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Facts and figures: President Noynoy Aquino’s promises by the numbers

July 24, 2011 benign0 6 Comments

Politicians are quick to grandstand about their achievements and their “contributions” to the development of our wretched land, the Philippines. Whenever statistics about the economy or survey results describing public sentiment is released, politicians will go on a media blitz to ensure that an association between these and themselves are implanted in the vacuous minds…

Development, Economy, Politics

Main Event: Manny Pacquiao vs the Manila Polo Club

July 22, 2011 benign0 13 Comments

Lots of populist huffing and puffing going on again after Filipino boxing champ Manny Pacquiao was allegedly refused membership in the Ã¼ber prestigious Manila Polo Club (MPC), which reportedly counts only people who are “the country’s A-listers belonging to the influential and affluent level of the Philippine status quo” as worthy to join its ranks….

Glitz and Glamour, Society

Online social lives – the modern-day mental virus

July 21, 2011November 24, 2018 benign0 4 Comments

They’d presumably be flirting and exhibiting wit and cool (the stuff that we are all finely-tuned to use as a basis for making friends and finding mates) using real voices, making real eye contact, and exhibiting real body language, all of these reciprocated by the other party using the same biological ensemble. People who are…

Society, Tech Talk

Why re-opening the Hello Garci case is like the second invasion of Iraq

July 20, 2011 benign0 76 Comments

Making news today is another blast from the past — the re-opening of the 2004 election cheating scandal that engulfed most of former President Gloria Arroyo’s term from then ’til 2009 and a new investigation mounted on the back of a possible testimony from Zaldy Ampatuan and Lintang Bedong both of whom have admitted to…

Crime, Politics

What Metro Manila billboards tell us about the Filipino character

July 19, 2011July 19, 2011 benign0 18 Comments

Driving up or down EDSA, the main road transport artery through the Philippine megalopolis of Metro Manila, is like navigating a badly-designed website. The huge billboards that line the iconic thoroughfare competing for the attention of motorists and their passengers are monuments to the aesthetic sensibilities of Filipinos. Manila, after all, is the cultural capital…

Culture, Environment, Media

An unsolicited draft of President Noynoy Aquino’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) for July 25, 2011

July 18, 2011June 8, 2012 benign0 5 Comments

My dear countrymen, members of Congress, honourable House Speaker, Senate President, and Chief Justice, ladies and gentlemen of the diplomatic corps: Today I stand before you, this 25th day of July 2011 to do three things: (1) report on what we had achieved in the last twelve months, (2) give you a summary of the…

Development, Economy, Government, Politics, Society

Google+ relationships are one-way streets

July 18, 2011 benign0 10 Comments

It’s been one week since I first jumped into the Google+ bandwagon and published my initial thoughts about it. My observations from that piece haven’t changed — basically Google+ is the Facebook sharing experience wrapped around a Twitter-like networking philosophy. In that sense, Google+ is a true “mash-up” — a Facebook-Twitter hybrid that seems to…

Tech Talk

A call to President Noynoy Aquino to ditch the color yellow

July 16, 2011August 20, 2013 benign0 66 Comments

Tired, old, and quite frankly embarrassing. That’s what’s become of the whole yellow motif of the Aquino clan and its circle of business cronies, relatives, “shooting buddies”, lackeys, Media outlets, and cadre of bloggers, publicists, and “social media activists”. It was the primary colour of a successful propaganda campaign that started in 1983, peaked in…

Culture, Government, Politics, Society