than most of us did especially since the DBM secretary also belongs to LP,” Ejercito said yesterday.

“However, I do not subscribe to the idea that the previous administration’s practice of vendetta and holding out the PDAF of opposing representatives are being continued by the present administration,” Ejercito added..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/nation/20110516nat1.html

‘Bebeng’s damage to infra, agri products goes up over P1B 05/16/2011

‘Bebeng’s damage to infra, agri products goes up over P1B

05/16/2011
Damages to properties and agricultural crops left by tropical storm “Bebeng” has breached the P1 billion mark as the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (NDRRMC) expressed belief that such amount could still go up as reports from affected areas started to come in.

Reports from the Camp Aguinaldo-based NDRRMC showed that as of 6 a.m. yesterday, a total of P1,370,404,821.61 in infrastructure and agricultural products were damaged after Bebeng battered six regions with heavy rains and strong winds last week..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/nation/20110516nat3.html

BoC official denies charges against her By Mina Diaz 05/16/2011

BoC official denies charges against her

By Mina Diaz 05/16/2011

A Bureau of Customs official yesterday said the alleged graft charges filed against her before the Office of the Ombudsman were pure harassment to discredit her anti-smuggling campaign.

Customs Intelligence and Investigation Service chief Marissa Rae Galang denied she failed to declare her real property in the Statement of Assets and Liabilities and Networth (SALN) that included a townhouse in Quezon City acquired in 1993.

Galang claimed she acquired the property in 1993, eight years before she joined the bureau.
She also denied falsifying her daily time record in May 2007 when in fact she was in the Republic of Palau as evidenced by Asian Spirit’s Airline passenger manifest..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/metro/20110516met4.html

House body pushes stiffer penalties for child abusers By Charlie V. Manalo 05/16/2011

House body pushes stiffer penalties for child abusers

By Charlie V. Manalo 05/16/2011

The House committee on the welfare of children has endorsed the swift approval of the proposed Anti-Corporal Punishment Act that imposes stiff penalties on the use of physical and humiliating punishment to discipline or control children.

Authored by Bagong Henerasyon Rep. Bernadette Herrera-Dy, House Bill 4455 was unanimously approved by the House panel as it issued a strong appeal to the House leadership to immediately calendar the proposal for second reading debates.

Herrera-Dy, committee vice chairman, said aside from promoting positive and non-violent methods of disciplining children, HB 4455 also provides the legal framework to the country’s commitment to a number of international commitments to protect the youth..... MORE

SourceThe Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/metro/20110516met1.html

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