Why should we become federalists?

In a political culture where the checks and balances system is diminished or simply made lame by tyranny and corruption accompanied with incompetence and unaccountability in its agencies and lack of proper representation of the people, the breaking up of such power is the only way of weakening the despotic tendencies of a highly centralized executive branch. Furthermore, nationwide crises of poverty and rebellion are offsprings of the lack of geographical and sectoral equity especially in the distribution of powers and opportunity of development, hampering the growth of areas and sectors who find it most difficult to represent themselves.

A solution lies in the institution of an alternative to our present system, and in time has it arrived in the hands of eleven senators who submitted a Joint Resolution to Convene the Congress into a Constituent Assembly for the Purpose of Revising the Constitution to Establish a Federal System of Government, authored by Senator Pimentel and signed by the eleven proponents last April 23rd. I view recent attempts of charter change with ultimate distrust because they might result to a still mighty executive, yet this one is a system that shall decentralize national government and distribute some powers to new States endowed with their own legislatures, thus a broader and closer way of representation as well as immediacy in decision-making.

This will also answer the problem of poverty as the creation of states will produce new more accessible centers for trade and development to strengthen domestic industry in all areas. Likewise long-standing insurgency will likely be reversed as the insurgents' grievances can be addressed through representation in their respective statewide legislature (I hope the proponents may broaden the scope of sectoral representation in the state legislature other than the farmers, fisherfolks and senior citizens, to include the other minorities as what their respective localities may constitute).

This is better compared to our present form of government where stacks of pending matters consume the session of the Congress and insurgents' grievances are not being brought up with swift concern - the reason why they still raise arms against the government and even worse against the citizens and non-citizens.

The joint resolution, as its title states, seeks to convert the Congress to a Constituent Assembly to revise our existing constitution in a shift towards federalism, where regions reorganized and renamed as States shall possess their own executive and legislative powers under a State Governor. The country shall then be called The Federal Republic of the Philippines (Revision No. 2 of Article I), a federation of government units under a federal administrative region (Metro Manila), similar to the United States. The only difference is that the federal system of the US sprang from its founding fathers' desire for a central federal government while ours is framed originally to decentralize the government for the maximal mobilization and participation of the entire archipelago.

The main feature of the draft, as has been mentioned earlier, is the creation of states, eleven in all, plus the Federal Administrative Region of Metro Manila, so that there would be established “eleven centers of finance and development in the archipelago” (Explanatory Note) and “help dissipate the causes of unrest and rebellion in the land.” (Revision No. 1 of Article II, Section 9). Under the Revision No. 2 of Article I is the composition of States with their corresponding proposed capitals, namely;

1. The State of Northern Luzon (Tuguegarao City)
2. The State of Central Luzon (Tarlac City)
3. The State of Southern Tagalog (Tagaytay City)
4. The State of Bicol (Legazpi City)
5. The State of Minparom (Mamburao, Mindoro Occidental)
6. The State of Eastern Visayas (Catbalogan City)
7. The State of Central Visayas (Toledo City)
8. The State of Western Visayas (Iloilo City)
9. The State of Northern Mindanao (Cagayan de Oro)
10. The State of Southern Mindanao (Davao City)
11. The BangsaMoro (Marawi City)
+Federal Administrative Region of Metro Manila

Some other notable revisions are the abolitions of the Judicial and Bar Council (Revision No. 1 of Article VIII, Section 8), Sangguniang Kabataan (Revision No.5 of Article XII, New Section), Deputy Ombudsman for the Military (Revision No. 4 of Article XIII, Section 5) and of the Presidential Commission on Good Government (Article XIX, Section 26) possibly because of questions in performance and effectivity.

The draft also contains revisions that aim to assign state representation to Senators, hence making them geographical representatives (Revision No. 2 of Article VI). According to Revision No. 3 of the same article, states shall be represented by 6 senators, and 9 to represent overseas Filipinos (Revision No. 4 of Article VI, New Section). This means that all in all the Senate shall have 75 members, and in an enlarged proportion the House of Representatives grows to 350 members; 300 from congressional districts and 50 from party lists (Revision No.7 of Article VI, Section 5).

It is my intention to dwell more on this draft weren't it for the length of this posting. However this shall continue on the following days. It is my pleasure that the patient reader may allow The Pelican Spectator to offer reactions and opinions regarding the joint resolution and how it can affect the nation, and indeed it is my humble honor to always do the service of informing my countrymen without any compensation.

Was Shakespeare two different poets?

It is my interest for poetry which renders yesterday, April 23rd, a special day but a degree lower than my fiancée and I’s anniversary. April 23rd is both the traditional birthday and the death anniversary of the most posthumously controversial poet who ever lived, the “Great Bard” of the universe William Shaksper. Yes, the man Shaksper who supposedly wrote the most beloved plays Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello etc., is the authorship rival of another contemporary poet mistakenly celebrated in his day as the same man. And his name was Shake-Speare.

I am not the only fool who doubts whether the bard we know today as William Shakespeare wrote the entire magna opera ascribed to the name “Shakespeare”. There is a long list of men who had expressed their disbelief that the peasant from Stratford-upon-Avon who went not farther than London could write about Venice, Denmark, and France and much of Europe. Among them are Walt Witman, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Mark Twain, Orson Welles, Henry James, Sigmund Freud and Tyrone Guthrie (Shakespeare Authorship Coalition).

I was most intrigued when I found out that the sonnets, 154 in all, are not actually published under the name “William Shakespeare,” but instead under the pseudonymous SHAKE-SPEARE. Consult every copy of The Sonnets in your local bookstores, and read the introductions which may explain the same incongruity. Furthermore, William Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon, as we differentiate him from our theoretical SHAKE-SPEARE, is not born as a Shakespeare. Based on the parish registry of the Holy Trinity Church he was baptized on April 26, 1564 as William Shaksper, and he and his family used either Shakspere or Shakspear, but never Shakespeare.

The Stratfordian Shakespeare was educated in a free school chartered in 1553, called the King’s New School, and beyond that he never went to Gray’s Inn (which was the training house for lawyers during his day). Yet, as what can be perceived in his sonnets, legal terms (at least during their time) such as impeach, exchequer, auditor, forfeit, moiety, recompense, sureties, lease and many more (200 in all according to Sobran) are scattered in his lines. In The Merchant of Venice he has an elaborate description of the Italian city customs when in fact he had never been there. Are the writings ascribed to the known “William Shakespeare” actually works of two authors (one William Shakespeare and the other SHAKE-SPEARE) mistaken to be one? But if the former is the playwright and theater owner from Stratford-upon-Avon, who could have been the mysterious SHAKE-SPEARE?

During the 17th century it was not “honorable” for an aristocrat to write plays and poems for the public. Hence poets who were courtiers of the period published either under pen-names or just left their writings to their will. Such writers who had their outputs published posthumously were Sir Philip Sydney of the Astrophel and Stella fame, Fulke Greville and Sir Walter Raleigh.

Our search leads us to one man; similarly a poet, playwright, sportsman, patron of writers and the theater, Elizabethan courtier, and a traveler who in his lifetime roved the cities mentioned in the Shakespearean plays - and most of all, William Shakespeare’s contemporary - Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford.

What is the parallelism between Oxford and the writings ascribed to be Shakespeare’s? Let us take it incisively. Oxford was a talented courtier, educated at Gray’s Inn in 1567, and was a poet and playwright famous during his time (even more famous than the theater-owner Shakespeare of Stratford-upon-Avon), but as it appears none of his work under the name Oxford survives today. Researchers premise that Oxford used a pseudonym because it was the common style of aristocratic writers of the period. Was SHAKE-SPEARE the pseudonym he used?

Polonius, a major character in Shakepeare’s Hamlet, is being seen by Elizabethan scholars as modeled after Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley. And who is William Cecil? He was just the custodian of Edward de Vere during his youth.

If you have read William Shakespeare’s First Folio, you shall see that it was dedicated to a certain Earl of Montgomery who was, according to the Folio, one of the INCOMPARABLE PAIRE OF BRETHREN. And was it just a coincidence that the Earl of Montgomery was the husband of Susan de Vere, Oxford’s daughter?

Another mysterious dedicatee is a certain Mr. W. H. of The Sonnets. Was Mr. W. H. Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, who was engaged then to one of Oxford’s daughters?

“To the onlie begetter of these insuing sonnets Mr. W. H. all happinesse and that eternitie promised by our everliving poet wisheth the well-wishing adventurer in setting forth T. T.”

T. T. was Thomas Thorpe, the printer who published the Sonnets. The term “ever-living” is usually used to refer to someone who has been deceased. But why would Thorpe mention the word in 1609 when the Stratfordian Shakespeare was not yet dead (his death would occur seven years later in 1616)? Was he referring to Oxford, who was already dead five years past in 1604? Remarkably it is notable that after 1604 Shakespeare “fell silent” until Thorpe’s publication of the sonnets in 1609.

And if you would examine the contents of The Sonnets, the first seventeen sonnets all try to convince a certain Fair Lord to marry and have children lest his youth will fade without an heir. Similarly Oxford tried to convince Henry Wriothesley (to whom Shake-speare’s Sonnets was dedicated) to marry one of his daughters who had been engaged to the latter.

The sonnets were written in the ababcdcdefefgg rhyme scheme known as the English Sonnet or later the Shakespeare Sonnet. The rhyme scheme was invented by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, and he was Oxford’s uncle.

Oxford once wrote an epistle to Thomas Bedingfield’s English Translation of Cardanus, and the same epistle was being referred to by critics as “Hamlet’s book” because it incredibly parallels the thought and style of writing used in the play particularly in Hamlet’s famous monologue “to be or not to be.” In addition to it Oxford was a man with too much knowledge in aristocratic life, the military, law, and his passion in the theaters, things rarely observed in a rustic. A researcher also adds that there are abundant similarities between Oxford’s life and the Shakespearean plays (Looney, 1920).

Also, there are only a few records of the Stratfordian Shakespeare’s life, and not only his writings had been doubted but also his religious beliefs and even his sexuality as well.

These are a few evidences that influenced my viewpoint on Shakespeare similar to what convinced numerous historians, actors, poets, politicians and writers. However, it is up to you to either believe it or do a lot of research before jumping over the fence to the yard where the Oxfordians are grilling barbecue. Just some tidbits of controversy though, to commemorate the birth and death in the peculiar fashion of a much peculiar Shakespeare whose name has somehow left the world with the nostalgic air of Elizabethan life in the cloak-and-sword days.

It is midnight of the 23rd, or rather, 24th

Lying in bed deep in my thoughts I try to resolve something that puzzles me lately. It seems that for decades we have been in a long political experiment that ends in trial and error, but how come? Is it simply because of governance? Has our political culture gotten something to do with it? Or our history? Is it something legal? Moral?

Every nation in the whole sphere is embedded with corruption, for so it is the prevalent disposition of mankind to always degenerate and be the prisoner of his shadow, but it is headache to be absorbed wondering why the Philippines is being hit hard in the stomach. Is it just grandstanding in our part?

I stare blankly before this little screen before me, the cursor blinking impatiently urging me to impress something upon the virtual paper that is my freedom, my expression. This will be my last escapement when I am being cuffed by the madness of our times.

Ah, my ever-madder, ranting soliloquy! Perhaps, perhaps. Some light flickers in my brain amidst this midnight darkness. I find some reasons to believe that as someone who has a vital role in this nation I need to have a voice, or to be in place of it a representation. But what if my countrymen and I have an uneven opportunity of getting represented?

The country is a little collection of masses drifting in democracy, yet not everyone has a voice. We are a small geography, hence we should be easier to manage, and will benefit if convened altogether. But how? Even though, we are still more than 85 million people to convene. Perhaps to organize us in some regional assemblies that have national personality? Let issues be heard first in a lower level, then the representatives of the regional convention, which should be the senators, will forward the regional decision to the national government. This way I reckon, representation is broadened and put to maximum use while at the same time distributing the power of the government to regions.

Ah! Am I thinking of federalism?!

Where on Earth Day is the Philippines?

Today I try to forbid myself from creating another political ranting to give way to a very important observance begun one score and eighteen years ago - the Earth Day. To celebrate the occasion I fixed my old mountain bike first thing in the morning and rode to town to promote usage of environment-friendly transportation rather than belching exhaust gas from hot rides none of which I do possess.

My God! I sighed back home. Temperature escalated considerably in comparison to the previous summers. This year, Cabanatuan City is the hottest place in the country in terms of degrees Celcius, not in night live parties. This concern is augmented by rubbish deals, as in literally rubbish, knocking on our door since 2004 and admitted entry in 2006 in the form of JPEPA, or the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement, which not only makes the Philippines a continental Payatas exclusive to the Japs, but also drains our workers in foreign market access, an interest defined in the Medium Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP) and Philippine Export Development Plan (PEDP). Our goods are exchanged for loads of toxic garbage.

I do not know if She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named has lost her wits or just simply her sense of dignity that she sold the country's resources for a contemptible mandate. She did not even weigh the practicality and took it at face value, without a foreshadowing on its short-term and long-term outcome as well as fallout.

Sigh, soon we will become nostalgic of the days when the gentle winds carry the fresh scent of the month of May. Will the country ever smell the same? Without hefts of wastes, without pollution, just that same old sweetness.

Sigh, it is Earth Day. Let me have my mountain bike. Like R. Kelly I'll just roll my wheels and ride away.

Consolidated funds in place of pork barrel

The type of consolidated revenue system I have in mind is different from those utilized by the Commonwealth states particularly Canada, Great Britain and Australia. My version springs from the thought that pork barrel is a seemingly immedicable and perennial syphilis with corruption as the spirochete responsible to our national difficulties. I have no idea why Congress prefers not to repeal it, unless I be as malicious as any investigative journalist has been, to find that most politicians' abundant bank accounts are well indebted to it. Hence when no other acts seem expedient to push for its revocation we are left to search for but alternatives difficult to be perverted. These is what I'll be ranting for today.

I put up before your monitor the consolidated revenues style, which is a more secure way of spending the taxpayer's purse. We have here the Bangko Sentral, an independent entity, as one of the modules of the experiment, but with a minor role in this ranting.

It works simply, as a senator or a congressional representative acts as the proponent of his projects for the fiscal year. Here let us introduce two types of allocations, one the fixed allocations and the other the special allocations. Both can only be retrieved after the appraisal of a responsible agency, who shall study the value of the projects for the fiscal year. Only after such calculation and presentation of feasibility studies can the proponent secure clearance from the agency to collect his funds.

By the last two months of the fiscal year, a different agency (to prevent or discourage bribery), this time the Commission on Audit, shall review accomplishments or progress reports. Surpluses and deficits must be taken into consideration and should be appropriately recalled and reimbursed respectively, to and from the fund.

There is not yet any precedent of this method's implementation in similar governments, but our political culture calls for an innovative step to spearhead reform.

Broadening representation

I view our present way of representation with uncertainty due to the fact that, as I have put forward yesterday, not all of the minorities (i.e., the marginalized sectors) are granted legislative voices. In fact in the Lower House we can have a maximum of fifty sectoral representatives, but since many could not surpass the 2% vote required not more than twenty are given seats.

On the other hand, I also view those elected by their districts with the same degree of doubt because we are not sure whether they are serving primarily for the advancement of the community or just looking around for some personal glory and gain. It is a politician's sacrifice to give up his ambitions solely for the sake of public service, one thing most rarely done.

A district with a corrupt and incompetent representative who is too deaf to hear or too mute to voice out the distresses of his people can be described as underrepresented. Same is a sector which because of being too little to garner enough support cannot break the 2% barrier. The latter is what I call the arithmetically deprived.

The Philippines, because of its diversity, must innovate a way to address every part of the society, from farmer to OFW to ethnic groups, for every minority needs a voice as the basic realization of our democracy. Furthermore this is how every Filipino can participate in national policy-making, to be done largely by broader representation. Categorical rather than numerical representation is also a solution to the problem of overlapping entities in our party-list system.

However, this gives rise for another concern - the sizable allotment of the pork barrel. The solution should be its painful removal and putting in place of it the Consolidated Revenues system, the contextual applicability of which to the Philippine political culture and status quo, I shall further study and will explain in later postings.

Of the functionality of party lists

I am wondering if we are indeed a well-represented society. Since my faith has fallen less in district congressmen whose projects have to be stamped with names in bold letters and appear more like a private property I began to turn my attention towards the significance of sectoral representatives (party lists).

In the multi-party arena of Philippine politics the bulk of party lists sitting in Congress are being chosen not by the number of marginalized sectors ought to be represented but by the 2-6% standard percentage of total votes just like any country else.

Thus what this system has is a blind election process where a sector may be represented by more than one party lists of overlapping goals and statements of principles. That is a good drain of government funds which should have been proportioned to other distinct sectors unfortunately provided with the slimmest attention. How about those sectors which have the least but most needy constituents?

Furthermore I fear that, like many other mainstream political parties, some of them are only party lists in name. Only a handful of sectoral representatives have expressed active participation in the legislature while others are dependent upon other legislators (who might have concurred as a result of lobbying). With these things in mind I ask not only the Honorables but those who went to the polls in the previous election and are voting in 2010 as well, just how strong and functional is our party list system today?

Truth or truth, which one?

Retired Bishop Jose C. Sorra of Legaspi recently collected the belowmentioned information allegedly about Jun Lozada, which has just found its way to my email inbox as a forwarded message. The Pelican Spectator does not necessarily reflect the opinions not ascribed to its authorship, but only to reveal information as is actually occurred or written.

*******

The 'Permissible Sins' and Dysfunctions of Jun Lozada
By Ret. Bishop Jose C. Sorra of Legaspi

"We cannot be warriors of truth
if we are not men and women of integrity."
-Rolando V. de la Rosa, OP
University of Santo Tomas

HE ADMITTED to have committed "permissible sins" under a "dysfunctional government procurement system." Consider the following and judge whether Mr. Rodolfo Noel "Jun" Lozada is indeed a hero and a saint as he projects himself to be, or simply a crook and a heel:

1. As Chief Executive Officer of the Philippine Forest Corporation:
He gave lands to his relatives and friends under the Lupang Hinirang reforestation project of the PFC, instead of the poor farmers;

He gave 50 hectares of prime land in Antipolo City to Transforma Quinta, a company he and his wife owns;

He insured himself for P15 million, using government funds and with his wife Violeta as insurance agent;

He awarded many contracts to just one company (Gabriel Multimedia) without public bidding;

He awarded 10,000 hectares of land to just one family in Negros, while claiming to be touched by the wretched condition of ordinary farmers.


2. As witness to the Senate investigations on the NBN-ZTE deal:
Other than his theatrics (crying, laughing, looking scared), Lozada said nothing new and substantial. He never presented documentary evidence, and much of what he said were hearsay that could not stand in the court of law;

He said he never talked to the opposition prior to his appearance at the Senate. But Senator Panfilo Lacson himself said that he and Senator Jamby Madrigal met with Lozada at least six (6) times since December last year. There are reports that Lozada has been dealing with Lacson much earlier than December 2007, indicating his coming out has been well-planned and scripted. When he admitted meeting with Lacson, Lozada said he discussed with Secretary Romulo Neri and offer by rich business people identified with the opposition of a "patriotic fund" worth P20 million for them to come out and speak against the government. Neri refused the offer. By coming out, and by making the offer to Neri, Lozada may have received the "patriotic fund," making him a paid witness;

Lozada said he was a "consultant" of Neri without pay other than occasional lunches and dinners. Why he dipped his hands on big deals such as the NBN project to "moderate the greed," as he claimed, indicates he was a fixer. Fixers negotiate between the parties involved and usually take cuts on the commissions;

Lozada only embarrassingly admitted to his irregularities as head of PFC when he was confronted by Senator Miriam Santiago with documents. He would not have admitted to his "permissible level" of wrongdoings if Santiago did not open them up.

Lozada presented himself as an expert in information technology, and also projected himself as an "expert" in the economy, in government systems (even if he served only in government for more than two years), in morality, among many other fields. In all this, even his
casual opinions have been projected as Bible truth.


3. As a professional:
As an IT professional, he was a failure. His company Net Curricula Inc. became bankrupt. There are reports of failed and irregular deals with his company's clients;

Lozada became known as a broker for construction projects. Being an alumnus of the University of Santo Tomas, he brokered several UST construction projects, including the sports complex and multi-storey carpark. The sports complex project resulted in the dismissal of the UST treasurer whom Lozada dealt with, indicating of irregularities. In the carpark project, he brought in a company called Selegna Holding, in which he reportedly is part owner, to build the project on build-operate-transfer (BOT) scheme. But Selegna did not have the money to finance the project, and used instead funds of the university via the brokering skills of Lozada. UST got the raw end of the deal. Ginisa sa sariling mantika. Up to this day, Lozada's wife Violeta still collects P200,000 a month as Jun's share in the operations of the carpark.


4. As a person:
If Lozada can tolerate and accept as "permissible" a commission and overprice of US$65 million (P2.6 billion), then he is a crook of the highest order who can be sued for plunder 50 times over;

Taped conversations with Joey de Venecia on amounts to be remittedto his ATM account regarding the NBN project prove that he is just asrotten and devious as the people he is ratting on;

Lozada is enjoying and having fun as the nation becomes deeplydivided and as the economy is now being affected by the situation hecreated. He swaggers "like a rock star," proclaiming himself as "champion of the truth." He does not care that the extremist destabilizers and political opportunists have used him for their own ends – to grab power;

Lozada is a philandering husband, a liar to his wife and children, as he fathered two children from another woman. He was so brazen he even travelled with his mistress abroad (in the US in 1999);

Lozada admits to be a liar and a crook, believing that people will absolve his lies and misdeeds only because he admitted to them;

He has unabashedly used the Holy Mass as a tool to spread divisiveness and confusion. Yet, in the height of arrogance, he threatened to renounce his Catholic faith if does not get the full
support of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), majority of whom are unimpressed by his antics.

HEROES ARE SUPPOSED TO BE NOBLE.
SAINTS MUST BE HOLY.
THE FOREGOING POINT TO WHAT
LOZADA REALLY IS –
A CROOK.
+Jose C. Sorra

Enough! What we are asking now is peace

I agree that the Philippines is in a chaotic state, but compared to others we are a country so aggressive for democracy that the dilemma is psychologically depressive to the mind of every concerned Filipino. As a youth I am just representative of those who are confounded by the events mustered by the failures and adversities especially in good governance. Why does the youth march and yell before the gates of public offices? Not for the reason that we know the cause, but that we are confused of the cause itself.

Sometimes we become like automatons who are repeatedly asked to do the same thing. Twenty-two years ago our fathers were told to fight for freedom. They fought for it, but had they got what they deserved? Not really. Eight years ago our brothers did the same, and what did those efforts bore? Just the same. We changed leaders just to be the same. We staged our efforts and broke our limbs to smother tyranny but all we got is an empty stomach. We are mercenaries expecting to be paid with freedom, human rights and a better future, a better economy. But they still remain promises with different, ever-changing skins. Even some of our elders are deriding us that we are too unnecessarily idealistic. We have stretched our extremities but still what do we have?

Enough of all this. It took us decades just to wake up and say, “Finish up this damn dream! We are fed up with all your troubles, what we are asking now is peace.”

Give Bush a world record for the first blunder of the millenium

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W10-ufTRCW8

For five years the United States is trying to mend the destructions brought by the Bush administration's bad decisions in Iraq; in setting the wrath of insurgents aflame instead of deterring them; in being obliged to use so much money to continue war operations; and finally in being on a greater part responsible to the diminishing global oil industry that left nations groveling in poverty.

I wonder if the bushwhack boy of America lying in wait for more chances of war and self-glorification is unconscious of it or is just playing will-o'-the-wisp in continuing with his Middle East policies. There are above a dozen contradictions in the reports of the media and humanitarian organizations to those of what Bush and his secretaries repeatingly assert.

He must learn that less boasters means less mistakes. The more he brags of his military's expertise and precision the further away his distance from reality, and the people are no jackass-suckers to fall on his propaganda. The world is now educated to separate fiction from fact, and everything is beginning to be obviously palpable.

Laugh out loud for Rummy who said years ago that those who were continuing the insurgency were supporters of Saddam Hussein. I am glad the war-architect has long been off the Wing for good. How come he knew it when he only visited Baghdad not more than two times? Should a conclusion be drawn from bettors who never saw actual warfare?

Take it from correspondent Michael Ware of CNN, who had been present all along the chaos, with other media, military and humanitarian volunteers.

”None of [the insurgents] are fighting for Saddam; they are fighting for their homes, their honor.”

I was then a high school junior when I saw live on television how the American bombers ripped Baghdad five years ago. I confess I initially felt admiration towards the sophistication of the US offensive; the radars, Tomahawk bombs, self-guided missiles with adjustable explosive power, etc.. But the next day saw me stunned by the images which turned both my stomach and my principle. Those images were no propaganda, but genuine eyewitness accounts. It was shock and awe alright, which mission is to inspire fear to what US is able to do to any power who dares come across its plans.

The biggest mistake of GMA's Atlantic ally is his biting the bait set for him by extremists. They knew his weaknesses; his hatred, ambitions and wanting. His own actions gave terror the green light and justified the perverted means of insurgents, half of whom has been fighting for revenge and the other half challenging the religious and ideological supremes. It would not surprise me if one day an alliance is formed by these hostile dissenters, for even now Osama bin Laden is talking of Iraq as an ideal setting for a jihad (on a video released last March 20).

It may mean that an assimilation of terrorist forces is going on, and further agression of the US-led army will not secure peace but rather inspire more terrorists to unite and rally on bin Laden's side.

It must serve as warning, that is to say, a late warning especially to him who has blundered on his foreign policies.

What is worse is that we can see no rue in Bush. Nor does he try to reverse it, but instead he made it severe with his 2007 “surge” attempt. What has this man gone into? What a coincidence, I prefer him to Leslie Nielsen for the role of the US President in Scary Movie 4.

Bush calls the insurgents “extreme and ruthless.” Being at the same level as him they truly are.

There was a year when it was rumored that Bush had been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Nay, for that early blunder let Guinness give him a world record instead.

Rule of law, not rule of thumb

Whatever the kinds of truth they are talking about in the Lozada case call me ignorant for not having understood the ambiguity of their definitions. I just do not believe that you can have truth that easy, may it be through numbers or through lies, it does not make any sense at all. Will it be that I should just state my case and sputter a few poetry and call it truth afterwards, or summon a whole council to vote on it and after a referendum or the yeas and nays of the roll call decide by the majority?

The mass is exclaiming “katotohanan, katotohanan,” and the Honorables are uneasy in their swivel chairs because the Filipino humanity is once again warning to strike the roads if impatience in the matter grew.

So whose Truth is it? Is it the Lozada Truth, or the Government’s version?

We come here to an urgent resolution, because living in a democratic republic with a vast political diversity it is improper to raise banners and go to Mendiola if our reasoning is simply “e sabi nila eh ganun daw kasi.” First, what must be known carefully is on what side of the political fence one is, and whether he acts by the name of the cause or by the name of a politician/s. Government politics is not a two-sided fence, but three. Are you maka-Administrasyon, maka-Oposisyon, or maka-Bayan? Which of these?

The first of the three takes to account the salvation of the government, of course. Meanwhile the second is made up of dissenters pushing for the demolition of the administration with less concern to its aftermath (what happens to peace, economy, etc. they do not care), perhaps because they are under the influential powers of someone or somebody. The third one may support either of the first two, but is uninfluenced except by national weal alone, and thinks that everything must be put in order so that the nation will not suffer the consequences especially if the upshot becomes detrimental to public and economic welfare in general. Rule of law, that is.

Happily our young Honorables of the opposition today both from the Congress and the Senate are more like the last of the three, maka-Bayan. Having faith on the established procedures is the right and peaceful way of finding out the TRUE TRUTH. Let us pray for their success in doing so.