Last na, Kuya M.

mlq3:

It would be easy to say that Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, as chief executive, has not lived up to the standard of leadership set by her father. But Sen. Joker Arroyo, for one, says she has. He has pointed out (to defend, of course, his decision to run under GMA’s Team Unity) that much as he had been a pain in the neck when it came to her executive issuances, the President never used her position to put pressure on him;

maybe not on him, pero tignan nyo na lang ang ginawa ni maam arroyo sa mga mas mahihinang tongressmen, cbcp, sa judiciary at mga appointed officials nito.

In contrast, the Estrada era began with the disappearance of the man said to have video-taped Erap gambling, and ended with the disappearance of a political public relations fixer at odds with him. Not to mention the use of the BIR against his enemies and advertising boycotts.

MLQ3 conveniently fails to mention the extrajudicial killings that are going on right now. And Arroyo did not use the BIR against her enemies?????????

and i have no idea who killed bentain. it's been six years na na out of power si erap. siguro kung guilty si erap o si lacson, matagal nang lumabas ang ebidensiya na tumutukoy sa kanila. as for dacer, again ask fr. baldostamon. he might know something.

i do recall before dacer disappeared, the PR man was on his way to meet a certain General/client of his.

The story is now told to close friends by the Dacer children, Ampy and Sabina, that the Ramos visit to Dacer’s office on that fateful day of the disappearance was very uncharacteristic. In the many years of Dacer and Ramos’ professional dealings, never once did Ramos visit Dacer’s office. But on the day of Dacer’s kidnapping Ramos did, and after only an hour of waiting he started making it too obvious he was concerned—by calling media about his alarm over Dacer’s disappearance.

It could have just been traffic, a flat tire or engine trouble, a sudden family emergency, a bum stomach, an extended breakfast meeting, or a hundred other small possibilities that delayed Dacer for an hour. With cell phone service the way it is today, and service providers undermining each other by delaying interconnections or with cell sites jammed or down, an hour’s wait to get a cell phone connection happens quite frequently. So, delayed cell phone contact is not sufficient reason to panic and call media.

Read the whole thing. It was ramos who called the attention of the police re dacer's kidnapping because na late lang ng isang oras si dacer. Makes you go hmmm....... (ah!~ siguro masama ang kutob o ESP ni FVR re dacer kaya tinawag nya kaagad ang mga lespu)

i think these accusations and piling on happened after edsa dos. understandable. Arroyo wanted to finish off their enemies. but i think the dacer accusation is as credible as the accusation vs. erap/lacson na sila ang may pakana ng LRT bombings, or the one that corpuz/rosebud/pelaez started re lacson's "hidden bank accounts" in the US and HK.

Not to mention the use of the BIR against his enemies and advertising boycotts. In contrast, President Arroyo, even when business was being critical of her, never hit the businessmen where they’d hurt: their pocketbooks;

I have to strongly disagree na Arroyo doesnt put pressure on her civil society enemies. re using dirty tricks against her enemies, what about arroyo's attempt to silence cory aquino with the hacieda luisita issue?

what about her attempt to intimidate and harass those in the media that are critical of her? to coerce abs-cbn by putting pressure on the lopezes and it's other business ventures.

and except for the Left, she has avoided many opportunities to hit her enemies really hard.

well, mas mahihina yung iilan sa mga middle class at civil society types eh. she doesn't have to threaten the civil society types with bodily harm, unlike the left. all she had to do is to push the right buttons, know their breaking points, hit them where it hurts.

ya don't have to kill the weak civil society types. just threaten them with jail time, and they will fold like a house of cards. or buy them off. proven strategy na yan. ganyan rin ang nangyari kay mahusay, zuce, rashma hali etc.

eto sabi ni manuel re that:

PCIJ suggests it might be a way to hit the media where it hurts -in their bottom lines. That may be so. As this Philippines Free Press editorial from 1909 points out, using government advertising to punish the media is an old, old trick. After Edsa, as a way of democratizing things, publishing laws and government ads for things like bidding for contracts was encouraged. That was before the days of the internet, and in the two decades since Edsa, the placement of government ads, notices, and announcements has become a way of subsidizing friendly media and punishing unfriendly media.

Eto pa, from MLQ3 too:

Of course. Many smaller papers, though, are kept alive mainly by government ads. Therefore, creating, in a sense, a government ad placement authority is a strategically clever move, and is quite politically useful. Such a move is not a blow to press freedom; but it is an enhancement of government’s financial clout with the media.

So MLQ3's claim na arroyo puts no pressure on the "enemies of the state" is not true.