Category: Politics

Are UP students suffering from a failure of thinking?

April 20, 2017April 20, 2017 benign0 3 Comments

Interesting how just as the government of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte is unveiling a massive programme of infrastructure spend of unprecedented proportions, the prevailing online chatter amongst would-be and wannabe “activists” had so far been centred around the proposed honorary degree to be conferred by the University of the Philippines on the president. The sheer…

Education, Politics

Did Congressman Floreindo’s Side Chick Cathy Binag Meddle In Tadeco’s Business?

April 19, 2017 P. Farol 2 Comments

I’m still recovering from the holy week “festivities” as I write this and of the dozens of stories I heard from vacationing pundits across the Philippine socmed universe, one sticks out. It has to do with a previous Inquirer article titled “Cathy Binag: GF spat alone did not trigger Alvarez case vs Floirendo” and fellow socmed enthusiast…

Politics

Current VP Leni Robredo’s vanity and delusions of grandeur got her in deep trouble

April 19, 2017 Ilda 9 Comments

We all have that moment when we ask ourselves “What the hell was I thinking?!” after we realise we made a huge mistake and then wish we could kick ourselves on our backsides for doing something we regret. Yes, it happens to the best of us. We are not perfect, after all. In a lot…

Media, Politics

Supporters of Leni Robredo dumbfounded by 11 percent fall in trust ratings!

April 11, 2017 benign0 15 Comments

A report published by Pulse Asia on the 5th of April showed that Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s “performance ratings” declined by five percentage points and his “trust ratings” by seven percentage points. As expected, the Yellow camp and Duterte’s critics were ecstatic. The eminent former “journalist” and Human Rights Watch research person Caloy Conde was…

Media, Politics

Is Philippine House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez saying extra-marital affairs are “normal”?

April 7, 2017April 7, 2017 Ilda 6 Comments

Current Speaker of the Philippine House of Representative Pantaleón Álvarez recently came under fire after his extramarital affair was exposed. To be precise, he copped some flak from some sectors of society, but not all. Apparently, it was an “open-secret” in Congress that Alvarez has a girlfriend, but for some “reason”, presumably because he is…

Civics, Lifestyle, Politics

The Crass Moralism of The Silent No More Facebook Page

April 7, 2017April 7, 2017 P. Farol 24 Comments

Silent No More is one of those Facebook pages that crosses my timeline now and then, largely because some of my friends belong to the yellow political spectrum or have business with some of its high priests. Among Silent No More’s recent posts, one that made me cringe a bit was one that shamed Elenita…

Government, Politics

Philippine Twitter Goes Bananas Over Cong. Tonyboy Floreindo’s #25Billion Scam

April 5, 2017April 5, 2017 P. Farol 3 Comments

Topping the oddities that happened over the past few days is the trending hashtag #25BillionScam which nearly overtook #ColdPlayManila a couple of times over the past few hours. I’m not sure how many tweets it takes for a topic to trend, but I’ll estimate that it’s in the magnitude of a couple of thousand per…

Politics

Dutertard vs Yellowtard: Cult of personality is a hard Filipino habit to break

April 3, 2017April 3, 2017 benign0 12 Comments

Filipino activists have it all wrong. The scope of their advocacies is defined by people, and not by principle, issues, and ideas. When one defines her interests or advocacies around a person, she necessarily locks herself into a non-negotiable loyalty to that person’s own advocacies. It is a lazy sort of advocacy — picking based…

Culture, Politics, Society