Senator Richard Gordon, presidential candidate of the Bagumbayan party, struck another blow against traditional Philippine politics (I guess) this weekend when he urged the Commission on Elections to ban the distribution and use of sample ballots with pre-shaded candidates’ entries.
Just one question about this supposed psychological report on Senator Benigno Aquino III:
What was Fr. Carmelo Caluag doing signing reports at the Ateneo Psych department?
(Got this in my spam folder, so…)
Senator Richard Gordon, presidential candidate of the Bagumbayan party, does not mince words. So when he says incumbent Senator Manuel Lapid deserves to be president more than Liberal Senator Benigno Aquino III, he means it.
Why he would say such a thing is another matter entirely. I mean, come on. Really?
Really?
I get that in politics, you sometimes have to get as many blows in as you can. Anything to get ahead and all that. But Lapid? Really?
I always check the comments section on news sites that have them. They help give me an arbitrary and unbalanced peek at how your average Filipino thinks.
One of the big stories over the long weekend was the plagiarized commencement speech delivered at the Ateneo by Philippine Long Distance and Telephone Co. chairman Manuel Pangilinan, and the reactions are more of a story than the actual story.
Either Pampanga Rep. Juan Miguel Arroyo has been a Leftist sympathizer all along, or he just doesn’t give a damn anymore because when you’re the President’s son, victory is pretty much a sure thing.
The Makabayan Coalition, composed of eight progressive people’s organizations, has accused Arroyo and the party-list group of tricycle drivers and security guards that he claims to represent of plagiarism.
Allegedly, Arroyo’s Ang Galing Pinoy party-list copied militant party-list Bayan Muna’s constitution and by-laws pretty much to the letter. According to Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares, the basic documents that Ang Galing Pinoy submitted to the Commission on Elections were very lazily copy-pasted.
A statement on the Makabayan web sitesums it up thus:
Ang Galing Pinoy was found to have plagiarized the following from the Bayan Muna Constitution even copying the exact number of articles and sections:
(i) Bayan Muna’s 10 point program in its Constitution, including its vision of establishing a nationalist and democratic government.
(ii) A word for word copying of Bayan Muna’s organizational structure and membership principles, even copying Bayan Muna’s provisions on Intermediate Leading Bodies and Barangay chapters.
(iii) Ang Galing Pinoy also copied Bayan Muna’s Special Provisions on the formation of alliances and regional parties and even how to generate funding and resources.
“Rep. Arroyo’s group is so completely detached from the marginalized sectors that it doesn’t even know the issues and condition of the poor they have to copy Bayan Muna’s declaration of principles and even organizational structures,” says Colmenares.
While probably true, a more simple explanation presents itself: Mikey is an asshole.
(Thanks, FreeSince09)
Despite years of voters’ education and politicians’ claims about how much smarter the electorate has become, it still boils down to some 53% of respondents on a Social Weather Stations survey inclined to re-elect Senator Ramon Revilla Jr., scourge of pervy doctors and the Metro Manila Film Fest.
Senator Manuel Lapid, harbinger of doom, also got 26% of the votes of 2,100 respondents, whose main criterion for choosing senators is apparently that they do nothing. If elections were held today, Lapid could get the 10th of 12 contested Senate seats.
On the other hand, if elections were held today, there would be a failure of elections since the polling machines aren’t up yet. So, there’s that, at least.
In this week of student protests, University of the Philippines (not to be confused with the Polytechnic University of the Philippines) threw paint bombs at a member of the university’s Board of Regents.
From gmanews.tv
While some sectors may call the protest action ‘awesome shit,’ there may have been less ecstatic reactions from some of UP’s more moderate students.
And so, we have this ‘apology’ being passed around on facebook:
Given people’s propensity to not read to the very end of things, facebook users (and you) probably stopped reading at “Contrary to what the whole nation witnessed on March 24, 2010, not all members of the University are rude, uncouth and disrespectful.” And, really, that’s one facebook statement I’d append my signature to without hesitation. I mean, the people have to know that we don’t all throw paint bombs at officials, right? I mean, a lot of us just get high and/or drunk at the Sunken Garden not bothering anyone. Right?
Except when you read it till the end and you realize that this isn’t an apology at all. The ‘community’ “will not apologize, however, for our militant actions (like throwing paint bombs)” because, as they say, the UP administration left them with no choice but to disrespect a university official with some sort of doctorate or whatever. The statement circulating on facebook is an apology, that’s true enough. But it’s an apology on behalf of the UP administration for forcing students to throw paint at them.
I wonder whether the more than 100 people who appended their signatures to the apology know that they were endorsing the incident that they may have been trying to distance themselves from.
On the other hand, this is a brilliant piece of work. I almost signed it myself.
Raise high the red banner of militancy at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines! Onward the proletariat! Or whatever.
Christ Jesus, PUP student leaders, doesn’t wrecking school equipment sort of, I don’t know, suddenly justify the tuition fee increase you guys are protesting?
Sort of like shooting yourself in the foot there, guys.
And then, of course, next year, there’ll be protests against the lack of desks and chairs because of the state’s abandonment of its responsibility to provide quality education. Which is probably true, but you won’t have chairs chiefly because you guys broke them. The 1,700-percent tuition fee increase from 12 pesos per unit to 200 pesos per unit won’t even buy one desk, I’m thinking. So, onward, onward. I guess.
To rebel is justified...somehow
One student leader, to show his solidarity with the students, has this to say:
“Actually, I have final exams today. But I was thinking, ‘what if next year I can’t take finals anymore because the tuition fee is so high?’ So we decided to protest instead.”
News flash for you, scholar: if, for some reason, you aren’t able to take your exams next year, that could be because you failed your finals this year by, I don’t know, not taking them. Â A-plus.
(Thanks, mouse)
The country’s fightingest senator says that she has been doing poorly on pre-election surveys because people might look for her on the ballot under ‘Santiago’ instead of  her preferred ‘Defensor-Santiago.’
Local media was agog (as much as it could be under the circumstances) when CNN Hero of the Year Efren Penaflorida admitted to courting actress and Encyclopedia Dramatica archenemy Angel Locsin.
Thanks a lot, Angel!
To no avail, it turns out, judging from his twitter stream.