By Carol Pagaduan-Araullo Streetwise | BusinessWorld IF UNITED STATES President Obama and his Wall Street patrons would have their way, US troops, warships and aircraft will soon be pre-stationed (read: permanently based) in Philippine territory from where they will be routinely launched, as in the Cold War era, on missions of death and destruction to…
Category: Commentary
Bewitched
By LUIS V. TEODORO Vantage Point | BusinessWorld NO, this isn’t about Benigno Aquino III’s latest love object this Valentine’s Day, but about the jobless. The President of the Philippines, who’s been crowing over the 7.2% growth of the economy, was described in one broadsheet account early this week as “baffled” by the rise in…
Obama’s ‘secret war’ and diplomacy game plan
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star “So whenever you look at what we say publicly, it’s always about maintaining the peace, the stability that’s critical to prosperity in the region but also urging all the claimants, including China, to follow… rules and international law.” The quote is from Scot Marciel,…
The rhetoric–reality divide
By BENJIE OLIVEROS Bulatlat perspective President Benigno Aquino III reportedly called a Cabinet meeting after the Social Weather Stations (SWS) released the result of its recent survey showing that the unemployment rate rose to 27.5 percent, affecting an estimated 12.1 million Filipinos. Around 2.5 million Filipinos lost their jobs between September and December last year.…
Master’s tools (Notes on cynicism, labor, finance capital, and the art industry)
The current economic crisis under global capitalism is worsening at a speed that even its most shrewd and sneaky economic managers have not succeeded in slowing it down. But its cultural managers scattered in key institutions still talk of the existing order as if it were a result of some divine ordination. For them, the present can only be deemed as the end of a historical progression that has reached its ultimate peak so that an alternative vision can only be a threat to civilization.
Pag-ibig
GUNITA NG SALITA Ni ROLAND TOLENTINO Bulatlat.com Ito ang pinakalaspag na salita sa anumang wika dahil kahit sino ay pwedeng gamitin ito–individual, kababaihan, LGBT, bansa, estado, kapitalismo, o global–at ano ay pwedeng tumukoy dito: chocolates, I-phone, bukangliwayway, sinta, magulang, martir ng bayan, o nasyonalismo. Ang pag-ibig ay nagkakaroon ng kabuluhan sa nosyon ng pagtutumbas sa…
CARP backers urge free land distribution
By Satur C. Ocampo At Ground Level | The Philippine Star Are we going to see, in the remaining two years of the P-Noy administration, the free distribution of land under an extended CARPer (Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms)? This question is being posed because, after 25 years of disappointing implementation of the…
Déjà vu?
By Carol Pagaduan-Araullo Streetwise | BusinessWorld The announced completion of the negotiations for the Comprehensive Agreement on the Bangsamoro (CAB) with the signing by the Government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) of the following — the Framework Agreement on the Bangsamoro or FAB (October 2012), Annex on Transitional Arrangements and…
Rodrigo’s way
By LUIS V. TEODORO Vantage Point | BusinessWorld Although former Manila mayor Alfredo Lim may have once been in the same league, Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte is in many ways unique. He’s a government official leery of his fellow officials’ capacity to do their jobs. He’s a law and order mayor who allows protests…
#GGSS
GUNITA NG SALITA Ni ROLAND TOLENTINO Bulatlat.com Ito ang self-referential hashtag na unisex, “gandangganda sa sarili” o “gwaponggwapo sa sarili.” Reafirmasyon ito ng selfie at ng selfie na kuha ng iba, karaniwang posed shot, at kung gayon, may posed na kahulugan at posed na pangangailangan ng kahulugan. Ang posed na kahulugan ay tulad ng maari…
A matter of political will
By BENJIE OLIVEROS Bulatlat perspective In December of 2013, when Meralco’s petition for a rate hike was approved, Malacañang scrambled to justify it. Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma said the rate hike is neither “arbitrary nor unreasonable.” Coloma echoed Meralco’s justification that the rate increase would be “temporary” because of the “maintenance shutdown of the Malampaya…