Twittering Arroyo's $20K Dinnergate

JM: uhmm..why would martin romauldez spend $20,000 of his own money to host GMA's contingent for a 1 night dinner especially during bad economy?

CaffeineSparks: @johnmarzan asking myself the same thing. can we view the P1 million dinner as an 'investment' of sorts? hehehhee

JM:@caffeinesparks i think remonde is not telling the truth. Even by american standards, a $20,000 dinner is a lot for any individual to pay fr

JM:kaya nga napansin ng nypost eh. that $20,000 price tag is a staggering amount.

JM:i'm sure hinihintay ni romualdez ang reinbursement from the gov't once the issue dies down.

JM:i can see the conversation going like this: "hey bayaran mo muna, martin. don't worry, we'll take care it once we get home."

Chiz Escudero seeking GMA's support for 2010

Buking si Escudero. From the Tribune:

Reacting to the biting criticisms made by Sen. Francis "Chiz" Escudero on President Arroyo’s ninth State of the Nation Address (Sona) delivered last Monday, presidential son Pampanga Rep. Juan Miguel "Mikey" Arroyo, in a dzMM interview, slammed the senator, saying that while Escudero publicly criticizes his mother and her administration, he uses back channels to get his mother to support his presidential bid in 2010.

Arroyo also blasted Escudero for saying that his mother failed to give a categorical statement on her political plans, pointing out that if Escudero did not believe she is leaving Malacañang, why is he seeking his mother’s support for 2010?

Actually, matagal nang buking.

Still want to put your blind faith on Automated election machines?

Honduras' referendum results on Zelaya's consti amendment pre-loaded on computers.

the report got picked up by Slashdot.

"In Honduras, according to breaking Catalan newspaper reports (translations available, USA Today mention), authorities have seized 45 computers containing certified election results for a constitutional election that never happened. The election had been scheduled for June 28, but on that day the president, Manuel Zelaya, was ousted. The 'certified' and detailed electronic records of the non-existent election show Zelaya's side having won overwhelmingly."

Related: What happens if Automated voting system is run by the same Arroyo and Garci lieutenants?

What happens if Automated voting system is run by the same Arroyo and Garci lieutenants?

we are the only country where the elites think that automated is more "reliable and secure" than manual. if you ask all the other countries around the world, especially those with experience in computerized voting (particularly in the US)--they'd tell you the opposite, na mas safe and reliable ang manual because it is more difficult to fix the results (forge signatures, mess up the count) without getting caught thru verification.

sure, automated counts votes faster, but it is also easier/faster to fix elections from the inside. and AFAIK, chairman melo has not done anything to investigate or remove the 2004 operators who worked for garci inside the comelec. he did not clean house.

doing the automated system without credible election officials in charge is like building a swanky new henhouse while retaining the services of the fox to guard it.

Catching vote discrepancies and verifying the count would be almost impossible. NAMFREL and other watchdog groups from the CBCP becomes redundant/useless. Something like this will never ever happen again. if you did not catch it, it never happened. ignorance is bliss.

hindi kasalanan ng manual kung may dayaan sa 2004. manual made it harder for them and more risky to fix the results. kinaylangan ng administration ang sangkatutak na comelec at military operators para ayusin ang eleksyon. hindi pa maganda ang pagkakagawa, according to one general. alam nating may dayaan, sa 2004 canvassing pa lang halata na. pero walang nakulong. lusot ang mga mandaraya. dahil corrupt ang gobierno at accomplice ang CBCP.

UPDATE: Armida Siguion Reyna:

You ask a question about the transparency of the bidding process, of how the Comelec granted the bid to Total Information Management (TIM) and Smartmatic, and right away you get a defensive answer still in the form of another question: "Bakit, ayaw mo ba ng automation?"

Carlitos clarified that he was for automation, but not merely automation per se. Accuracy remained the highest value, as opposed to automated elections nga, automated din ang daya. He mentioned what IT experts in Princeton University had done to prove it was possible to put in, or pre-load, information into a computer that could alter results of a vote, and from there suggested it best for the Comelec to allow local IT experts to fully examine TIM-Smartmatic hardware to settle once and for all if hacking was possible.

When Rafanan reacted that wasn’t necessary as the Smartmatic process had been tested in other parts of the world, the soft-spoken Bahague countered the factors in, say, the US, would be different from here, iba raw ang testing sa US, dapat, iba rin dito. In other words, Carlitos exclaimed, walang Virgilio Garcillano sa America, so iba talaga ang testing doon, sa testing dito.

No reaction there, from Rafanan. I didn’t expect him to bowl over with laughter, a chuckle would have sufficed. Nothing doing, and that’s when I realized he must have been nervous. He then proceeded to insist the Comelec had been for the past few months working to weed out undesirables from its rank-and-file and that for me was cause to worry. I didn’t want to be unfair to him, but I couldn’t help but feel he wasn’t altogether being truthful.

Na-diyaryo na dapat ‘yon, na-bandera sa lahat ng media, kung tutoong naglilinis ang Comelec ng bakuran, with one year to go before the presidential elections of 2010.

I mean, where is lawyer Lintang Bedol, the election supervisor of Maguindanao linked to the alleged anomalous "win" of Miguel Zubiri over Koko Pimentel? What’s happened to Rey Sumalipao, lawyer Pebo, names attached to the fraud of 2004 and yet allowed to "operate" in 2007? Garci several times in his recorded conversation with "the voice of the President, but it is not she who is talking," as per Mike Defensor, made references to having to kidnap or salvage recalcitrant Comelec low-rank officials — has he even been made to at least clarify what he meant by those horrific statements?

And Benjamin Abalos Jr., the former chairman, who vowed to "clean his name," kaya na nga raw at nag-resign. He didn’t do anything to investigate Garcillano, and took a further plunge into degradation by getting involved in the NBN-ZTE deal. The last we’ve heard from him is that he’s flippin’ "borjers" at the Wack-Wack Golf and Country Club and in a stall somewhere in Boni Avenue.

The problem of the Comelec then was credibility, the problem of the Comelec today is still credibility.

It’s a credibility issue that has nothing to do with if indeed TIM was only "fronting" to be the local "60 percent" of a "60-40" investment requirement, or with how TIM and Smartmatic like lovers broke up and kissed and made up the next day, and refused to tell what exactly happened between them.

It’s a credibility matter that runs from Comelec top to bottom, in every possible way. We’ve heard of the abominable dagdag-bawas, there are still other tricks from within, designed to take advantage of the naïve candidate. Such as city-level Comelec officers brazenly refusing to release Comelec checker IDs shortly before an election, because "masakit ang braso, nangangalay, hindi makapirma ng ID." The candidate pays them, voila! Bigla na silang nakakapirma ulit. Or Comelec "brokers" who go around offering their own "protection" services to candidates.

If current Chairman Jose Melo, na former Supreme Court justice pa mandin, wants to send the message that under his leadership the Comelec has become aboveboard, the first thing he needs to do is go back to prosecuting past known "operators" from within and putting them in jail, Bedol, Sumalipao and Garci included.

When people like ComelecAKO's postigo luna and COMELEC spokesperson James Jimenez continue to claim that Garcillano did nothing wrong in 2004, you have to question their judgment and credibility.

MORE common sense from Raul Pangalangan:

The manual writing of the ballot—no different from the manual filling in of the boxes in the PCOS plan—is not the cause of the delay. The manual counting at the precinct level is usually completed within hours after the end of election day.The PCOS computers are infinitely faster but astronomically less transparent. But the greatest delay—and greatest opportunity for cheating—is in the transmittal, collection and final tally of the votes from precincts at every level. That is the stage that we must computerize—and we wouldn’t need fancy optical reading machines for that, just your basic wired PCs that will transmit and collate the precinct, municipal/city and provincial results. But by that stage, we already have the record of votes against which we can audit and counter-check what the central computers are doing.

"Since you can’t cook elections manually anymore and no one can cook electronically, spend your 80 percent kickbacks on vote-buying."

"That is still allowed, that’s my advice," Teddyboy Locsin (PDP-Laban) said.

No one can cook electronically? I beg to differ.

About those secret foreign trips by Arroyo

there's been lots's of speculations on why she went to Colombia. But where there's smoke, there's fire.

Here's something that happened just today in the US, headlined in Drudge.

South Carolina governor admits affair, secret Argentina trip

The governor, who went missing since last week, finally admitted to an affair.

I Question the Timing of Mar Roxas-Korina Sanchez Wedding!

It's political!

Just kidding!

But I don't think there has ever been a presidential candidate na hindi married (and Cory is a widow of slain opposition leader Ninoy Aquino).

Anyway, napanood ko yung interview ni Kris Aquino kay Mar at Korina a few days ago. Tinanong ni Kris si Korina kung may prenup sila. Before Korina got to answer, sumingit si Mar at sabi nya: "What is hers is hers, and what is mine is hers."

Natawa si Korina and she shot back: "O sige nga, isulat mo yan sa papel."

Then Korina answered the question saying na dapat raw may prenup para hindi magulo, kasi may kanya kanyang na silang assets.

Tribune: Chiz-Jinggoy tandem shaping up in NPC’s 2010 plans

WTF:

The prospect of Sen. Jinggoy Estrada seeking the post of vice president in next year’s elections yesterday appeared on the political horizon following reports that the camp of Sen. Francis Escudero, a presidential hopeful, is already in the thick of negotiations tapping Estrada as his running mate under the Nationalist People’s Coalition (NPC) ticket.

“So far, the negotiation is going smoothly. They just have to iron out a few kinks,” said a lawmaker who requested the media not to identify him but to just describe him as a solon from the Visayas who has been openly supporting Escudero’s presidential bid.

Armida smacks the CBCP hard

First paragraph from Armida Siguion Reyna's latest:

Two outings ago, I narrated in this same space how the June 10 rally went at the corner of Ayala Avenue and Paseo de Roxas in Makati City: “Makati Mayor Jojo Binay had all the right to at least welcome the public to his city, but he gave up his slot when the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines’ admonished politicians to stay to the sidelines; an admonition, I must say in an aside, the CBCP has no right to issue, considering a good number of them either waltz with the Squatter in Malacañang or just safely sit on the fence like the three monkeys who see, say, and hear no evil.”

Read the whole thing.

Philippine Commentary now a Group Blog

i know it's been that way for a few days na.

but i think it's great because i don't have to monitor all the blogs i used to read. nandiyan na sila lahat (MB, Schumey) sa blog ni manong DJB.

No Surprise Here

UN Report: State use of torture under Arroyo government "routine"

Obama's Defining Moment

The lame statements the Obama admin gave re Iran is very discouraging. It is very similar to their initial reaction when Russia invaded Georgia last year.

Barack Obama thinks the Mullahs of iran and ahmadinejad can be negotiated with with regards to their nuclear ambitions ("talk without preconditions") and is afraid that any statement that can be seen as supporting the people's uprising in iran might anger the clerics. To think that anything substantial will come out of talks with ahmadinejad about halting their quest for Nukes or stopping their support for terror groups like Hezbollah and Hamas vs Israel is naive.

Instead of suggesting that he "wear a green tie" the next time around, why doesn't he grow a pair?

And don't think for a sec that the Iranian people will not remember this.

Michael Totten: "it’s frankly inconceivable that anti-Americans among the Iranian opposition will be angry at President Obama if he takes their side. It should and likely will anger them if he refuses and tacitly recognizes the legitimacy of the hated dictatorship they wish to replace."

Kidlat Tahimik's "Perfumed Nightmare"

wow, great masterpiece! weird funny wacky. Now i know who Werhner Von Braun is!

"Where is my their vote?"

I got this from Andrew Sullivan.

Oishi.com.ph website infected with JS.Kryptik virus

don't visit the site. arrgh!

Iran on Fire

massive demonstrations and clashes after the questionable results of the Iranian elections.

this could either turn into Tiananmen or Edsa 86.



Up to the minute updates from HuffPo.

David Brooks huge omission

nice defense of Sonia Sotomayor. But his arguments fall apart by failing to mention how Sotomayor handled the recent Ricci case, which is all about race.

Jennifer Rubin has more on Brooks' omissions.

Romeo Intengan vs MLQ3

the Ateneo Jesuit gets MLQ3 to recant.

Orlando Roncesvalles comments on the case.

How Erap can best help the Opposition

By staying neutral in the selection of Opposition presidential candidates.

Sabi ni Ellen Tordesillas:

Sana hindi na rin itutuloy ni dating Pangulong Estrada .Sana hindi na niya hintayin na i-disqualify siya ng Supreme Court. Tulungan na lang niya ang isa sa mga oposisyon na kandidato na siyang magsusulong na maayos na pamahalaan. Kasama doon ang pag-usig sa mga mandaraya at magnanakaw na katulad ni Gloria Arroyo at ang kanyang mga alagad.

I think Erap can be more useful to the opposition by telling his followers NOT to vote for any administration candidates.

Dick Cheney: Pro-Torture and Pro-Gay Marriage

Cheney's popularity is already on the rise because of his defense of "enhanced interrogation".

Will it rise even more after this?