Monday, August 29, 2005 [ 6:18 PM ]

PIECE OF CHIZ

Luckily I had the chance to interview Chiz Escudero last week. Like in my interview with Gilbert Remulla, I saw the sincerity in the eyes of the young congressman. Although admittedly, the staff of Chiz were not that accommodating compared to those of Gilbert’s. Maybe because they were too busy accepting interviews from different media groups and besides, they were also busy about the impeachment hearing.

In that interview, Chiz sounded more intellectual than Gilbert (sorry zel) He answers all the questions spontaneously with conviction and it is evident in his eyes that he knows what he is talking about. He answered all the questions in his own soft tone, a non-trapo way of speaking and not even a slight sign of arrogance can be seen in him, with the way he dress and the way he moves and mingle with his staffs, he is the same person we see on TV.

Through that interview, I can say that if an open-minded solon, and I want to emphasize, open-minded solon (if there’s still some of them) would listen to Chiz, he/she might be convinced in what this person is saying. If political bias would be set aside, and the congressmen will just listen to what Chiz have to say, I believe that even without the help of other minority congressmen, he can gather even more that 79 signatures for the impeachment. XD but of course, they won’t listen to him if what he have to say will not favor their interests.

Honestly, I can say that he in some ways had inspired me to be dedicated in my studies and give more attention in acquiring all knowledge possible, because some day, I may have a better use for it. In a very discriminate world, knowledge would be one of the best weapons that should be part of our arsenal.
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Friday, August 26, 2005 [ 9:09 PM ]

YOUNG POLITICIANS

Years before I entered college, what comes to my mind whenever I hear the word politician, is an old man, partly bald, wearing a piña barong and delivering a slow and boring speech in a pulpit. But some years back, I have seen new breed of politicians, young, soft-spoken but intelligent enough to be one. Although admittedly, most of them were just a young replica of what I pictured before as a politician, but still it cannot be denied that there were some of these young politicians who have shown the power of the youth in changing time respected traditions, including the traditional politics.

I don’t want to sound defending politicians, I know they don’t worth it, but I just want to commend what these young politicians have made. These young distinguished politicians have opened the awareness of the younger generations in national issues and social concerns. Before, the youth was only concerned with topics such as fashion, sports and show business depending on their class, but because of these creatures, many among the younger generation have tried to consider shifting their interest in other subjects such as politics, economics and other more serious topics. They have shown to the older generations that the youth’s perception must also be taken into serious consideration and they have made known what the youth power is.

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Tuesday, August 23, 2005 [ 9:30 PM ]

THE GREAT RAID?

Last week the operatives of the CIDG and the intelligence arm of the AFP, the controversial Isafp raided the safe house of Segundo Tabayoyong, witness of the opposition. This may seem late but I rather write on this than to let it pass XD
As I can see, that was a very desperate move from the side of the administration for the following reasons: first, Angelo Reyes himself cannot say any legal basis of the raid. Second, Brig. Gen. Jose Honorado said that the AFP has no police power and can only participate whenever national security is concerned and he admitted that the Isafp wasn’t supposed to be in that raid. And lastly If the opposition really has no evidence in proving the electoral fraud in the 2004 election, then why did they confiscated all the documents and ER’s in the safe house.

Sec. Ermita said in an interview that the president knows nothing about it and he seems to acquit GMA from responsibility. I don’t believe so, simply because under the command responsibility, the highest authority is responsible for all the actions of his/her subordinate and GMA is the commander in chief of the military and therefore she should be responsible for the actions of the Isafp for that matter. Another thing is that they raided the safe house without any search warrant. The Isafp said that they just responded to the call of the owner of the house and the owner let them enter the room of Tabayoyong. I believe that they should be accountable to it simply because… I will just quote what chiz himself said:
”We would take to task the CIDG “so far as the illegal raid is concern for the following reasons: first, no warrant. Second, they only asked the permission of the owner of the lease premises knowing fully well that once premises is leased out, the owner has already given away the possession of the property and therefore the lessee has full control of the property. She (Cabuhat) cannot consent for people to enter the premises and third, they should have made an inventory at the time of the seizure or the raid, not a week, not two weeks, not even the day after.”

1 COMMENTS

Friday, August 19, 2005 [ 12:26 PM ]

TAKING STAND

I watched Debate last night and saw how the guests defended their belief on the issue of Impeachment or Truth Commission. The guests stated their different points of view in the issue and in my perception; the Impeachment side got it although the televotes showed that it only lead by a single point.

What I noticed in the program that somehow irritates me was the moderator. Oscar Orbos and Winnie Monsod are supposed to be the mediator of the program, to give it a formal and proper flow. In fairness to Oscar Orbos, he behaved well enough as a moderator but Winnie Monsod…
As a moderator she is allowed to throw certain questions that would start the debate and some intelligent queries that would put the stand of the guests into test. But what she did is directly contradicting the guest, as far as saying phrases as “I don’t believe you” “What you said is not true” etc. I think that was very unethical for a moderator. In the name itself, a moderator should moderate and not to take a stand regardless of her belief on the issue. If she wants to air her side and to make certain pronouncements of her principle then she should be on the side of the panelist and not as a moderator.

********************************
In some scenes on that debate, one of the panelist said that the only proper venue for the president to answer all these controversies is through an Impeachment proceedings, the questions to her in cheating, stealing and lying can only be resolved in an impeachment court. At this point Winnie Monsod take her stand, she said that “So what if she cheat? So what if she steal? So what if she lie? Would that resolve the problem of the country? I don’t think so.” Monsod means that whether GMA is proven guilty or not, that would not change anything in the country, still the problems will remain. What should we do now? Let it pass and ignore it? If we leave the issues unresolved then the political crisis will continue, if we would not mind such allegations for the reason of nothing would change, then we will be on chaos. Everyone will just do whatever they want however grave it is and say, so what? Nothing will change even if they do otherwise. Huh? If a murderer was caught in the act of killing, should the police not arrest him? Besides nothing would change, there were other murderers somewhere else so nothing would change if they arrest this killer. That’s nonsense. If a criminal whether it is an ordinary citizen or even the president of the Philippines, that has been proven to be guilty beyond reasonable doubt suffered the appropriate penalty of what they have done, then at least others would hesitate to do such delinquency, at least obviously.

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Thursday, August 18, 2005 [ 10:00 PM ]

CONGRESS VISIT

My first visit to the House of Representatives was luckily in the height of the impeachment case against GMA. Although I planned to watch several hearings including the “Hello Garci” issue, I was not lucky enough to have the time to be there. Now I am supposed to be in the congress not to watch the impeachment hearing but to interview Gilbert Remulla and it is not I that scheduled the interview but the hyper Elizel, I just asked her if I may join her in the interview.

I noticed that the congress just like any other government agencies has the attitude of discrimination toward those who are less fortunate in this life. The security was very strict with those who were dressed not too decently although it is a public office anyway; people should go there even with their simplest clothes.
Before I went to the congress I looked for my peach polo to show that “IM Peach” XD but unfortunately I cannot find it so I ended up with my pink polo and it looked like “I'M Pink” Just for the record I am in favor of the impeachment because it is the only proper venue for the president to answer all the controversies swirling around her so I hope there would be no more technicalities to delay it.

The staffs in the office of Gilbert were very accommodating, they didn’t treat us as students asking favor for the interview but instead they treated us as a formal guest. Until the time Gilbert came, they talked to us casually with different political issues in the country. Gilbert himself was very humble and apologetic, and as I have said in my comment to Elizel’s blog, he didn’t treat himself as an important person and he has his way of making other people comfortable talking with him. The interview went ok and within my heart I can feel the sincerity of the person we talked to. For complete details of the event…visit Elizel’s blog hehe. (I am hoping to have at least a longer post after my interview with chiz, my alter-ego, on Monday hehe)
2 COMMENTS

Friday, August 12, 2005 [ 9:08 PM ]



MARS?

Planet Mars will be brightest in the night sky starting August. It will look as large as the full moon to the naked eye. This will culminate on August 27 when Mars comes to within 35 million miles on earth. Be sure to watch the sky on August 27 12:30am. It will look like the Earth has two moons. The next time Mars will be this close is in 2287. Share this with your loved ones and friends as NO ONE ALIVE TODAY will ever see it again.
(I also wanted to prove if this is true hehe, so I just hope the sky would be clear on that night)
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Thursday, August 11, 2005 [ 11:37 AM ]



Lousy Lawyer

GMA until now is very quiet with regard to the person she said as an election official which she called to during the 2004 election. Although she confessed that her voice was on the “Hello Garci” tape, she didn’t reveal the identity of the man on the other line. (Of course everyone knows it’s Garci) Although the president is hiding its identity, her lawyer yesterday had revealed it and confirmed that it was Garcillano. After a while he said that he was just misquoted (a person is misquoted if what he said is different from what is written in the news) after realizing that he was not really misquoted he said that it was just a slip of the tongue. (nadulas lang daw)
1 COMMENTS

Wednesday, August 10, 2005 [ 12:34 PM ]



DISAPPOINTED

I tried to finish reviewing all the readings for the prelim exam in Filipino just to be able to monitor in the congressional hearing for the impeachment case of GMA. Luckily I finished reading last night just to be disappointed that the chair of the hearing called for an executive session… so there’s no media coverage. I’m just wondering why they have to be in an executive session when they only have to talk about some procedures. As one of the congressman said, executive sessions may only be applied when the sake of national security is concerned. I think there is no such matter in the procedural debate.
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Friday, August 05, 2005 [ 12:27 PM ]



Not about politics

Something not about politics… It’s always fun to write something that is current or somehow controversial but writing something else would also be delightful.
Honestly I haven’t written anything that is like this before so this would be a sort of experimental. I can’t decide of anything to write but something just came up that gave me an idea, so I decided to write this just to make a record. :D

Some years ago I had met a friend that became close to me. We always have a quarrel at first but that quarreling just started up our “friendship” We always argued with our different points of view, sometimes it leads us on a formal debate. We haven’t noticed that somehow our arguments became sharing of stories, struggles in life and personal mischief. She became my closest friend during that time. Before we used to disagree with one another but eventually we end up defending our beliefs against others who tried to dispute it. Our “friendship” lasted for some years and then we separated ways. All the while we still kept in touch with each other, sometimes even arguing again despite the distance. Some months ago, I hadn’t heard of her, no messages, no news or whatsoever until the other day when I heard that she has a serious problem. I don’t know if I should contact her, besides who am I to interfere with her life, but still I tried. She said that she has no problem, but deep within I know she has but she doesn’t want to tell me. So I go on with my life, I don’t want to bother my self thinking of someone that doest care about me at all.

I am just wondering about what could have happened, her openness to me suddenly disappeared without any reason at all. I though that she just wanted to deal with her life and that I don’t have anything to do with it. Yesterday, I heard from someone, that my friend is soon to be married. I still don’t know if that was her problem, but I think everyone has a life to deal with. Everyone has a decision to make. But why she didn’t inform me? I still don’t know. Well maybe she doesn’t want me to know.

“As time passes, we miss people less… but the loneliness stays forever”
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Thursday, August 04, 2005 [ 11:01 AM ]



Where's Garci?

I remember during my childhood days where I played hide and seek. I seldom became the seeker because I’m very good at hiding during that time But with the few times that I became one, those that were hard to find were those that hides themselves in a very far place, as far as their cousins house in the next few blocks. That was hard to find but the hardest is the one who would go home, sleep and forgot that he is playing the game. (I admit being one, but I did it only once) But why did that happened? It is because of that clumsy seeker, who would look to places that obviously no one would hide like in a main road, and those who hide get bored and end up going home; sometimes even the seeker goes home and didn’t bother to seek. In a hide and seek, the seeker cannot find those who hide if, they were good at hiding, or they went home, or the seeker is a clumsy seeker, or the seeker is really not seeking.

That brings me to the where’s Garci issue. The Congress had invited him not just once and there were also two subpoenas issued for him. The problem was no one had received the subpoena because no one knows his whereabouts. It is very obvious that he didn’t want to show himself in the House of Representatives, don’t tell me that he didn’t know about the congressional hearing. That is a nonesense. The congress decided to issue a warrant of arrest yesterday to forcefully bring him to the hearing and copies of the warrant were given to the PNP, AFP and some government agency to serve it to Garci. The problem is, those who will serve the warrant were the same that were supposed to issue the subpoena to him.

Can they now find Garci? What is the difference of serving a subpoena and serving a warrant of arrest if Garci cannot be located? That would mean the same. No Garci, No Subpoena, No warrant of arrest. The question is why they cannot find Garci? Is it that Garci went to a far place? (as far as London) or they were just a clumsy seeker who were looking in places that obviously shows no signs of Garci? or is it that they are really not looking for him? or worst, is the seeker the one who is hiding garci?

*****

In a classroom situation, the professor told the students before the exam “Do your best” and the students says “ok sir, we will do our best.” After the exam, some students failed. The professor asked “did you do your best?” Of course the students answered yes. The professor said “your best wasn’t good enough.”
That applies to those who are looking for Garci, “did you do your best?” if yes, “your best wasn’t good enough” if no, “Do your best stupid, look for Garci!”
1 COMMENTS

Wednesday, August 03, 2005 [ 12:30 PM ]



Poor Philippines?

I can’t really recall the exact figure but as if I remember it right, the news said that there would a P64B budget for the Charter Change that would be taken from the government allowance.

P64B? I thought the Philippines is a poor country… am I wrong? Is it that the Philippines is just pretending to be poor? and it is not true that our country has a big budget deficit? and our country doesn’t really need the help of other country to lend us money? and our government offices are just saving their money for a future use like chacha?... I don’t thinks so.

Is our government saying that it is better to use that budget for the change of the constitution rather than to the malnourish children of this country dying because of hunger? or because of eating spoiled food? Is our government saying that the P64B is better to be used for the change of the constitution rather than to the change of public classrooms that looked more like a stockroom? Is our government saying that it would be better to use the P64B to change the constitution rather than using it to provide shelter for the homeless? Well… maybe that is what our politicians want to say.
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Tuesday, August 02, 2005 [ 11:38 AM ]



Now it's clear why

The congress now had finally come up with the decision that they would adopt the same rules of impeachment used against former President Estrada. Surprisingly, the majority did not hinder the adopting of the same rules. In it, the minority can legally gather signatures to complete the magic 79 that would transmit the case to the senate. Before, some majority congressmen are saying that it is not possible because the only signatures that will be recognized were that 42 that were in the complaint.

As said by Chiz Escudero, the majority may think that they cannot gather the signatures needed. That is quite logical, because if the majority is sure that the minority can gather the votes, they would have not allowed the same rules. But there maybe some other reason behind?

Administration congressman Marcoleta who endorsed the first impeachment complaint filed by also an administration lawyer Oliver Lozano is now desperately working for attention. He is now saying that the impeachment complaint that the congress should recognize is the one he endorsed and not the amended complaint by the minority.

Can you see the picture? If the congress agreed to work on the original complaint endorsed by Marcoleta, the complaint will just be dismissed even if the minority succeeded in transmitting it to the senate because of its lack of substance. What the minority wants to work on is the amended version and not that original that would certainly fail.

This is why the minority called to the administration before that they should not preempt them in filing the complaint. It is just like that the administration decided what questions to answer. (Like what they did in the last press conference) That is clearly a strategy from the administration, to file their version of the complaint just to escape the main issue. The administration knows that they can easily break from the complaint of Lozano that?s why they are pushing it, they don?t want the amended complaint, they only want the Lozano (administration) version. That is a very clear example of using legal tactics to hide something. In the first place the administration would not have endorsed a ?weak? complaint if it was just for nothing.

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