No Sona, that
EDITORIAL 
Click to enlarge 07/28/2010
AState of the Nation Address (Sona), it certainly wasn’t. Facts, they weren’t either, as no statistics to substantiate those claims were even presented.
Too much time was devoted to blasting away at the past; little time was spent on specific solutions to problems President Aquino claims to have inherited, and hardly none at all on where he and his government will be taking us in the next six years.
To this day, he says the Filipinos can dream again. But to dream again is more of a campaign promise that a presidential candidate latches on; not a spiel for a president delivering his maiden Sona. That state of Filipinos dreaming again that he speaks of should now be translated into reality under his presidency. We can’t keep on dreaming for the next six years.
Yet even as he tells the nation that.... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com1.html
.... MOREDelayed revulsion
FRONTLINE 
Ninez Cacho-Olivares 07/28/2010Funny that Noynoy Aquino blasted away at Gloria Arroyo’s way of getting the National Power Corp. (Napocor) in deeper debt by “forcing” the agency to lower power rates and enable her to get the presidential vote in 2004.
Funny, because Noynoy certainly knew about it even then, yet he never denounced it then.
Since he had known about this, especially as his uncle, Paul Aquino, was in the same government power business, and was in fact, into glorifying Gloria and her plan to lower Napocor rates during the 2004 campaign, why didn’t Noynoy even come up with a privilege speech in Congress and denounce this move which would make the Filipinos suffer? The media already brought this out, saying this was a clear political gimmick for which the Filipinos would be paying the debt through the nose for years and years. So why did he wait for six years, when he certainly had a forum to denounce this? Why bring this up and in his State of the Nation Address (Sona)? Ah, but in those days, he was a staunch ally of Gloria Arroyo, and as all her allies did, praised her, protected her, and covered up for her
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com2.html
.... MOREThe tapadas: Latin America’s veil-clad women
FEATURE 
07/28/2010LIMA — Europe’s heated debate over the Islamic hijab has revived memories in Peru of its own tapadas, women from Lima who in centuries past wore long skirts and a face-covering veil.
The saya, an overskirt worn tightly at the waist and raised slightly to show ankles, and the manto, a thick shawl that covered shoulders, head and much of the face, inspired painters and writers for three centuries. And they were once considered a distinctively national attire.
A legacy of the Moors, or Muslims, who fled persecution in Spain, “las tapadas Limenas” were especially common among the Spanish elite when they first arrived in Peru after the Spanish colonization in the 16th century.
The attire “was clearly intended to serve as a cover, to protect women’s virtue and ward off temptation,” explained Alicia del Aguila, a sociologist who has studied and written about the subject
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com3.html
It’s just a dream
MR. EXPOSE 
Amb. Ernesto Maceda 07/28/2010President Benigno Simeon Aquino’s first State of the Nation (Sona) message was in the opinion of majority of listeners disappointing to say the least. All sectors of society were expecting specific solutions to their problems.
The five instances of corruption cited did not achieve a shock and awe effect because they were not big enough nor detailed enough. In the matter of the NFA rice importations, he cited an importation of 900,000 metric tons in 2004 that had a 117,000/MT shortage and in 2007 an importation of 1.8 million MT when the reported shortage was only 588,000. He could have said that in nine years, the amount of importation in quantity and price paid kept increasing to a grand total of more than 12 million metric tons in eight years and bought at prices 50-100 percent above the prices reported by Bloomberg or the New York/Chicago Commodities Exchange.
In the matter of the Motor Vehicles Fund, he mentioned the misuse of more than 200 projects worth about P480 million. He did not mention the bigger Road Users tax of P54 billion. He did not mention the billions allocated for road guards and road signs. He could have cited the P1.5 billion of road guards for Nueva Ecija alone.... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com4.html
Hoping, but not counting
C.R.O.S.S.R.O.A.D.S 
Jonathan De la Cruz 07/28/2010So, OK. What do we make out of P-Noy’s Sona? While many would have wanted to have the villains in their minds excoriated no end for the continued deterioration of our situation 24 years after Edsa l and, of course, the injection of their favorite mantras or themes in the 30 minute speech we got what was advised early on. Plain and simple detailing of the whys and wherefores and the hoped for., It was a plain recitation of where we are — a country in crisis, where the poor have gotten poorer, the rich richer and the middle class almost nowhere to be found and, as is now clear, suffering from a host of excesses. And then, a “wishing map” of where we hope to be six years hence. It was a hopeful (we can dream again.) speech but an auditing rulebook as well. It presented our situation as plainly as can be, although some say, not as factually as should have been. We are told, for example, that the MWSS “package” while problematic was not as graphic or even condemnable as some of the excesses in other GOCCs and GFIs. Or, worse, those which befell the PCGG sequestered assets. Maybe it was timed for what is now turning out to be more of a contrived water crisis in the Maynilad service area than earlier presented. Similarly, the “dreaming” part was more modest than what many had hoped for. No soaring rhetorics, no excessive hopes. Just plain and simple things. Which may be par for the course as the administration sorts out the place, so to speak, and spell out the solutions and directions it hopes to lead us to. Indeed, it may be too much to ask for more at this point. But we will be watching and counting..... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com5.html
Not as simple as that
HE SAYS 
Aldrin Cardon 07/28/2010To simplify, President Aquino wants it known that government is nearly bankrupt.He wants it known that it no longer has money to move around, and that of Gloria Arroyo’s penchant for committing abuses, including what now appears as plunder of the 2010 funds with only half the year gone; that she has to receive blame if we fail to move an inch even if we all want to scoot toward progress, now that the diminutive, overly ambitious lady with big, deep pockets is gone.
No, she’s not exactly gone. She was in Hong Kong when Noynoy delivered his very first State of the Nation Address (Sona), which even Vice President Jejomar Binay, described as “simple, direct and truthful.”
Gloria’s flight denied the people of a spectacle, those of what would have been her reaction (or non-reaction) to P-Noy’s statement, especially when he revealed how her past government mismanaged all nine years which were wasted opportunities, or nine years of abandoned.... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com6.html
Simply amazing
SHE SAYS 
Dinah S. Ventura 07/28/2010As expected, the first State of the Nation Address (Sona) of President Noynoy Aquino, given after three weeks in office, was met with mixed reactions, from the negative to the positive, and everything in between.The business community is reportedly disappointed over the lack of reference to details that would be useful to the industry, such as taxes and stuff.Militant groups were typically vocal about their opinion over the lack of specific plans for dealing with corruption and the corrupt, now that P-Noy had detailed some of the unsavory practices in the previous administration.The Arroyos, meanwhile, said nothing said was new, and that they were “used to it,” meaning the allegations, I suppose..... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20100728com7.html
- Upon questioning of the FFM team SPO3 Ali Guibn Rangiris admitted that they only conducted a cursory examination of the body.
- he preservation of the material evidences in the crime scene was not dealt properly
"they did not take with them the bed sheet allegedly used by the victim to hand himself.
" the cellular phone of the victim was left unsealed. He told the FFM team that they found the phone empty (phone book, inbox/outside messges, pictures) while in fact SPO3 Ali Guibon Rangiris used the said phone to contact a family member on February 3, 2010 at around 2:00 in the afternoon to report that they found Gregan hanging inside his room.
"Gregan's body was left by the Police to the care of the US troops upon the insistence of the latter that they will be the one to send the body.
- The Photos taken by SPO3 Ali Guibon Rangiris showed that the victim was wearing green T-shirt, Maong pants with his underwear partially shown. On the contrary the cadaver was delivered at La Merced Memoria Homes in Zamboanga City and when the family opened the body bag filled with ice cubes the cadaver was without shirt and wearing only a camouflage cargo shorts. ... MORE
