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Terrorists

August 12, 2011 by Webmaster

CLASHES between artistic freedom and religious sensibilities occur from time to time, and they become even more contentious when art, whether in the form of a novel, a sculpture, or a painting, is subsidized with public funds.

The controversy over the “Kulo” exhibit at the Cultural Center of the Philippines is not unique to this country. Neither are the demands for the CCP board members to resign, the threats to cut the CCP budget, the insults, hate messages and death threats both the board as well as the artist have received, and even the vandalism of parts of the exhibit.

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Palliatives

August 5, 2011 by Webmaster

AN appeal based on liberation theology is among the least likely to convince the mostly conservative bishops of the Catholic Church to end their campaign against the Reproductive Health bills now pending in Congress. (The Senate version is SB 2865, “An act providing for a national policy on reproductive health and population and development.” Currently being debated is the House of Representatives version, HB 4244.)

In Part 1 (is there a Part 2?) of her sponsorship speech for SB 2865, Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago initially described reproductive health as “a non-issue” in the context of the more urgent problems the Philippines has. But she later argued that a reproductive health law is needed to liberate the poor from social injustice. In her effort to convince the bishops that rather than opposing the RH bills they should instead support it, Santiago described the passage of SB 2865 as in conformity with liberation theology. “The RH bill,” said Santiago, “is an enterprise in social justice and in love for the poor.”

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His own boss

July 29, 2011 by Webmaster

NINETEEN years have passed since then Congressman Oscar Orbos filed the “Freedom of Information Act of 1992”. Several other, more or less similar, bills were filed in the Senate and the House from 1998 until 2008, when then House Speaker Prospero Nograles filed House Bill 3732, or “An Act Implementing the Right of Access to Information on Matters of Public Concern Guaranteed Under Section 28, Article II and Section 7, Article III of the 1987 Constitution and for Other Purposes.”

In 2009 the Senate Committee on Public Information and Mass Media filed Senate Bill 3308, or “The Freedom of Information Act of 2009.” It passed the Senate on third and final reading on December 14, 2009. On January 20, 2010, the bicameral conference committee reconciled conflicting provisions in the Senate and House bills. The Senate approved the reconciled bill on February 1. The bill went to the House on February 3, but lack of quorum prevented its discussion. Congress then went into recess in preparation for the 2010 elections. Supposedly assured of passing on the last day of the 14th Congress on June 4, 2010, the bill died when the House adjourned without discussing it for lack of quorum. A number of administration congressmen, including some listed among House Bill 3732 sponsors, were not on the floor, but were seen in the House premises, leading to suspicions that the House leadership had orchestrated their absence to prevent passage of its own bill.

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The teller, not the tale

July 22, 2011 by Webmaster

IF INDEED Marine Col. Generoso Mariano was calling for the overthrow of Benigno Aquino III, few except Malacanang and its own version of the Arroyo regime’s Lorelei Fajardo seem to have been either surprised or worried.

Deputy Presidential Spokesperson Avigail Valte went so far as to declare that once retired, Mariano could work directly for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, since, she said, the latter’s camp has been saying the same thing that Mariano said in that video someone took of him reading what looked like a prepared statement, and uploaded on YouTube.

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Blaming Arroyo

July 15, 2011 by Webmaster

BENIGNO Aquino III blames not only his immediate predecessor, Mrs. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, for the country’s ills; he’s also mentioned the late Ferdinand Marcos as equally responsible for them.

For doing that in some of his speeches and interviews with the media — and implying that Marcos and his female clone have made changing anything extremely difficult if not impossible — not only the partisans of Arroyo have accused Mr. Aquino of trying to deflect criticism from his own administration’s inadequacies. So have others impatient with the administration’s seeming inability to solve the country’s most urgent problems.

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Understanding

July 8, 2011 by Webmaster

NOT all of them bought Pajeros, a sport utility vehicle ( SUV) manufactured by Japan’s Mitsubishi Motors; some bought even more expensive SUVs and pick-up trucks, and others cheaper Asian utility vehicles (AUVs) with funds from the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO). Erroneously tagged by the media as “the Pajero 7,” some of these bishops of the Catholic Church are asking for “understanding,” in tacit admission that their use of public funds might have been neither legal nor moral.

Some of the country’s bishops also asked for understanding when the world-wide sex scandals involving the clerical abuse of children erupted during the papacy of John Paul II, making this the second time in less than a decade when the allegedly spiritual and moral betters of the Filipino people have asked poor sinners for sympathy.

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Shallow bench

July 1, 2011 by Webmaster

BENIGNO AQUINO III has an approval rating of between 68 and 70 percent, most probably because he hasn’t done anything scandalous or controversial. That says something about how low Filipinos’ expectations of their leaders are. But you can’t blame them for it, their high expectations having been frequently dashed to pieces, and given how anxious they are to have someone in power better than Mr. Aquino’s predecessor, in comparison to whom even Ferdinand Marcos was already in danger of looking good as she ended her nine-year watch as the (putatively elected) President of the Republic.

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Haunted

June 24, 2011 by Webmaster

HE’S been dead for 22 years, having died in Honolulu, Hawaii on September 28, 1989 at the age of 72, but Ferdinand Marcos haunts us still.

The most recent manifestation of the ghost of atrocities past came in the form of his children’s pushing a resolution in the House of Representatives, with former Marcos acolyte Congressman Salvador Escudero as pointman, asking the Aquino III administration to allow the burial of the Marcos corpse in Manila’s Libingan ng mga Bayani (Heroes’ Cemetery).

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Asking for it

June 17, 2011 by Webmaster

THE SUPREME COURT has granted a petition for live coverage of the Ampatuan Massacre trial filed by media advocacy groups, TV networks, individual journalists, and academics from the University of the Philippines. But it has imposed conditions some media organizations are already describing as difficult if not impossible to meet. Some are already talking about filing a motion for Court reconsideration of some of the conditions. Others may decide not to cover the trial at all.

Among the guidelines media organizations find problematic is the Court’s requiring coverage of the entire proceedings each time there are hearings. The trial is currently being held twice a week (Wednesdays and Thursdays), and usually lasts from 9 in the morning to 4 in the afternoon. Any TV or radio station that applies for and is granted permission (one of the conditions the Court is imposing) to cover the trial Branch 221 of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court is conducting would have to devote as much as five hours of coverage each time. No interruptions and commercial breaks are allowed except during recess periods, and no repeat broadcasts will be allowed on pain of the RTC’s withdrawing the station’s permit.

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Tales twice told

June 10, 2011 by Webmaster

IT was one of those statements that make no sense, but which some Catholic bishops are especially adept at making. Butuan Bishop Juan De Dios Pueblos said House Bill 1799, or the divorce bill, will lead to more immorality in Philippine society. The faithful should be trembling in their flip-flops. Immorality and the threat of hellfire are tales often told, though not always by an idiot.

The Philippines is now the only country in the world where there is no divorce. But assuming the Philippines finally catches up with the rest of the planet and Congress passes a divorce law, how would it lead to “more immorality”?

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