Eight Random Election Afterthoughts

1. Ara Mina lost. Anjo Yllana lost. Aiko Melendez lost. Bottomline: Pops and Paulie, don't even think about it. Or better yet, tell everyone you don't know who the heck Jomari Yllana is.

2. May mga schoolmates (high school and college) pala akong politicians. Sa mga nanalo,congratulations! Sa mga di masyadong mapalad, (a) Di kailangan nasa gobiyerno para maglingkod-bayan, (b) Stick to your guns and serve the public if that's really your calling; the public will see through you, (c) End of the world na raw sa 2012, but then kungpostponed there's always 2013.

3. If Noy would rather be sworn in by a barangay captain, look no further. Anjan na sa senado o, number 1 pa - IDOL KO SI KAP BONG REVILLA!!!

4. Risa Hontiveros said it’s mathematically impossible for her to get the 12th spot in the senate race. Ma’am, as much as it hurts me to say this, we were hoping against hope. After all, ang kalaban mo sa karera, nakakabayo! Ang pagbabalik ni Leon Guerrero sa senado!

5. Villar and Loren lost, and I was kinda expecting them to get even with their ineffective endorsers by replacing them in their shows. After all, they paid millions to these stars for... nothing. So I was visualizing a Jed Madela vs Eric Santos vs Christian Bautista vs Tita Loren showdown tomorrow on ASAP XV. I was also expecting Tito Manny to get contestants who swam in a sea of garbage for Wheel of Fortune and Biga-10. But now that it's Binoe Padilla hosting Wowowee, I guess Tito Manny will have to make do with replacing Lolo Pidol in his TV5 shows and guesting in Show Me the Manny, perhaps.

6. The only scandals that work nowadays are scandals about stolen stuff. This means, yes, Filipinos (including me) do not really care about having a president having allegedly failed what turned out to be fake psychological tests (I didn't vote for Noy because of his apparent lack of skills, not because he was allegedly cuckoo. Heck, the first senator I shaded was #13 - someone who has been confirmed depressed after her son's death – Miriam). People of my hometown don't really care much for Japayukis getting allegedly raped by the vice mayor and several councilors. The councilors who ran again, plus the vice mayor all won. Compare these to the C5 extension and PSE sweet deal scandals that were thrown to Tito Manny. No amount of endorsements from Lolo Pidol, Wowowee and People's Champ resuscitated his credibility.

7. What the effing eff was Willie Revillame thinking, challenging ABS-CBN to fire him because of Jobert Sucaldito, just days before the elections? In the first place, he's not exactly A"Bias"-CBN's (I don't really 100% believe in this, I just want to use it) darling as of the moment as he endorsed Manny while the TV network has made it quite clear from the start they were leaning towards a Noynoy presidency. And the smug attitude by saying "ABS-CBN is not the only TV station in the Philippines." The heck? ABS-CBN has kept you despite that "explain before you complain" scandal, the anniversary stampede and your generally inept and irritating manner of hosting. Now that your presidential candidate lost and with the ire of your rival Joey de Leon who has TV shows on TV5 and GMA, which TV networks are you actually planning on transferring to? IBC 13? NBN? The Dating Daan station.

8. Boy Abunda on 'Kris's Despedida' issue: "Give the girl a break." Uhm, Kuya Boy, kaya nga pinapaalis, para siya magkabreak! Isipin mo, kung aalis si Kris, magkakabreak siya, magkakabreak din ang sambayanang Pilipino! Bongga!

Why I’m voting for Gibo Teodoro

Finally, I have decided who to vote for President on Monday. After much thought, it came down to either Richard Gordon or Gilbert Teodoro. Sorry, but at least for me, the others weren’t even close. I eliminated Villar as early as when he announced his candidacy (and it wasn’t even because of the C5 issue). Nicanor Perlas and JC de los Reyes didn’t really strike me as people who can actually do things on a national scale, although I applaud their efforts in their previous endeavors. Jamby’s anti-Villar campaign focus at the start of the campaign did not impress me. Noynoy Aquino was someone I considered up until I realized something – he hasn’t really done anything. So, I choose Gibo.

I have no grand illusions of this decision as having a ground-breaking, earth-shattering effect on the elections, compared to what I think a popular noontime show host thinks of his grand Vice President “announcement,” but hell yeah, it’s my vote and I am making sure I’m making an informed, well-thought decision. People who think making such a big deal out of one’s vote is unnecessary, close this note now. I guess I’m just someone who thinks exercising my right to vote will give me the right to participate in my country’s future. So, yes, I’ll be entitled to complain come hell or high water if Gibo doesn’t win and whoever sits in the presidency constructs another circus with a 6 year run.

So, why am I voting for Gibo?

• At least for me, the presidency is a job. I consider myself a part of a 36 million-strong country-wide HR department who’ll determine the candidate fitting the position. As any other job interviewer, the first thing I’ll be looking for are qualifications, of course.

• Noynoy Aquino was 3-term congressman and a senator for close to three years. For those more than ten years in the legislative, he became Deputy Speaker for Luzon (a bone tossed by then House Speaker de Venecia to placate his LP dogs/supporters) and Senate Committee Chair on Local Government. He authored 9 bills plus sponsored another 9 in the senate, and those that were actually passed into laws add up to a total of (drumroll, please)... 4. Yes, there’s definitely more to legislature than to write laws. I understand there’s check and balance with the executive and judiciary, adhoc senate committees, etc etc – I graduated with a Political science degree, thank you. But when you have someone like Miriam Defensor-Santiago who has authored around 700+ bills since 2004, heads senate committees, is battling depression after her son’s suicide AND is allegedly psychologically unstable, Noynoy’s 18 bills just doesn’t seem to make sense. At all.

• Erap has had some really solid accomplishments during his interrupted presidency, including the quashing of the MILF, the “booming” of the BPO industry and the use of his picture on MRT cards, a project his predecessor masterminded. He was also found guilty of plunder beyond reasonable doubt and was sentenced to reclusion perpetua. Meaning, he would still be in jail now if not for the presidential pardon a little lady bestowed on him. Bottom line: he’s a criminal who got away.

• Whatever happened to Villar’s Capitol Bank? I still remember watching the news with people lining up just to discover that bank already closed. I just cannot imagine someone running my country if he couldn’t even prevent his bank from going bankrupt. Yes, I know, businessmen are supposed to take risks and make mistakes. But come on, this was a bank with other people’s money, for effing goodness sakes, gone, just like that.

• The use of children, poor (as in fiscally poor, not just cutesy poor) children at that, to campaign for you is inexcusable. I don’t even care if the jingle is as catchy as H1N1 flu. What the heck, letting children tell the public that you are God’s sent to eliminate poverty because you were poor before? How creative and thoroughly disgusting. The worst thing with that campaign was that people easily dismissed it as “You have to hand it to his PR men, the ad is so catchy.” Seriously? From my end it sure looks like Children of the Corn dressed in tattered clothes. Read: BRAINWASHING the most vulnerable, because they are (1) children (who are like tape recorders and repeat anything, catchy or not) and (2) poor (who’ll do anything for a warm meal).

• Another thing that bugs me: candidates that claim that they used to be poor. That was like 30 years ago. You are swimming in money now. Get over it!

• I will not vote for a candidate who hasn’t done anything and just tells everyone to vote for him because he’ll “continue” his parents’ legacy. Our country is brimming with heroes. In that case shall we invite all Osmenas, Aguinaldos, Quezons, Garcias, Magsaysays and Rizals to run for presidency? On second thought, why don’t we all invite all descendants of St. Lorenzo Ruiz to be president? That’s one person recognized not only by the Filipino public, but the entire Catholic Church on all corners of the world. That way we don’t just get the son of a hero and a dead president, we get the grandson or granddaughter of a saint. A SAINT!

• I will not vote for Bro. Eddie because it’s his second time to run. Now, he’s claiming he was called by the higher power for the second time to run again. Now if the same higher power called him to run the first time, why did he lose? The higher power may act in mysterious ways, but for him to let his “chosen one” lose the first time and call him the second time seems a bit absurd.

• Jamby, after Gordon and Gibo, actually has the best public service track record. What I don’t like about her campaign is that she started off by doing an anti-Villar campaign. I don’t really want to give my vote to someone who’s just presenting herself as an alternate to someone she hates. As much as she has already started showing TV ads of her platforms and issues, I think it’s a little too late.

• Until the last minute, I considered Richard Gordon, but then if he couldn’t even run a campaign with his running mate, I’m afraid he might be running a one-man show should he become president. That’s rather scary.

I am voting for Gibo because he has the qualifications for the job. He has the smarts, the leadership skills, a clean track record and holds himself accountable to everything he has done. No “vote for me because I’m the chosen one.” No “vote for me because I’m the son of heroes.” No “vote for me because I used to be poor and poor kids are singing my campaign jingle.” No “vote for me because we all hate this shark of a candidate.”

Of all the candidates, I see myself voting for Gibo and actually being proud of voting for him. I don’t get the feeling that I’ll have to defend him or think twice before telling anyone that he has my vote. If he wins, I am convinced better things are in store for our country. If he loses, then I won’t really be surprised if we’re headed for another six years of waste.

The Fast and Comfortable are Complaining

"The aid is never fast enough for the armchair aid workers sipping their lattes."

STEVE MATTHEWS, spokesman in Haiti for World Vision, on the critics who say that aid has not gone to Haiti quick enough; blogs and social networks have questioned the response to the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake

Oooooh, now that's a fierce bitchslap from someone who's actually there! Amidst all the clamor by bloggers and social network addicts for whoever is in charge to speed up the aid to the hapless victims, let's collect ourselves and think. Or as Kris Aquino has popularized with her interview last week, count to 10, or at least say you tried.

Now, as someone who is from the Philippines, a country with a social calendar that's incomplete without its at-least-once-every-quarter share of natural and man-made disasters, I could only imagine how difficult it must be to send all the help to Haiti. The Philippines is also surrounded by water, and the logistics of passing aid in that kind of situation is almost impossible. To send planes and helicopters full of aid is time-consuming and budget-draining. I mean, where else can Haiti get aid? From the rest (read: poorer) regions of the country? From the Dominican Republic, the only country that shares a border with them?

Yes, it is a foregone and mildly irritating conclusion that aid for Haiti would primarily come from the US. Of course, when the US headlines a cause, whatever it may be, results are expected to surface as fast as a McDonald's counter giving you your Big Mac and French fries. So, what to do Americans do when CNN and The Huffington Post report of the continuous suffering of Haitians? Complain via their blogs and social fora.

Well, well, well, isn't that just convenient? Now, before hurling a fresh batch of complaints, consider: if you donated cash to Haiti victims (like I did when the deadly typhoons hit this country), it should be understood that your cash goes through a process. Your money will be used to buy stuff. The stuff will be packed and transported, which will take a bit, considering the stuff will not be going through the Channel Tunnel or be transported by a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird. Once whatever stuff was bought with your money arrives in Haiti, relief workers need to sort through them again and they will be transported to where they are needed the most, which will take more time, considering the earthquake made Port-au-Prince's roads worse than rocky road ice cream.

So, I dare say, if you want fast results, results that you can actually see and experience for yourself, why not go to Haiti yourself and lift some bricks and recover some victims? I don't know how you're gonna go there, maybe take a plane to Santo Domingo and walk. Volunteer under the Red Cross. Ask Ricky Martin to lend you his private jet. But until then, if you think that your monetary donation gives you the right to yap the whole day and demand that the UN move their asses, you are unfortunately wasting your energies.

I knew a lot of people, in the midst of the two typhoons hitting the Philippines in the span of two weeks, actually move their own asses and distribute relief goods or use their surfboards to rescue flood-stranded people. In hindsight, I could only remember the actual victims complaining because they had the right to do so - after all, they were suffering. The rest were busy in networking with their friends on how to join a volunteer group and using their Facebook, Twitter and Blogger accounts to organize relief efforts. To summarize, everyone was too busy with their own thing to complain. People like me, who were a bit chicken to brave the chaos or were hampered by logistics to help and could only spare a few pesos, shut their holes and knew that the people actually doing something were heroes.

So, bloggers who can't seem to do anything but complain about how slow everything is with regard to Haiti while typing their entries in Starbucks, shush. If you want fast results, get your own asses moving and experience how it is to actually help these people in Haiti.

Until then, why don't you pray along with Pat Robertson?

* * *

Don't even get me started with the Dominican Republic. Read "The Feast of the Goat" by Mario Vargas Llosa for more info. But before you get your underwear in a twist, the Dominicans are doing all they can, with even their congressmen pledging 10% of their salaries to the Haiti efforts. It's just that the road between Port-au-Prince and Santo Domingo has not been developed, with their nasty history and the mountainous landscape between the two capitals.

After

Today, June 12, 2007, on the occasion of the Philippines' 109th Independence Day, I realized something weird. Sad. Every time Filipinos get a taste of "freedom", of "independence", we go stagnant. By some unfortunate turn of events, whether our doing or not, we seem to go wayward, like a ship lost at sea.

I say so because the country has been through a gazillion changes and we've only gone so far as the rest of the world has pulled us along with. Through the years, it seems that we've only been free riders, sharing the benefits that the others have gained. We've adopted so much for so long without really moving ahead, with innovating, without going full speed, arancada. True, we've gone global with texting, the internet, gigantic malls, pirated DVDs and the lot, but what can we show for the 109 years that we've been free?

How ironic that last June 11, the non-working day in commemoration for the 12th, which was the real holiday, I watched a Pedro Almodovar film. Ironic? Well, I was celebrating my country's 109th year independence from the Spaniards, and I was watching a film by a descendant of the purest breed. Mr. Almodovar is pure Kastila, born and raised in Calzada de Calatrava, in the heart of Castilla-La Mancha, Spain. Direct descendant of the mananakop, of the malulupit na Kastila who treated my ancestors as second-class citizens. Not only is he Spanish, but he's through and through Castillan, descendants of Felipe I to whom we owe our country's name. He's not Catalan, or Valencian, or Basque, or Andalucian. Castillan. Kastila, as our grade school Sibika at Kultura books would term our country's colonizers. Therefore, I felt like I betrayed my Katipunero ancestors by watching an obra of an nth generation Kastila, whose ancestors have caused mine great pain and suffering.

But so much for that. Actually, what struck me was that Almodovar was an integral part of La Movida Madrileña, La Movida for short. La Movida was Spain's sociocultural movement which happened during the first ten years after the death of Generalisimo Franco in 1975. During that time, Spain reopened itself to the world, a new emerging Spanish cultural identity was born, and Spanish economics blossomed. Almodovar spearheaded this movement by making such films as Pepi, Luci, Bom y otras chicas del montón (1980), documenting the Spaniards' newfound freedom after years of repression under the General. To see such advance by Spanish society in such a short time was what struck me. Like us, Spaniards also suffered for quite some time (WWII to 1975 - that's long). But since then they've moved on beautifully. 

On the other hand, we Filipinos seem to always be in a rut. After WWII, Marcos. After Marcos, People Power. We should have gone full speed ahead too. But then, countless coup attempts. After coup attempts, EDSA II. After EDSA II, EDSA III. After EDSA III, a stubborn president who's doing everything she can, but has lost to apathy and opponents who are just waiting for her to screw up big time. Granting that these are only political concerns, what else have we got to show since EDSA I with the other areas of our existence as a nation? Poor economy, lackluster arts and culture? No movement, no advancement. Did we ever had a chance to do our version of La Movida? Grand chances we had, but I guess no one took 'em chances.

What's most ironic is that the "golden" years of Philippine arts and culture, when the likes of Brocka, Bernal, Cervantes, Aguilar, Juan dela Cruz Band, Florante, Asin, APO, and Gary Granada churned out amazing works, were done at the height of the Marcos dictatorship. With the regime gone in 1986, what happened? The only image I had growing up during the post-Marcos years that was truly Filipino was The Dawn. Nothing else. Movies? Nada. It seemed that Filipinos just suddenly started sleeping for a while, allowing Debbie Gibson, Michael Jackson, Bananarama, New Wave Music, Joan Collins, and Chuck Norris to dominate their culture while preparing for a resurgence of communist rebels and Gringo Honasan and Co. to awaken us. 

Which led me to think, are Filipinos capable of doing great things only when they are oppressed? Rizal, Luna, Bonifacio, et al. emerged when the Spaniards were still here. Gallaga, Brocka, and Bernal blossomed under Marcos' dictatorship. Only Premiere, LVN, Lebra, and Sampaguita were producing movies in the '50s to the 60s, the so-called Golden Age of RP cinema. Can't Filipinos do great things without a monopoly or without being oppressed  I'm hoping that the current stream of rock bands can replicate what the Eraserheads did in the '90s or that our promising indie filmmakers could be as great as Raymond Red. I'm afraid that we only saw spurts of brilliance in the '90s. I hope a good, huge movement can happen these next few years.

Until then, happy Independence Day.

English, et tu?

Last night, there was a debate on ANC about repealing Gloria Arroyo's presidential decree ordering the return of English as the medium of instruction in the academe. This topic has been subject to countless discussions since time immemorial. Personally, I don't see any contest. A waste of time and energy, if you ask me. Not to mention a waste of saliva, airtime, and newspaper space, too.

I say so because for one, I don't see any alternative to English. If not English, what then? Filipino/Tagalog? Can anyone explain to me the difference between a suspension and a colloid in Filipino? What is the Filipino term for currency depreciation? Having to translate all terms from various academic disciplines to Filipino is a colossal task, involving lots of time and effort amongst the country's linguists. In the very unlikely case that this could be done, DepEd would have to print and distribute gazillions of new books, creating a new bane in the already hole-filled pockets of the government. In any case, will the country's established institutions in, e.g. medicine or physics be receptive with a new Filipinized standard? It would take the Pollyanna in every Filipino to believe that any of these could be done.

Anyhow, we've already milked enough from our self-promoted English "proficiency". Aren't our undergraduates and new graduates reaping the benefits of the proliferation of call centers in the country? Ten years ago, the only options for people fresh out of college would be (1) to work overseas as factory workers and domestic helpers, (2) work overseas as nurses or teachers, or (3) work locally and scramble with the rest of the population for a few measly job openings and get paid lousy minimum wage. 

Nowadays, anyone with two years of tertiary education and good English skills can go to any building in Makati, pass resumes to the 20 call centers on that building, and get a job offer by the end of the day. No need to go abroad and get abused or raped to earn big bucks! An average call center agent earns around 16,000 pesos, more than twice the salary of an average office worker. These call centers have given rise to a breed of yuppies who can afford their Starbucks coffee and pay rent without having to go through nursing school. And to think that the American bosses of these firms are predicting unprecedented growth! Too bad they're also getting weary of the decreasing quality of English among Filipino graduates. 

And people are talking about re-replacing English as medium of instruction again. The pros and cons of the call center industry are different topics altogether, but the good some of its employees have gained, thanks to their proficiency in English, cannot be denied. Another generation of poor English speakers may end this industry and obviously, one less career option for the country's graduates, who are already grappling for jobs, even with call centers around.

The country has had a long history of English usage. By 1901, public education was institutionalized, with English serving as the medium of instruction. The 1935 Constitution added English as an official language alongside Spanish. Even as Tagalog was chosen as the national language by the National Language Institute in 1937. The present constitution, ratified in 1987, stated that Filipino and English are both the official languages of the country. 

Filipino is an official language of education, but less important than English. It is the major language of the broadcast media and cinema, but less important than English as a language of publication (except in some domains, like comic books, which are meant to speak directly to the Filipino psyche) and less important for academic-scientific-technology discourse. English and Filipino compete in the domains of business and government. Filipino is used as a lingua franca in all regions of the Philippines as well as overseas Filipino communities, and is the dominant language of the armed forces (except perhaps for the small part of the commissioned officer corps from wealthy or upper middle class families) and of a large part of the civil service, most of whom are non-Tagalogs.

I am not on English's side because I'm elitist or pro-American. English is a practical language that has been used in the country for quite some time now, and we have had a lot to gain because of this. English "proficiency" has been an advantage for us Filipinos and it would be a huge loss if we do not protect this advantage. I'm not even going into the regionalism argument, wherein most people from the provinces would rather speak in English than Filipino. As it is, Filipino is being spoken everywhere in the country, so why lessen the avenues where English is being practiced? If students don't hone their English skills in school, I'm afraid there wouldn't be anywhere else they could master the skill, as most of them prefer using their regional dialects at home or with their friends.

Could we move on to other (more significant) matters?