A FULL RETAKE of the nursing exam is needed

(UPDATE) my heart tells me sige, just pass them nalang. but my head tells me the nurses and this administration will be making a big mistake if it chooses to take the easy road.

Ito ang balita kanina. I'm sorry but this decision is another one of those "win-win" BS that doesn't go far enough to rectify the problem.

More from the PDI Editorial:

The decision effectively narrows the scope of the scandal: to Metro Manila and Baguio, and to three review centers. To be exact: to those examinees who attended the “final coaching” sessions of the three review centers.

“The tests that were conducted outside of Manila and Baguio were observed by both the respondents and the NBI [National Bureau of Investigation] to have been clean. The successful examinees thereat are therefore entitled to an immediate oath-taking and license,” the ruling written by Associate Justice Vicente S. E. Veloso read. Additionally, “the Manila and Baguio examinees who did not review at Gapuz, Inress and Pentagon review centers and those who reviewed thereat but did not attend their final coaching” could also take their oath and receive their license immediately.

How can they be sure na hindi kumalat ang leaks na yan sa ibang lugar, outside of Manila and Baguio. Once the leaks are out, it's pretty easy to pass the info around. Ever heard of EMAIL?

Once the genie is out of the bottle, it's hard to put him back in.

A reviewer admitted to this back in Oct 7:

Davao reviewer says nursing board cheating was nationwide

A NURSING board reviewer from Davao City on Saturday corroborated reports that cheating in the June 2006 nursing licensure examination (NLE) was nationwide.

Daryl Joel "Butch'' Dumdum, a registered nurse and former nursing professor, said he got information that NLE test questions were also leaked in the cities of Davao and Tacloban.

Dumdum, who said he is now a reviewer for a review center after quitting a teaching job at the Davao Doctors College, said a certain review center which has branches in Davao City and other parts of the country offered tests questions to a dean in a Davao City nursing school a day before the June 11 and 12 NLE.

“The dean who is also teaching the subject (of the leaked questions) was offered a leakage by a review center. She refused to take it,'' Dumdum told the Inquirer by phone.

Dumdum said one of his students relayed the information to him just a week ago. He said the same review center, which he did not yet want to identify, could have also given the questions to its examinees in other areas.

Dumdum said he learned of another leakage in Tacloban.

“I called an ally from Tacloban and he said there was also a leakage there,'' Dumdum said.

Dumdum said he was convinced that the leakage of the NLE questions reached not only Manila, Baguio and Davao but also other parts of Mindanao and the Visayas as pointed out by Rene Luis Tadle, president of the faculty association of the University of Sto. Tomas College of Nursing.

“The leakage is everywhere. It's simple logic because the review centers in Luzon have branches in the Visayas and Mindanao,'' Dumdum said, adding he was willing to help investigators.

"I will disclose the information I have (to the NBI),'' Dumdum said.

Dumdum said he came forward to support efforts to restore the integrity of the nursing profession.

Although he backtracked from his statements a little bit the next day. "Hearsay" lang raw yung sinabi niya. siguro takot lang magsalita yung mga taong nagbigay sa kanya ng information. Or somebody must have gotten to him. We've seen this before when hostile witnesses vs this arroyo admin gets intimidated and pressured to recant, like the mahusay, the vidal doble and the rashma hali.

I think a full retake will benefit the nursing graduates and the nursing industry in the long run by removing the cloud of suspicion over their heads.

but when you have a president with no credibility to lecture us re cheating, I guess the only thing she can do at this point is flip flop and give in.

UPDATE: Int’l community wary over nursing leak mess

The controversy brought about by the nursing licensure examinations leakage last June is now creating a stir within the international community, particularly to foreign countries known as top destinations of Filipino nurses.

Labor Secretary Arturo Brion yesterday revealed that some foreign governments that hire Filipino nurses are “monitoring” the developments on the nursing exam scandal and that the European Union (EU) and Japan have expressed “concern” over the issue.

A representative of the Japanese embassy had paid Brion a visit while the Philippine labor attaché in Belgium called him up Tuesday night, both inquiring, on behalf of the foreign governments concerned, on the status of the matter and how the Arroyo administration is addressing the controversy.

PDI Editorial: The Wrong Treatment

Money Quote:

And yet the scandal was wearying partly because the administration’s inept and irresolute handling made it so. The stakes were as high as they could go, with serious consequences for both critical institutions (the health care system, the labor export market) and a mass of dedicated, highly educated individuals (some 17,000 new nurses). And yet the administration acted in a baffling way: at first it took its time, then refused to cooperate with congressional inquiries, then it ordered a retake, then took back the order, and then it watched while various officials bickered. The self-defeating behavior continues, with the NBI detecting a pattern of leaks over the years and yet, confusingly, praising the PRC.

That is what happens, when even a nursing scandal is treated by the doctors of politics. The plea to “move on” is thus merely an appeal—made familiar in other crises, in other contexts—to forget.

UPDATE: Malacanang orders PRC to suspend nurses’ oath-taking

What a mess.

No more Garci?

Lito Banayo:

No more Garci, declared Ben Abalos. Ha, ha, ha. Just because Esperon and Habacon and Kyamko and Lomibao and all their ilk have, through their SND, signed a memorandum of agreement with the Ombudsman’s favorite commissioners, Garci is gone. Dead for all Abalos cares. Funny.

Months back, three cabinet secretaries, went on a hegira to Cagayan de Oro because Garci assembled his Sumalipaos and Pobes and all of his Comelec menagerie in Mindanao and was threatening to call a press conference. First there was a line department secretary from Mindanao. Then there was a presidential adviser with cabinet rank from cabalen-land. Garci would not be dissuaded by such "mere mortals". He was asking Malacañang for something, but it had not delivered, wearing his patience thin. So in flew the boy wonder, the Doña’s Mr. Fix-it, the defender of everything amoral, yet Manong Gil could not be mollified. By noon, someone more powerful flew in by private jet at Lumbia airport, went straight to Garcillano, and after less than an hour, "straightened" things out. Garci was happy, and went back to his poultry and plants in Baungon. Who could be more powerful than the Little Mike? Someone bigger, obviously, went on a pilgrimage to Garci.

Weeks after, Garci celebrated his birthday, with lechon and liquor flooding his highland estate, attended by a cabinet member and two congressmen, a general here, a general there, two colonels, and of course, the ever-loyal, the ever-faithful Comelec provincial supervisors and regional directors whom Abalos has never suspended or disciplined in any manner whatsoever, Hello Garci notwithstanding. Why, Sumalipao, who vowed that he would shoot himself if there was proof he cheated in the 2004 polls was even promoted to regional director!

No more Garci? Tell that to the Marines.

Garci may be gone from the COMELEC, but his lieutentants and the dagdag bawas infrastructure are left intact.

More from Conrad de Quiros:

I grant that limiting the military’s role in elections can have tremendous salutary effects. Especially given that today’s AFP is controlled by the generals mentioned in the Hello Garci tapes as having cheated for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, chief of them Hermogenes Esperon. They were all rewarded, and not punished, for that monstrous act of infamy. But limiting the AFP’s role in elections won’t exorcise Garci from the face of this earth, or even come close to it.

Lest we forget, there’s an exchange in the “Hello Garci” tape, where GMA worried about not getting enough votes in some parts of Muslim Mindanao and Garci responded by saying, as you know Ma’am the military isn’t really good at rigging things, “di gaano marunong gumawa,” but that generally speaking the effort to pad her votes was being executed well, “’yung hong pagpatataas sa inyo maayos ho naman.” That is a breathtakingly revealing statement in more ways than one. The least of what it reveals is that the soldiers are not the Einsteins of cheating in elections, people like Garci and his boss, GMA herself, are.

Lest we forget too, it was people like Brig. Gen. Francisco Gudani and Lt. Col. Alexander Balutan who tried earnestly and desperately to stop cheating in their areas of jurisdiction. For his pains, Gudani was told to go on a paid vacation, to relax on a beach or go mountain hiking, which would have been temptation enough for a lesser man, but which he himself took to be the punishment that it was. If I recall right, in the same “Hello Garci” tape, one senatorial candidate referred to him as “tarantado talaga.” This was after Garci told him there was little he could do for him as Gudani was bent on keeping the elections clean. There, too, you find something breathtakingly revealing: In this country, people who are determined to be honest are an affront to high office, they are tarantado talaga.

Both Gudani and Balutan went over and beyond the call of decency and went on to tell the Senate what they knew about the cheating in the last elections. For which pains they were court-martialed for defying GMA’s order forbidding any subordinate—as though Gudani and Balutan could ever be that by any moral standard—from testifying against her without her permission. What can I say? Tarantado talaga. I leave you to determine whom that judgment properly applies to.

Why on earth should limiting the military’s participation in elections stop another “Hello Garci” from happening? The “Hello Garci” tape wasn’t a conversation between military officials or between a candidate and a military official, it was a conversation between two civilians. It was a conversation between GMA and Virgilio Garcillano, between the incumbent-president-cum-presidential-candidate and a Comelec commissioner, at the height of the counting of votes—a conversation that by all the rules of God and man, democracy and decency, should never have taken place. It was as much an “impropriety” as the lawyer of the accused in a court case barging into the judge’s quarters and being assured by the judge in the most obsequious terms that her case is won. What has that got to do with the role of the military in elections?

At bottom, what is the “Hello Garci” tape all about? It is all about cheating. It is all about the highest official of the land conspiring with a Comelec commissioner to screw the voters, and not quite incidentally kidnapping a public school teacher to prevent her from squealing on the cheating. That can’t be prevented from happening again by limiting the participation of the military in elections. That can’t be prevented from happening again by putting the public school teachers solely in charge of elections, which will only succeed in overworking while underpaying them. That can’t even be prevented from happening again even by computerizing the elections, though that should have been done long ago. Except that Abalos, who now jokes about cheating, cheated the taxpayers by awarding the bid to an unqualified bidder.

Unless you remove the corrupting influence occupying malacanang and start a real house-cleaning inside the COMELEC, not much real improvements or credible reforms will take place.

Nakaka...

Nakaka-inggit naman si Davide:

As ambassador to the United Nations, Davide would have the duty to ensure that Philippine interests are protected in all the international treaties that the organization is crafting and implementing. For that, he would get at least $30,000 ( P1.5 million) a month, representing $20,000 free housing plus some $10,000 in salary and allowances.

Read more about it here.

Warrant of Arrest for Ellen Tordesillas

From her blog today:

I have just been informed by Malaya that I have to go to court to post a bail because there’s a warrant of arrest issued for me in connection with the libel suit filed by Mike Arroyo.

I was already dropped from the case but Arroyo petitioned that I be re-instated. The judge approved it.

Have to go to the office. Will update you.

UPDATE: Another related view from Neal Cruz that's worth reading.

Roger Ebert's writing reviews again

Hooray!

Faithful readers and viewers will recall that I expected a speedy recovery from surgery for salivary cancer last June. My expert (and now beloved) doctors had an encouraging game plan, and I expected to be back at work right away. Then I had several episodes of sudden and serious bleeding.

They stabilized me, operated on me to deal with the arteries, kept me sedated to avoid disturbing the affected areas -- and then I essentially spent July and August completely out of it. I remember only fragmentary episodes.

In September, my bleeding hazards stabilized, I came off sedation to find I had lost track of two months of my life, and starred in several prayer vigils for which I am eternally grateful to my wife and tower of strength, Chaz; my family and friends, and the many clergy who came to see me.

I was so touched when Chaz described those lost months. And now I am at the famous Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago -- learning to walk again! My muscles were atrophied by the weeks of inactivity, and I became a rehabilitation candidate. It's been quite an adventure, made easier by the tireless good cheer and expertise of Dr. Jim Sliwa and his RIC team.

During all of this, I didn't lose any marbles. My thinking is intact and my mental process doesn't require rehabilitation. Visits from colleagues at the Chicago Sun-Times, "Ebert & Roeper," ABC-7 and the film world kept me informed -- although, curiously, I found myself more interested in plunging into the depths of classic novels ("Persuasion," "Great Expectations," "The Ambassadors") than watching a lot of DVDs. I prefer to see the new Oliver Stone, Martin Scorsese and Clint Eastwood films on a big screen, for example. But our "Ebert & Roeper" producer Don DuPree brought around a DVD of "The Queen," and when I viewed it, I knew I wanted to review it.

here's a new ebert article on the 7-up series by michael apted.

In 1964, director Michael Apted interviewed a group of seven-year-old British schoolchildren for a BBC television documentary called "7 Up." Apted, now known for directing such features as "Coal Miner's Daughter" and "Gorillas in the Mist," has since returned to film these subjects every seven years. They are now 49. Roger Ebert, who lists the "Up" series among his ten greatest films of all time, interviewed Apted in London for the release of the latest installment, "49 Up," which will be seen in American theaters beginning in October.

In it's current form, the Anti-Terror bill should not be approved

UPDATE: More updates below.

UPDATE: Before anything else basahin nyo muna ito: Can we trust the Arroyo administration with the Anti-Terror bill?

Let's talk about the anti-terror bill.

I am not against the Anti-Terrorism Bill per se. I just dont trust the administration that will implement it. And the bill in it's current form is unacceptable and needs to be rewritten.

Sabi ni DJB:

On a deeper level, the Anti-terrorism Law truly IS a reduction in the "democratic space" of all citizens that is ALSO a necessary response to the condition of WAR that currently obtains between a radical jihadist movement and the rest of the civilized world, (including almost all Muslims).

We were already hit hard by an al queda style attack back in dec. 30, 2000.

Maybe arroyo did not remember that attack, but i do.

That arroyo never passed an anti-terror bill into law during 2001-mid 2005 (when she has both the senate and house on her side) is a head scratcher.

The funny thing about all this is that Arroyo only found out about the urgent need of the Anti-terror bill after lumabas ang gloriagate legitimacy problem niya.

And her anti-Terror bill proposal in 2005 seems like it was written more with the anti-Arroyo opposition in mind back then as much as the real terrorists.

I believe the anti-terror legislation should be rewritten before they even think of passing it.

From Dean Agabin:

Dean Pacifico Agabin of the Lyceum of the Philippines College of Law called the bill “constitutionally suspect” because it is “couched in vague and over broad terms, in violation of the substantive due process and the right to fair notice clause of the Constitution.”

Agabin said the bill was worse than the United States Patriot Act — enacted following the 9/11 attacks — because all criminal acts in the Revised Penal Code would fall under it, thus altering the Philippine criminal justice system.

“The proposed bill tries to cast as wide a net as possible and so it suffers not only from ambiguity but also from overbreadth,” he said, stressing that it would give way to a “fishing expedition” of the police.”

And I have no problems with the U.S. Patriot Act myself.

But if the contents of the Patriot Act were as bad as Arroyo's anti-terror bill, hindi ko susuportahan yan. And if Bush acted like Arroyo and used the Patriot Act powers on his political enemies, definitely dapat makulong si bush diyan.

Sabi pa ni Dean Jorge Bocobo:

I would prefer a number of improvements too John. For example, perhaps the implementation and supervision of the entire Anti Terror Law needs to be under a special Court, like FISA in the US, which does not crimp timely action, but provides a lot of oversight.

But it's getting late...I think we are about to be hit HARD!

If you're talking about the re-writing of the anti-terror bill, i don't think it's going to take that long.

hindi ba may anti-terror bill sila lacson, jinggoy, at magsaysay? I think most filipinos will find their terror bill more acceptable than arroyo's version. Because they've crafted this bill with the intention of only going after the real terrorists.

Yung anti-terror bill naman ni Arroyo lumps the political opposition and the anti-GMA groups/"destabilizers" along with the JI, Abu Sayyaf and NPA as one and the same.

Arroyo's terror bill in it's current form should be rejected.

pati sa US, even the senate rejected the renewal of the patriot act the first time it came up because of many senators (including some republicans) expressed concerns re the need to amend some of the provisions in the Patriot Act.

so i don't think we should be stampeded into passing arroyo's version.

So we don't have an anti-terror bill even after 12/30 and 9/11. Who's fault is that really?

at sa nakikita ko, this arroyo admin is not hampered by a lack of anti-terror bill anyway.

If arroyo is sincere and REALLY serious about this anti-terror bill, then she'd have no problems accepting the opposition's anti-terror bill, with enough built-in safeguards for everybody's peace of mind.

tama rin si MLQ3, dapat may "sunset clause" sa terror bill, to be renewed and re-authorized every 3 years.

pero kung ako ang tatanungin mo, i don't trust arroyo and I am reluctant to give arroyo tremendous powers knowing her admin's record of abusing it. she doesn't deserve these powers.

kung sa US ito, malamang hindi na na-renew ang patriot act, if democrats found out that bush was behaving like arroyo using the Patriot act against his political foes instead of the real terrorists. hindi lang yan, bush would have been impeached and removed from office by his own party by now if bush did an arroyo.

Tanong ni Amadeo:

Is one to suppose then that the delay in this passage is one or both of two things?

Because the country does not really believe the urgency and/or relevance of the proposed law to local conditions.

the delay for the bill is that arroyo never really took the WOT seriously, and saw it only as an opportunity to get the US support for her 2004 elections.

And news like these doesn't help.

Or the more politically expedient one, because this proposal reminds the local population, especially the vocal and US-averse critics, too much of the US and what it does; and thus even the administration would like very much to distance itself from anything US-sourced or –related.

i don't think so. hindi ba arroyo was gung ho about being seen as bush's ally back in 2003?

Sabi ni DJB in answering amadeo:

Neither or both amadeo. I think we're gonna get hit HARD, then the debates will go away or settle down to the grim reality.

Hit hard, but by WHOM?

nung Rizal Day bombing 12/30/2000, everybody assumed Erap's government masterminded it.

mali pala. si al ghozi at yung JI ang culprit.

so kung may bombang sumabog ulit, most people will understandably assume it's JI or Abu sayyaf.

Pero para sa akin, the possibility of JI, Abu sayyaf or NPA doing that is around 80%. The possibility of this administration "creating it's own 9/11" is around 20%.

More on the anti-terror bill from the PDI editorial, money quote:

We must bear in mind that the administration trying to panic Congress into passing the law is the same administration that proclaimed the February 2004 bombing of the Superferry 14 as an accident. Indeed, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo said it was the work of “pranksters.” She and other officials admitted only that it was what everyone thought it was -- the country’s worst terrorist attack -- in October, after she had claimed victory in the May 2004 elections. Yet four weeks after the bombing, Redondo Cain Dellosa, alias Arnulfo Alvarado, had been captured by investigators and confessed he had planted the bomb where it would inflict the greatest number of casualties. The Abu Sayyaf claimed credit, but the government laughed it off -- until after the elections. Even then, the President claimed six suspects had been caught, though the two masterminds evaded apprehension.

Here's DJB's reaction..

Money quote from Malaya:

The trouble with the anti-terror bill is that it proposes to give expanded powers to security forces at a time when the Arroyo administration is running amuck in going after its enemies. Dissenters are being charged left and right for imagined offenses against national security. The acts which prosecutors consider as constituting rebellion, it should be remembered, fall under the "terrorist acts" listed in the proposed anti-terror bill.

That's the danger there.

REad this piece by DJB on how Arroyo administration misled the public about the Super Ferry attack: Why Gloria Denied Superferry 14 Was A Terrorist Attack

It was the deadliest terrorist attack on the Philippines since the December 30, 2000 Rizal Day Bombing of the LRT, (which a lot of people, especially in the Civil Society Media actually blamed on Erap and Ping.) But read how the Superferry 14 Bombing on Feb. 26, 2004, which took 116 lives, was blamed by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo on "pranksters."...

Amazingly, the Philippine government did not even announce what it already knew about the Superferry 14 bombing until October 2004, after the elections had been safely GARCIED.

The President's managing of that deadliest terrorist attack on the Philippines by denying it's true terrorist nature reveals what a heartless political animal she truly is. Since the Palace was enmeshed in that entirely shameful controversy over FPJ's citizenship and the orchestrating of a series of public opinion polls in preparation for Garci's prestidigitation, and with the election campaign having just gotten underway, GMA was not to be bothered by a bunch of drowned and bombed Filipinos in the cruel seas near Bataan and Corregidor. Better to just attribute it to pranksters, even if there was a clear claim by the Abu Sayyaf, just a day after the bombing that they had done it!

Just as in the Angelo de la Cruz affair, and in every situation where honor and duty to country has mattered, Gloria has been a stunning and shameful failure.

Shameful indeed.

Arroyo nagpaparinig na naman kay Uncle

Sabi ni Ellen tordesillas:

The more Gloria Arroyo opens her mouth about North Korea, the more ridiculous she sounds.

Last Monday, she bested all Southeast Asian leaders in issuing a statement condemning North Korea’s nuclear test. Yesterday, she said North Korea’s nuclear test is a Damocles’ sword over Asia and underscored that the Philippines is “within striking distance” of a nuclear weapon fired from Pyongyang.

She's not ridiculous, Ellen. She's using the same playbook again to corral US support for her illegitimate and corrupt government.

Nagpaparinig lang siya sa US at kay Bush, to let them know that she’s still a “dependable ally” in the WOT, so that in return, the US won't abandon her or see her ouster via coup/people power as an "internal matter" for the Philippines.

Katulad nang sinabi ni JB Baylon last July, her statement "was directed more towards the White House than towards Pyongyang."

Dean Jorge Bocobo explains how Arroyo thinks:

(1) Despite her promises after 9/11, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has failed to secure an Anti-Terrorism Law in the Philippines, mainly because she has failed to make the case with the Filipino people and its Congress which she controls, to join in the Global War On Terrorism. I think this is because she is at heart, a politician, who saw GWOT just as a way into America's good graces. Sorry to let you know this, but she used you and she used our great nation, pretending to be our friend, when really all she wanted was to win an election in 2004, by hook or by crook, by golly or by Garci.

(2) Despite her promises to the Coalition of the Willing in Iraq, she negotiated with and capitulated to hooded terrorist kidnappers holding Filipino truck driver Angelo de la Cruz hostage. Spooked by the local antiwar Media and the Left, she gave in to the terrorists' demand and pulled out the Philippine humanitarian force.

(3) Despite fulsome support of the American people and the US Congress for her administration up until that point -- and indeed to this very day [sic!] -- Gloria then high-tailed it off to China to play that game of modern promiscuity that is the vice of Third World leaders who don't really want the Cold War to go away. It was always in pitting one Big Power against another during that long struggle, that the craftiest among them thought they found "an independent foreign policy." In my opinion, for Gloria this two-step process of abandoning the Coalition in Iraq and jumping into the Chinese-canopied bed in Asia was actually done in anticipation of a DEFEAT for the Republicans and George W. Bush in the 2004 US national elections. Analysis of the Palace's moves and statements in the crucial month before the November, 2004 polls shows that Malacanang was already betting on and backing a win by JOHN KERRY. Gloria did not believe you were going to win a second term, W.

Yes, Arroyo in the past liked to brag that the Philippines was one of the first countries to join the War on Terror and support the Iraq campaign... na we're one of the first countries in the world to offer more troops in iraq and that we were taking a LEADERSHIP role in Asian in fighting terrorism. (Hah! leadership role? pero walang maipasa na anti-terror bill during 2001-2005, when arroyo had the senate and House on her side? Hah!)

But we were also one of the first countries to pull out prematurely from Iraq when the going got tough.

(that was after "winning" her election in 2004 though, at hindi na raw niya kailangan ang supporta ng US dahil may "legitimacy" na siya, hwa hwa hwa...)

MORE from Ana Marie Pamintuan, of the pro-Arroyo Philippine STar (our version of North Korea's news media, in it's loyalty and devotion to the "Dear Leader"). The title of the article is "Unwavering Support":

MANILA, September 29, 2003 (STAR) SKETCHES By Ana Marie Pamintuan - It got little play-up here, but the spin of at least one American newspaper on the US visit of President Arroyo was that she was the first world leader to respond to a call from US President George W. Bush for more foreign troops to keep the peace in Iraq.

"We would like to send more (troops), and we hope that the United Nations can be more involved," the President told reporters at the Waldorf-Astoria in Manhattan, according to the Washington Times.

Earlier, the President had told UN Secretary General Kofi Annan that the Philippines would send more troops to Iraq, in addition to the 86-member humanitarian team now in a camp south of Baghdad, if the UN would shoulder the expenses.

That’s one big if. Still, the Bush administration can use even a best-efforts pledge from a cash-strapped Third World ally when the US president’s call is ignored by the international community. Russian President Vladimir Putin wouldn’t make a commitment even after being feted by Bush at Camp David.
.....
President Arroyo has flip-flopped on many controversial issues throughout her incumbency. But in her support for the US-led war on terror, she has not wavered, even as US troops sink deeper into the Iraq quagmire and Bush founders in the surveys. A Malacañang official said President Arroyo’s offer to send additional troops was in line with efforts to remove any potential kinks in Bush’s forthcoming Manila visit.

Her unstinting support calls to mind another staunch ally of Uncle Sam. Ferdinand Marcos had addressed the United Nations General Assembly during his first term as president, and became the first world leader to express support for the "Tonkin Gulf" resolution. This was the resolution passed by the US Congress on Aug. 7, 1964, which the administration of Lyndon Johnson used to justify US military intervention in Vietnam.

The Johnson administration had reported that on Aug. 4, 1964, in the Gulf of Tonkin, North Vietnamese torpedo boats had attacked without provocation US destroyers that were feeding intelligence information to the South Vietnamese.

Johnson’s boys drafted a resolution, which the US Congress passed days later, authorizing the use of all necessary measures to repel attacks against US troops and defend US allies in Southeast Asia. There were debates on what the resolution actually authorized, but Johnson used it to send American boys to war in Vietnam, and Richard Nixon also used it to justify US military involvement in Southeast Asia. In 1970 the US Congress repealed the resolution.

North Vietnamese Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap, in a meeting in 1995 with former US defense secretary Robert McNamara, said the torpedo boat attack never happened. In 2001, it was revealed that Johnson himself doubted that the attack took place.

Marcos, however, backed Johnson’s moves. In return, the Philippines received $200 million in US aid during Marcos’ first year in office. Shortly thereafter, we had troops in Vietnam helping Uncle Sam. * * *

Marcos got $200 million and Washington’s backing throughout martial law. What does Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo hope to get in return?

She will always say that she has only national interest in mind in her support for the US-led war on terror. Her critics, on the other hand, will always suspect that she wants Washington’s backing for her expected candidacy in 2004.

Interesting, interesting article.

I hope this is true

MLQ3: "Good news, if it happens: billboards to be dismantled includes those of politicians."

I guess mami-miss ko na ang pagmumukha nina Miles Roces, Lito Atienza at Ali Atienza (kontra Influenza!).

When it comes to dealing with the Nursing exams cheating...

Arroyo has zero-credibility to deal with it.

Her defenders on the blogosphere like Austero claim that cheating is no big deal because "everybody does it" anyway, without offering any credible proof that everybody is into this dagdag bawas thing.

See, when arroyo talks re why cheating during the nursing exams is bad, who's gonna take the phony seriously? and who's gonna take bong austero seriously?

The point is simple: The highest officials of this country, public or private, secular or religious, are the parents or guardians of this country. What they are and do is what they say and preach. How they act is what they teach. If they lie, cheat and steal, there is no warning against lying, cheating and stealing they can sound to the public that will be heeded. If they aid, abet and find ways to justify lying, cheating and killing, there is no threat they can issue to the public that will deter them from lying, cheating and stealing as well.

I’ve said my piece about the example Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has set by stealing the elections. Why should the nurses balk at trying to become bona fide nurses by answering leaked questions when the person claiming to be their bona fide President became so by counting votes from ballot boxes that were more leaky than the oil tanker that sank at the bottom of the sea near Guimaras? Why should the nurses agree to have the results of the exams rendered null and void because some of them cheated when the person claiming to be their President refuses to have the last elections declared null and void because she herself, with no small help from Garci, cheated the hell out of the voters?

But it isn’t just Arroyo who is setting a horrendous example there. I remember again Archbishop Ramon Arguelles’ breathtaking statement justifying the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines’ refusal to back the impeachment bid against Arroyo: “Talaga naman nandaya (si Arroyo).... Pero lahat naman nandaya e. Natalo lang ’yung iba sa dayaan.” [“Of course, Arroyo cheated. But everyone cheated anyway. It’s just that the others lost in the cheating.”]

Coming from one of the “istambay” who hang out in our neighborhood off-track betting station, that would have been dismaying. Coming from no less than an archbishop, that is reprehensible. One would imagine, as I said in a column in response to that, that the sheer prevalence of cheating would make us say in the face of the mother of all cheating that it was time we did something to make the cheating stop. Not say, “sige na lang” [just let it be], let is fester till kingdom come.

More from Conrad de Quiros: "Can anything be more hysterically funny, or a brilliant if unwitting exercise in self-satire, than Arroyo telling the prospective nurses they have to take the exams again because many of them cheated in the last one? The same reasons for requiring new exams are the same reasons for requiring new elections. No, they are more than the same reasons. Far, far more. The stakes in elections are higher. The price to pay for cheating in elections is steeper. If this country cannot survive the reputation of having fake nurses, it will survive even less the reality of having a fake president."

Arroyo doesn't need an Anti-Terror Bill

Most legit governments do, but not Arroyo.

From the Tribune Editorial:

If she was in for illegally entry, why was she talking about the alleged plans of Dulmatin, even saying he would fight to the end, and even confessing that she was a courier and a jihadist?

Yet, she was not placed in jail because, as Justice chief Raul Gonzalez said, we have no anti-terror law. But she continues to be detained by the military.

So what are all those other alleged terrorists nabbed by the military and police in for, given that we have no anti-terror law?

Matagal ko nang sinabi ito dati. this admin doesn't need an anti-terror bill because they're above the law anyway and can pretty much do whatever they want to do with the suspects and wiretapping etc. And Arroyo's SC is there to back them up.

an anti-terror bill is only needed for an administration that knows it's boundaries, respects the rule of law, and feels limited by the current laws because they are inadequate to deal with terrorism.

UPDATE: LMAO! if we had an anti-Terror bill, baka hindi na pinakawalan ng arroyo admin ang "erap 5" until it "confessed", dahil "legal" na ang pagdakip sa kanila. One of the "erap 5" will eventually "break" and accuse the opposition of working with the communists to mastermind the assassination of Arroyo and other cabinet officials.

From Ernie Maceda: "Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile told Sen. Luisa “Loi” Estrada he is resigning from the Partido ng Masang Pilipino if she and son Jinggoy vote against the anti-terrorism bill."

Pero hindi ba matagal nang wala na sa oposisyon itong si enrile, along with Angara?

Blogging will be light for now

May problema kasi ang computer ko. I need to get this resolved, ASAP.

More phony "People's Initiative" signatures exposed (WITH PHOTOS!)

From MLQ3:

Even as Donald Dee and Francis Chua continue to put on a happy face about the so-called “people’s initative” case, the lawyers of One Voice have been busy. Atty. Carlos Medina, Jr. has detailed some of their findings, including an election officer in Jose Abad Santos, Davao del Sur certifying “most signatures are fabricated,” while Romblon and Leyte documents revealed anomalies even as no certifications were made in Davao and Cavite; evidence that makes it clear the process was tainted.

My column for today is Barangay inspectors. I went to the Comelec office in the Palacio del Gobernador in Intramuros to take a look-see, and lend moral support to the young law students and lawyers there.

I’ve uploaded a Flickr album with some photos I took at the Comelec last Saturday. You can browse through the photos and take a look at some observations I’ve made for each picture. Move your mouse around each picture in the photo album and you’ll see the notes I added (or click the note link for each photo).

Check out the photos here (and read the notes).

Bang! Bang! you're dead!

May political killings dito, may political killings din sa Russia ngayon:

She was a fearless critic of President Putin and chronicler of atrocities in Russia’s long war with its breakaway republic of Chechnya. One of those concerns may have cost Anna Politkovskaya her life.

The most famous investigative journalist in Russia was shot dead by an assassin on Saturday, Mr Putin’s 54th birthday, as she stepped from the lift of her Moscow apartment building to collect shopping from her car. The murder bore the hallmarks of a contract killing. . . .

Hundreds of people gathered in Pushkin Square to light candles in her memory, many accusing the authorities of complicity. One poster read: “The Kremlin has killed freedom of speech.”

Valeri Borshchev, of the liberal Yabloko party, said: “This is a political killing, and the authorities are mixed up in this.”

Sabi ni Glenn REynolds: "I hope that this will get the reaction it deserves from the international community, but I'm afraid my faith in the international community isn't what it once was."

Disgusting

Raul Gonzalez and her prosecutors are a disgrace:

From the start, it was already evident that the Gloria administration was out to weaken and lose the case lodged by the alleged rape victim, “Nicole,” against the American servicemen.

Despite the witnesses’ accounts, including that of the van driver, which bolstered the rape complaint, the Justice department (DoJ) dropped the driver as a principal accused — along with three other US servicemen — after the driver recanted his first affidavit. Notably, the DoJ did not even move to charge the driver with perjury.

Even much earlier, the Gloria government did not move to take the accused US servicemen into custody, when it could have done so, even under the Visiting Forces Agreement forged with the United States.

Still, the fight for justice continued and was largely carried on by Nicole’s private lawyer, Evelyn Ursua, who did well for her client in the first prosecution in the trial stage.

Suddenly, however, when it came to cross-examination time for the prosecution, it was the state prosecutors who insisted on taking over, and it was clear that they were out to botch up their case as they did such a horrible cross-examination job.

This was also the time Nicole’s mother went public with her claim that state prosecutor Emilie delos Santos had urged her to settle the rape case with the American servicemen as the rape case would just be used in exchange for Jocelyn “Joc-Joc” Bolante’s immigration case in the US.

Nicole and her mother asked for a change of prosecutors, save for one, a plea which was quickly denied by Justice chief Raul Gonzalez, saying Nicole has no right to dictate to the DoJ who should be prosecuting the case. Delos Santos was kept on, despite the fact that she had publicly called Nicole a liar and Ursua a communist ally. Delos Santos should have resigned from the prosecution panel, knowing that her client had no confidence in her. Besides which, Delos Santos did something very unethical as she not only destroyed her client’s testimony by calling her a liar, but also insisted on going on with the case, and ensuring that more damage would be done to the prosecution’s case, by not going into the presentation of rebuttal witnesses, if only to impeach the testimonies of the US servicemen who had taken the stand.

Worse for Delos Santos and her team, the only one in the team who continued to enjoy the confidence of Nicole, went public to state that there was absolutely no discussion among the prosecution team on Delos Santos’ move rejecting a rebuttal, thus leaving the testimonies of the accused unimpeached, which only goes to show that there truly was a deliberate move on the part of the state prosecutors to ensure that Nicole would lose the rape case, and the Americans would walk.

It really is no different from a llamado boxer taking a dive — except that in the boxer’s case, he is no lawyer and is not sworn to do his best for his client.

To make it clear: This is not to say the accused Americans are guilty of having been accomplices to the rape of Nicole, or to say Daniel Smith, accused of raping Nicole, is guilty.

Similarly, this is also not to say Nicole was lying about the rape and that she had consensual sex, although from witnesses’ accounts that described her mental and dress state after they dumped her and sped off, and considering the circumstances surrounding that incident, consensual sex is too difficult to believe.

But this is instead to say the state prosecutors did their all to lose the case of their client, which is really disgraceful of them and of their legal profession.

Tsk tsk.

Dumb

That's the title of the Inquirer Editorial on our favorite ombudsman, Merceditas Gutierrez

ON Sept. 27, on the same day the Office of the Ombudsman resolved to dismiss criminal and administrative liabilities against all those involved in the anomalous Mega Pacific contract, the office also found probable cause to charge Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay and 10 others for “alleged irregular purchases of office partitions and furniture” worth P232 million.

To anyone but the most obtuse, the difference in the outcome of the two cases is easily explained: Binay is a leader of the opposition, and is therefore presumed guilty. Commission on Elections Chair Benjamin Abalos and other persons implicated in the Mega Pacific anomaly are identified with the administration, and—despite evidence of gross abuse of discretion that passes even the Supreme Court’s own stringent standards—must therefore be found innocent.

Gutierrez apparently thinks the public would not notice the difference, or perhaps she has come to believe those Palace operators who, despite what they say about the importance of public opinion, act as though they really don’t care.

(Are we being unfair, in characterizing the Ombudsman’s Sept. 27 resolution on the Mega Pacific case as incorrigibly partisan? Hardly. Yesterday, more administration allies in Congress rushed to Gutierrez’s defense, with some of them even gleefully declaring any attempt to impeach the Ombudsman is doomed. Because she had merit on her side? No. Because, they said, the administration has the numbers. Partisanship, again, trumps the majesty of the law.)

The case against Binay is familiar enough; suffice it to say that the Ombudsman found certain details in the biddings and awards for certain equipment “highly irregular,” resulting in “undue injury to the government.”

That summary, in less than 20 words, applies equally well to the Mega Pacific contract. The Supreme Court, having taken cognizance of the complaint because of the transcendent importance of the matter at hand, found serious irregularities in the bidding for and the awarding of a P1.3-billion contract for automated counting machines. And yet the Ombudsman, finally stirred to action by a dismayed Supreme Court, found no probable cause to hold anyone, no one at all, to account.

We know it requires an enormous act of dumbing-down to forget what one has learned in law school, and decide cases using extra-legal criteria. But does the Ombudsman think everyone else is dumb too?

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: Nagmukhang tanga si Winnie Monsod for believing in Mercy Gutierrez. She said Mercy's a "disappointment" raw, but there's no reason to be too upset. Let's "move on" na lang to more "positive news" (and she did segue into that nga, LOL.) The Tribune examines and disects the Malacanang spin on the economy.

I myself am disappointed with Winnie. After writing this article last week where she described the ombudsman's decision on the COMELEC automated machines as a "defining moment" and wondered whether Merceditas gutierrez was "worthy of her salt, or merely a sheep (or a “tuta” -- lapdog) in wolf’s clothing," who'll "whitewash" the case, I thought she'd be just as furious (or even more) than Dean Jorge Bocobo or the Inquirer Editorial after the Ombudsman came up with a lutong makaw decision.

Akala ko ba malaking bagay yan, Winnie? Hindi pala.

It seems that all this talk about good government coming from her was just moral posturing. No wonder she's able to shrug off the gloriagate scandal with ease.

CSKA Moscow whupped the LA Clippers 94-75

Yikes!

CSKA Moscow beats L.A. Clippers 94-75 in exhibition game
The Associated Press
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2006
MOSCOW Trajan Langdon scored 17 points and Tomas Van Den Spiegel added 16 to help CSKA Moscow to a 94-75 victory over the Los Angeles Clippers in an exhibition match Saturday.

Center Chris Kaman had 15 points and 11 rebounds and Corey Maggette scored 13 points for the Clippers, one of four NBA teams taking part in a European preseason tour and the first to play in Russia since the Atlanta Hawks in 1988.

Euro League champions CSKA dominated from the start, keeping the Clippers scoreless for more than two minutes and leading by as much as 21-14.

The visitors scored six unanswered points to trim the deficit, leveled at 22-22 early in the second quarter and then led 24-23 on Corey Maggette's score. But CSKA regained the advantage with the next basket and never fell behind again, steadily widening their lead and making it 52-39 when Anton Ponkrashov scored just before halftime.

Minutes after the break, Langdon hit two straight three-point attempts in quick succession to put his team 16 points ahead and CSKA extended its lead to 65-45 with five minutes left in the quarter.

Tim Thomas made it 65-48 with a three-pointer to start off seven unanswered points for the Clippers, but David Andersen scored for CSKA to help the hosts ease to a 73-57 lead at the end of the third quarter.

The Clippers scored the first five points in the final quarter, including a three-pointer from Maggette, but CSKA did not allow Los Angeles within 10 points again on the way to the victory.

Matjaz Smodis and David Vanterpool had 14 points each for CSKA, while Thomas scored 10 for Los Angeles. Former CSKA player Yaroslav Korolev played briefly at the end of the game.

The Clippers have been in Moscow since Oct. 1 for a training camp. They beat BC Khimki 98-91 on Friday night.

Come back, Mercy!

I forgot to post this kahapon.

-- Maaga pa lang, abusado na ang OIC mayor ng Pasay na si Allan Panaligan.

-- Ebidensya sa areglo inilantad ni 'Nicole'

Ibinigay kahapon ng 23-anyos na Subic rape victim na si ‘Nicole’ kay Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez ang kanilang mga ebidensiya na nagpapatunay na hinikayat ni Department of Justice (DOJ) State Prosecutor Emilie Fe delos Santos ang kanyang pamilya na makipag-areglo sa 4 na US Marines na inakusahan nitong nanggahasa sa kanya.

Kabilang dito ang mga affidavit ng kanyang nakakatandang kapatid na si Ricsan at inang si Aling Susan, kasama ang kanyang liham.

Nabatid sa affidavit ni Aling Susan na dakong alas-singko ng hapon noong Hulyo 14, 2006, kasama niya ang kanyang anak na si Ricsan ng magkita sila ni Delos Santos na kasama naman ang kanyang asawa sa Coffee Bean and Tea Loft sa Olongapo City.

Sinabi umano ni Delos Santos na kung ano ang gusto at nais nilang hilingin ay isulat lamang. Puwede umano kung nanaisin ni ‘Nicole’ na mag-permanent status sa US habang si Aling Susan ay maaring mabigyan ng multiple entry visa.

Hinikayat din umano sila ni Delos Santos na sabihin lamang kung magkano ang salaping kakailanganin sa planong pag-migrate sa US.

More here: Prosecutor offered US migration to settle case — Nicole’s mom

The mother of “Nicole” has reiterated her claim that the government prosecutor handling the Subic rape case had tried to broker a deal for “a new life in America” for her daughter and family in exchange for amicably settling the case.

In a two-page sworn statement for Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez, Nicole’s mother yesterday said senior state prosecutor Emilie Fe delos Santos invited her to a meeting at a coffee shop in Makati City last July 17 at 5 p. m. to discuss the proposed settlement.

-- PCIJ: Salonga on Ombudsman ruling: ‘Obscene attempt to cover up the truth’

Ricky Carandang of ABSCBN News notes the existence of a "cognitive dissonance" between the finding of the Supreme Court that the Law was broken by a "glaring grave abuse of discretion by Comelec" and the subsequent finding of Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez that there was no Lawbreaker.

Indeed.

How can a Law have been broken, yet there is no Law Breaker to be arrested or investigated?

How can a Crime have been committed, yet there is no criminal to be prosecuted?

Eto pa from DJB: COMELEC: The Ombudmamasan's Legalized Whorehouse

-- Dean Jorge Bocobo on Mercy's decision: A Crime With No Criminals--Making a Jackass of the Supreme Court

-- Inquirer Editorial: "THE Ombudsman’s decision to absolve everyone involved in the anomalous Mega Pacific contract is a terrible blow against the rule of law. It not only insults our intelligence, it not only offends basic decency, it mocks the very justice it seeks to serve.

The decision of Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez -- and it is all hers, despite the transparent attempt to let her deputies own it, while she is conveniently out of the country -- brings us to a new low in cynicism; it asks us to believe, against all evidence and experience, in a crime without criminals, an evil deed without evildoers."

-- Amado Macasaet: Pagtatakip ng ombudsman

-- Ellen Tordesillas: Sa pagsisirko ni Gutierrez, nahubaran siya

-- Where's Merceditas Gutierrez? Ask Dennis Villa-Ignacio.

There is something that chief state prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio apparently knows more of than what Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita does: the where-abouts of Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez.

Villa-Ignacio, during a press briefing, yesterday said Gutierrez had “committed to represent herself in an international con-ference” and “at the time she left, the resolution had been made,” referring to the Ombudsman’s ruling handed down last Monday that cleared all officials of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) of any accountability in an allegedly graft-ridden P1.3-billion contract that the poll body had entered into with the Mega Pacific consortium for the purchase of automated counting machines (ACMs).

He did not say where the conference is being held.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, for his part, earlier said Gutierrez is on an “official trip” to Switzerland but for what purpose he did not say, except that he was certain such trip has nothing to do with the ACM deal.

The Ombudsman “disappeared” a day before her decision to exonerate Comelec Chairman Benjamin Abalos Sr. and the poll commissioners was made public.

Come back Mercy! Don't worry, may tagapagtanggol ka sa mga administration solons.

-- Amando Doronila on the Arroyos' recent tactics to silence their press critics:

THE shot-gun blast fired by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s husband, First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, at the Philippine press when he laid criminal libel charges against 43 journalists at all levels of the media hierarchy -- from publishers, editors, columnists to reporters -- escalates the grudge warfare she has been waging against the press.

Mind you, the charges did not come directly from the President, but it makes things even more pernicious that the action was mounted by a person, who is personally close to her and who does not hold an executive or elective position, in what is beyond doubt an act of harassment of the members of the press.

As pointed out by Christopher Warren, president of the International Federation of Journalists, the carpet-bombing cases were not only “outrageous,” but were “deeply concerning that the husband of the President, a man of considerable influence and power, can try and hinder free speech by suing journalists to submission.”

Read the whole thing.

-- More anomalies in People's Initiative petition exposed

-- Erap to sue Atienza over video ban

Atienza banned the showing on the ground that the Movie and Television Review and Classification Board has rated it "triple X," which means the video was unfit for public viewing.
.....

Rodriguez said "Atienza’s capricious and malicious order also runs counter to the wisdom behind the creation of freedom parks under B.P 880 to guarantee a venue for the free expression of political dissent."

-- Rudy Romero: "There are different kinds of silence. There, for one, is prayerful silence, as when a person observes silence in order to be able to concentrate on the prayers he or she is saying. Then there is obligatory silence, which is what comes into being when a person received is expected to be silent. There is also deafening silence, which is the awkward situation that materializes when a person is not heard from at all when he should be.

Yet another kind of silence is the kind that is being observed these days by House of Representatives chief Jose de Venecia Jr., this country’s leading propagandist for the parliamentary system of government. The kind I am referring to is embarrassing silence. Jose de Venecia is embarrassingly silent about what has been happening in Thailand, in particular the unparliamentary ouster of the Prime Minister of the country that Speaker Joe holds up as paragon of parliamentary government. It is as though JdV has never heard of Thaksin Shinawatra."

More reactions on the Ombudsman ruling

Let's start with Winnie Monsod to show us what's at stake here. Her column last saturday:

CALL it a defining moment. Call it A moment of truth. But that’s what Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez faces. The Supreme Court set a Sept. 30 deadline (today) for her to report her findings on the possible liability of government officials and private parties involved in the election counting machines contract of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) which the Supreme Court voided and nullified. By this time, she will have to decide whether to adopt or repudiate the recommendations made to her by her own Field Investigation Office (FIO) on the matter.

A copy of those recommendations has been provided to me by former Sen. Jovito Salonga, which I share with the readers, so that it can be compared with whatever Gutierrez has submitted to the Supreme Court. We can then judge whether the ombudsman is worthy of her salt, or merely a sheep (or a “tuta” -- lapdog) in wolf’s clothing.

I say tuta. But Garcillano defender ComelecAKO agrees with the decision, tho. No surprise there. :rolleyes:

The Bystander is sickened by the ombudsman decision.

And here's the money quote from an email from the Black and White Movement:

"This is a travesty of justice! This is like saying a rape was indeed perpetrated, but there was no rapist", declared Enteng Romano, lead convenor of the Black & White Movement. "The Ombudsman has committed grave abuse of discretion, not even bothering to point us in the right direction. Who shall we hold accountable?"

Siguro "lapse of judgment" ng COMELEC lang yan Enteng.

And this PCIJ article says it all: Ombudsman ignored own investigator’s report holding Comelec officials liable

AFTER a two-year-long investigation, the Office of the Ombudsman yesterday finally released its findings on the P1.3-billion poll automation deal, absolving all officials involved in the controversy of any wrongdoing.

In a 52-page resolution, the anti-graft body cleared the Commission on Elections (Comelec) chair Benjamin Abalos, five other poll officials, and executives of the Mega Pacific eSolutions Inc. (MPEI) of any criminal and administrative liability.

Many were surprised with the ruling as it was a complete turnaround from the June 28, 2006 report, which recommended the indictment of Comelec officials and eight Mega Pacific officers and that impeachment charges be filed against elections commissioner Resurreccion Borra.

But what may not be known to many and what newspapers failed to report, is that on September 4, the Ombudsman’s Field Investigation Office (FIO) submitted a report to Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez, recommending “all sitting Comelec officers” at the time the anomalous contract was signed, a Department of Science and Technology official, and six Mega Pacific incorporators and stockholders, “be held criminally, administratively, and civilly liable in connection with the voided contract.”

“The report was totally opposite (from yesterday’s ruling). The question is, what happened to that report? Was Gutierrez aware of it and what was her decision?” raises former Comelec commissioner Christian Monsod. He says Gutierrez must be “very transparent on the findings of the opposing panel.”

I smell whitewash. I smell a coverup.

Read this report too from the Malaya:

Rep. Alan Peter Cayetano (NP, Taguig-Pateros), a deputy minority leader, said the Arroyo administration "has mastered the art of cover-up, making it appear that it is but a regular policy of the government."

"Nuong eleksyon, may dayaan pero wala naman daw nandaya. Sa fertilizer scam, may overpricing pero wala naman daw nag-overprice. Ngayon naman may kaso pero walang kriminal. This is the government’s best entry to Ripley’s Believe It or Not," he said.

Sen. Joker Arroyo said the "outrageous" ruling was either part of a cover-up or of a collusion.

"This has never happened in the past," he said. "What is sacrosanct about the Comelec? This was a compromise to save the souls of Comelec officials," he said.

Senate minority leader Aquilino Pimentel warned that the Ombudsman might have inflicted a "mortal wound" on itself.

Pimentel said it is outrageous and unthinkable that the Ombudsman would come up with a decision on a patently flawed transaction that exonerates the Comelec and Mega Pacific executives who were responsible for it.

In a 52-page resolution, the anti-graft body on Monday reversed its June 28, 2006 ruling that recommended the indictment of five Comelec officials and six incorporators of Mega Pacific eSolutions for graft and the filing of impeachment charges against Comelec Commissioner Resurreccion Borra.

The latest ruling is also in sharp contrast to the June 23, 2005 resolution of a panel of Ombudsman graft investigators that recommended the filing of impeachment complaints against Chairman Benjamin Abalos and Commissioners Borra, Mehol Sadain and Florentino Tuazon on the grounds of graft and corruption and betrayal of public trust and held retired Commissioners Luzviminda Tancangco and Pablo Ralph Lantion liable for two counts of graft each.

I think Mike Arroyo's classmate should resign. But that will never happen because this partisan is so useful to this administration.

re the partisan nature of the current ombudsman, eto sinabi ni Manong Ernie:

The Ombudsman is the agency that is tasked by the Constitution to be the principal check against corruption and wrongdoings by public officials.

Its decision clearing all Commission on Elections (Comelec) commissioners in the celebrated automated computerization contract declared void by the Supreme Court (SC) is sure to encourage all those conducting procurement or public bidding to violate existing laws on the matter.

Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez has effectively thrown into the waste basket the provision of the anti-graft law making it a crime to enter into any contract that is “disadvantageous to the government.” It also gives the supplier an excuse not to refund P1.3 billion to the government. She just threw away P1.3 billion.

It is difficult to accept the Gutierrez decision to reverse a clear finding of the SC. This is in sharp contrast to the hasty decision to charge opposition mayors Wenceslao “Peewee” Trinidad and Jejomar Binay.

It now confirms and validates all fears that Gutierrez, a close friend and classmate of First Gentleman Mike Arroyo, was appointed to the Ombudsman job to protect administration allies.

The Comelec clearance certainly is a step backward in the GMA administration’s announced drive against corruption. It looks like the millions given to the Ombudsman recently to step up its anti-corruption cleanup is a waste of money.

Read this MLQ3 roundup: A Crime but no Criminals

Dean Jorge Bocobo on Mercy Gutierrez:

ROGUE OMBUDSMAN: I can only describe MERCEDITAS GUTIERREZ at this point as a complete and utter disgrace to the Office of the Ombudsman and the legal profession with her WHITEWASH of Ben Abalos and the Comelec Commissioners responsible for what the Supreme Court condemned in 2004 as a "glaring grave abuse of discretion by the Comelec" in illegally awarding a P1.2 billion peso contract for an automated counting system that did not meet the Comelec's own bidding and technical specifications. By completely absolving Abalos, Garcillano, et al, and the Tansipeks (or whoever their stinking, crooked cronies are in this MegaPacific Consortium), the Ombudsman is undermining the legal, moral and juridical authority of the Supreme Court. She is acting as a Rogue of Impunity and challenging the Court to do something. What the Supreme Court does about this atrocious slap-in-the-face and dirt kicked in for good measure, may determine the fate of the Rule of Law in this ill-fated jurisdiction, where it seems, there can no longer be any counting upon the usual expectations of a nominally civilized and orderly society, where a two-bit political appointee of an illegitimate, lying, cheating, President gets to diss the Supreme Court and throw its Decision back in its face, with a spit and a click of her heels.

Sarcasm from the Malaya Editorial:

Comelec spokesman James Jimenez got it right when he said the poll agency was vindicated with the Ombudsman report.

"This is what we have been saying all along, that there is no irregularity (in the acquisition) of the ACMs," Jimenez said.

There is it, folks. THERE WAS NO IRREGULARITY IN THE ACQUISITION OF THE MACHINES.

It then follows that paying P1.3 billion for those idled machines was perfectly regular. Nobody was unduly benefited. There was no loss to the government.

The irregularity was only in the minds of the members of the Supreme Court and of Senate Blue Ribbon committee.

And Gloria Arroyo is the most truthful, honest and upright president this country has ever had

Heh. No amount of whitewashing will ever shore up Arroyo's partisan COMELEC.

Late Wednesday roundup:

-- Ellen Tordesillas is having a hard time coping with her asthma problem after 6 days na walang kuryente pa rin sa bahay nila.

-- Washington Post: Don't try to censor a blogger.

-- Tribune Edit: Enough is enough

-- Conrad de quiros: "There is one point about the killings that seems to escape the notice of foreign journalist organizations that have rightly condemned the atrocity. That is the fact that most of the victims have worked outside Metro Manila. That is the case in particular with the journalists. There seems to be an implicit taboo on the killing of journalists in Metro Manila. Nearly to a man or woman, the journalists have been killed outside the capital.

It’s not hard to see where that taboo comes from. It doesn’t come from the would-be assassins’ healthy respect for the national media, it comes from the would-be assassins’ healthy fear of international opinion. If the killers have nothing to do with government, they stand to be tracked down resolutely with the flailing of the international press. If the killers have to do with government, the government stands to be reviled passionately with the driving of the international press.

The confinement of the murders to the countryside is surprisingly true as well for the activists. Though a few activists have been murdered in the fringes of Metro Manila, most have been felled well outside of it. The people of the Bayan Muna party-list group that I’ve talked to at least have told me they still felt relatively safe -- such as any dissenter can still feel safe in the Philippines -- in Metro Manila. But that was before the recent murder of Makati City Mayor Jejomar Binay’s security aide, Pablo Glean. If that is a political killing, and it looks every inch so, it is a scary pass. It ups the ante on the mayhem."

-- The proliferation of gambling and casinos was one of the issues why erap was booted out. Pero bakit tahimik na lang ang mga usual suspects at moralists ngayong mas malala pa ang proliferation ng gambling under the arroyo admin?

The US Congress has approved legislation imposing severe restrictions on on-line or Internet gambling. For such broadminded and permissive Congress to pass this legislation is a recognition of the evil effects of on-line gambling on the general population, especially the youth.

For a conservative Catholic country like the Philippines, the GMA policy of allowing and opening up all forms of gambling to the public is certainly deplorable. It further impoverishes a great majority of the population.

I do believe that outside of Las Vegas, we now have more casinos and gambling parlors than any other country in this whole wide world.

If only for this reason, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines and Muslim Ulamas must unite to demand a reversal of GMA’s open country policy on gambling.

Nah, the bishops like their PAGCOR (and jueteng?) money too much to protest.

Anong purpose ng "War vs. the Left" ni Arroyo?

(1st update)

Most of our military officers are not corrupt and partisan. Most of them don't engage in political murders and abductions and illegal wiretapping against administration's officials and critics from the political opposition.

Para sa akin, sila General "Butch" Palparan at ang mga political appointees ni Arroyo like the Gloriagate loyalist Gen. Esperon ang dahilan kung bakit napaka-partisan at corrupt ng military ngayon at maraming human rights violations ang nangyayari under their watch.

I believe there are elements within the military that were responsible for the political assassinations vs. the leftist militants at political opponents. I believe Arroyo had an idea that this would happen when she put Palparan in charge of wiping out the Left, but didn't really care.

Yung Arroyo administration at yung mga katulad nina Gen. Palparan ang dahilan kung bakit may permissive policy and culture of targetting leftists and critics sa bansa natin ngayon.

So bakit naging ganito ang strategy nila?

Here's how I think Arroyo's "War with the Left" policy started. Hawkish advisers within the Arroyo camp believe there's a strong possibility na magsasanib pwersa ulit ang military at mga leftist militants (along with civil society, like they did the last time vs. erap) para patalsikin si Arroyo.

So to prevent that from happening again, Arroyo's military advisers told her to start another "War on the Left", and Palparan and his boys will "take care of the rest."

The purpose for this is threefold:

1) to neutralize and intimidate the leftist groups (sila kasi ang pinaka-active pagdating sa pagra-rally at public demos.)

2) to keep the military "busy" instead of being "idle" (an idle military is the devil's playground, sabi raw nila... hmmm, tama ba yon??).

3) and most importantly, to prevent them from joining forces by making them fight one another.

Unlike Edsa Dos, where rightwing military groups headed by Mike Arroyo and Chavit Singson were able to join forces with leftist groups like Bayan Muna and Sanlakas led by Satur Ocampo and Crispin Beltran to pursue a common objective (Remove Erap), ngayon mahirap na kasi dahil sa bagong War Declaration ni Arroyo sa mga maka-kaliwa.

And to help make matters worse, some elements in the military are deliberately targetting members of the left for assassination. Of course the militant groups are angry and are blaming the military for the murders. And the military and this administration seems incapable of solving the crimes.

Kaya wala na talagang tiwala ang mga militanteng grupo at military sa isa't isa.

Which means victory for Arroyo, Palparan and Esperon.

More: Palparan's boys seems to be good at killing "soft targets", pero pagdating sa tunay na threats like the NPA, Abu Sayyaf at JI, mukhang hirap na hirap sila.

Conrad de Quiros: "At the very most, there is Arroyo’s repeated promotion and commendation of the minor-league Yamashita, Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan, the last publicly and loudly during her State of the Nation Address. She singled out Palparan for a job well done, proposing his fellows find inspiration in his example. She did not tell Palparan that in a democracy people are presumed innocent until proven guilty; she told Palparan to keep up the good work. She did not tell Palparan that in a democracy there is a distinction between combatant and non-combatant, between soldier and civilian, between people who believe in Marx and people who take up arms; she told Palparan he had exceeded expectations. She did not tell Palparan that in a democracy it is wrong to murder first and say “I … am … sorry” later; she told him to stand up and bask in the applause.

That isn’t just elevating mayhem into policy, that is elevating mayhem into virtue. "

Mike Defensor: Gov’t job will ensure Palparan’s safety

PRESIDENTIAL chief of staff Michael Defensor yesterday defended newly retired Maj. Gen. Jovito Palparan who is being blamed by militants for the surge in extrajudicial killings.

Defensor said Palparan has done a good job in the insurgency campaign.

He said the plan to tap Palparan for a job in government is aimed at making use of his experience and at the same time protect him from threats against his life.

UPDATE: late Roundup:

-- PDI Editorial on the real scandal in the nursing exams mess

-- Frustrated in anti-pork drive, Ping eyes Manila mayoralty

-- Ducky Paredes writes about the abusive OIC mayor in Pasay who replaced pee wee trinidad.

-- wala pa ring ilaw kela Ellen Tordesillas.

-- Sen. Pimentel: Melo panel to investigate political killings toothless

Hao Siao!

Another bullshit lutong makaw whitewash decision from Arroyo's Ombudsman.

From Dean Jorge Bocobo: Ombudsman Junks Supreme Court Decision

ABSCBN 10:00 News reports that Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez has cleared Chairman Ben Abalos and the rest of the Commission on Elections of all liability in the matter addressed by the following January, 2004 Supreme Court Decision, which she has in effect JUNKED (along with their own previous Resolution):

.....
From the sounds of the Ombudsman's 52 page decision, she's now lawyering for the very people the Supreme Court condemned in the above -- by repeating the very arguments rejected by the Court in its original decision. How can it be that the Supreme Court has voided a contract for the nation's automated elections system, charging the Comelec with grave abuse of discretion and other crimes and misdemeanors, and yet the Ombudsman declines to prosecute any of the principal accused?

All I can say is...We must withdraw consent to be so misgoverned, or bear our chains in abashed silence!

Yes, tarantadong desisyon ito.

OTOH, the US government, Arroyo's benefactor, seems to like what it sees in Arroyo's Ombudsman that it even provided millions of dollars in financial aid (thru the MCA) just recently to help Arroyo "fight corruption" daw.

Merceditas gutierrez going after the corrupt big fish within the administration? What a laugh.

You might as well give that money to Raul Gonzalez's DOJ, Ms Kenney and pray to god it doesn't get "Bolante'd" in their anti-opposition este... anti-corruption campaign.

More here: Merceditas Gutierrez a Big Joke

Project Runway 2 - Banana Republic Challenge

Yes, nasa season two pa rin kami. Gumawa na naman sila ng design para sa Banana Republic (katulad ng season one), but this time the 10 contestants were grouped in pairs.

Finally, natanggal na rin si Marla Duran (the oldest) at yung Chinese nerd na si Diana Eng (the youngest contestant, I think).

Auf Wiedersehen!

"One week you're in, and the next day you're out." - Heidi Klum

More PR2 related stuff. Here's an Ann althouse post on why we love Project Runway. And i remember this episode where emmett was trying to confort Santino, "This is not the time to be second-guessing your vision." Hah!

And I have to read in reverse the entries found in the Manolo dahil ayaw ko ng spoilers at hindi ko pa napapanood ang season 3 ng PR.

Sige, basahin nyo

(3rd update) Charles Krauthammer: "How dare you say Islam is a violent religion? I'll kill you for it" is not exactly the best way to go about refuting the charge. But of course, refuting is not the point here. The point is intimidation."

Ralph Peters on the Islam Haters:

In our own country, we should respect our fellow citizens who happen to be Muslims - instead of implying that they're all members of a devious fifth column. More than 3 million Americans profess Islam. How many have strapped on bombs and walked into Wal-Mart?

Sure, bad actors will emerge. But every immigrant group has produced its gangsters, demagogues and common criminals. Fools who insist that "Muslims can't be good Americans" insult both Muslims and America - whose transformative genius should never be underestimated.

The problem isn't the man or woman of faith, but cultural environment. Once free of the maladies of the Middle East, Muslims thrive in America. Like the rest of us.

We are in a knife-fight to the death with fanatics who've perverted a great religion. But those who warn of Muslims in general are heirs of the creeps who once told us Jews can never be real Americans and JFK will serve the Vatican.

Obviously, there's a moral reason for not condemning all Muslims. Real Americans judge men and women by their individual characters and actions, not by the color of their skin or the liturgy they recite on their respective Sabbaths. Sorry, all you bigots: You'll never get the Wannsee Conference, Part II, at Lake Tahoe.

But even for our inveterate haters, those whose personal disappointments have left them with a need to blame others (sounds like al Qaeda to me . . . ), there's a Realpolitik reason not to insult all Muslims: In the serious world of strategy and the military, you don't make unnecessary enemies.

We've got our hands full in the Middle East. Why alienate the Muslims of Indonesia or West Africa (or California)? A wise strategist seeks to divide his enemies, not to recruit for them. Some of the bigots out there might like to try to kill a billion Muslims, but I'm not signing up for their genocidal daydreams - nor will my fellow Americans.

Ultimately, our military actions can only buy time. The long overdue liberal reformation within the Islamic world can only be carried out by Muslims themselves. Those who believe in Islam with all their hearts will have to be the ones who defeat those who hijacked their faith.

Do we have to fight? Yes. But let's fight our true enemies, not the innocent.

Amen. Read this too from Conrad de Quiros.

Neal Cruz: "THERE are many reasons why we should not change the Constitution now, but the two most compelling are (1) the motives of the proponents and (2) the total lack of respect of the proponents for the rule of law."

jb baylon on mike Arroyo:

If Mike Arroyo has a problem, it is simply this: he has failed to pass the so-called "Caesar’s wife" test. That is, that Caesar’s wife must be above suspicion; else, as in Caesar’s case, he had to get rid of – divorce, actually – his wife Pompeia for her being involved in a scandal concerning a ritual.

In Mike Arroyo’s case the consequence is not divorce, no matter how so many people wish that were an available option in the Philippines. In Mike Arroyo’s case the consequence is becoming the "usual suspect" in whatever corruption scandal is bruited about in the country!

Wags can even say that Mike Arroyo has apparently failed even to pass the "Caesar’s mistress" test, if ever there was one!

And then again, if Mike Arroyo has a problem, he too has an advantage. And that is, that he is a public figure in the country like the Philippines, and not in a country like the United States. Or South Korea. Or Germany. Or Singapore.

Can you imagine all these allegations about Mike Arroyo happening in a country like any of those mentioned above? In the United States, for example, Mike Arroyo would have been subjected to intense scrutiny by the FBI that he would wish he just hadn’t been born a descendant of Jose Pidal, Why? Because if the Jose Pidal accounts – accounts that, if I remember right, he disowned by saying he didn’t know who owned them and didn’t even know who Jose Pidal was. Never mind that he actually had a grandfather by that name. And never mind that his brother later on admitted – or should we say claimed? – to being the Jose Pidal account owner.

Even his brother, too, would have felt the heat of the FBI. Why? Because he would have been asked to explain how someone paying so little in income taxes would have so much money in what was apparently unexplained wealth. And then again, that would have been the case in America if it happened to the spouse of an American president. Heck, if the authorities could subject a sitting president like Clinton (or Nixon before him) to a withering investigation, what more a spouse (and an in-law?).

In South Korea, on the other hand, we’ve seen how the authorities have not only jailed former presidents, but even children of an incumbent president. Has the fiscal who would dare investigate a sitting president, his or her spouse or his or her kids already been born? I suspect the Second Coming will happen first before such a fiscal emerges.

Can you imagine, under present conditions, some fiscal daring to file a case against a First Gentleman or a First Lady? That would be cojones worthy of the Guinness Book of World Records.

Not to mention a Justice secretary who would dare sanction an investigation of his boss or of close associates of his boss! I suspect that Jose W. Diokno was the last one who dared, and we know what the president of the Philippines did. That president, by the way, was Diosdado Macapagal.

More on the Harry Stonehill case here. Read this old article too from TIME Magazine: Smoke in Manila (aug. 10, 1962)

2nd Update: Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy. that's the title of WSJ John Fund's new book.

Michelle Malkin in a bikini! Yowza! Not Safe For Work. ;) UPDATE: Fake yung photo.

Malaya Editorial on Arroyo's intolerance for cheating.

And the Tribune Editorial on Erap for his policies:

The very groups that derided then President Joseph Estrada for being a college dropout and an unfit president and even actively worked to have him ousted unconstitutionally, are now seemingly in praise for his wisdom and the policies he and his Cabinet have come up with during his brief term in office.

Many business groups, among them the Makati Business Club, whose officers and members were at the forefront in creating political and economic turmoil in the country to force Estrada out of office on trumped-up charges of plunder, corruption and even his alleged lack of work ethic, now say Executive Order (EO) 138, which Estrada issued and which has been repealed by Gloria Arroyo with her EO 558, was cited for its effectiveness and “earned for the Philippines accolades from the United Nations for having the best microfinance policy in the world.”

More faint praise was made when it referred to Estrada’s EO as it is now being said by these business groups that EO 138 was a carefully studied, well reasoned out articulation of a wisdom gained from accumulated experience of about 30 years of numerous failed government experiments.

“That a policy so steeped in wisdom, and one that is the product of many lessons learned from experience, and that has achieved so much, done so much good and has earned for the country international admiration should be scrapped with no justification, and contrary to all logic, is a setback of monumental proportion. What makes it more baffling is that this is being done by a government that understands the negative implications of such a major policy shift,” the business sector now says.

If the business groups are honest about it, they can well admit that government — whether for business and investments or the economy or even politics — was managed a whale of a lot better under the Estrada government than it is today, under Gloria Arroyo, whom they supported twice over; once in her power grab in 2001, and again in 2004 during the presidential polls, where these same civil society groups closed their eyes to the massive poll cheating and diversion of public funds by Gloria to buy the votes and cheat some more — and all because they wanted to prevent another movie star and one identified with Estrada from becoming president.

In Estrada’s time, international agreements were honored and even onerous sovereign guarantees and loans incurred by the previous administrations were being paid for faithfully by the Estrada government. And public funds were not diverted for personal use. There was neither bribery on Estrada’s part to any congressman to kill a trumped-up impeachment complaint against him. He followed the law and the Constitution and played by the rules of the game.

Business groups, as well as everyone else in this country know just why Gloria is bent on repealing Estrada’s EO 138. This is being done by Gloria for election purposes and to buy off more of her allies.

Estrada never cheated to win the polls.

It will be no different from the P3-billion fertilizer funds scam, which funds were diverted to the campaign kitty of Gloria to ensure votes for her from various mayors, governors and congressmen she bought off.

But even if the business groups continue refusing to acknowledge that Estrada was a better chief executive than Gloria can ever be, despite his different management style and his candor, as he is no hypocrite, surveys from various international organizations such as Transparency International and the World Economic Forum, or even the World Bank data, all point to Estrada’s government performance as the better performing government, compared to Gloria’s. Even in business competitiveness, the country was, during Estrada’s time, ranked at 35th place, where it is now down to 72 in ranking.

There is also no question, given the official data, that under the Estrada government, there were more direct foreign investments pouring in. Even in the matter of upholding the freedoms of a people, Estrada followed the law and the Constitution, something which Gloria does not do.

And in the corruption index, the country’s ranking under Gloria is dismal, as it is now up there in the category of one of the most corrupt governments while her regime continues to be scandal-wracked and corruption-ridden.

The economy is in bad shape, despite her claims of the country’s economy doing so well that we have gotten out of the Third World stage to the Second World status and soon to become First World.

They know she is full of manure. Estrada never fed the nation with manure.

Wala pa ring ilaw sa amin

weird kasi yung mga lamp post sa kalsada namin may ilaw na, pero yung mga residential buildings at condo na malapit sa amin, wala pa ring kuryente.

UPDATE: MERON NA!