Hey, here’s something for the credentialists out there: Who would you rather believe: (a) a drunken wash-out actor convicted of plunder, (b) a bunch of celibate men-in-robes who rely on a non-peer-reviewed 5,000-year-old textbook for their wisdom, or (c) a be-credentialled Economist?
I’m sitting here wondering how many of the following hats one can wear simultaneously while attempting to answer the above question:
The Credentialist hat;
The “Opposition” hat; and/or;
The Hat of Common Sense.
Here’s the venerable next most-likely-president-of-the-Philippines putting on his Economist costume:
“Arroyonomics is a kind of economics that is out of touch with reality and real facts,” Estrada said in a statement.
Right.
And here’s some bozo speaking for the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) apparently swinging over onto the side of statistics (which, by the way is a branch of science, padre — careful, as you may be excommunicated for heresy) as a matter of convenience in this instance:
“The state of the nation should also be looked at from the experiences and eyes of the remaining millions who are still suffering from hunger, illiteracy, unemployment, homelessness and sickness,” said Archbishop Angel Lagdameo, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP)
Hmmmm, there’s the small matter of overpopulation that you seem to have conveniently ommitted, padre — something that happens to be the common denominator amongst the above inconveniences suffered by the poor that you mention above.
So I kinda wonder now, considering that the good Father said this…
“This would balance the picture,” Lagdameo said. “They were outside the SONA site.”
… who really is the one being a bit unbalanced around here?
![big-bad-wolf[1]](http://filipinovoices.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/big-bad-wolf1.jpg)
There is so much to learn from the way irony routinely escapes the vacuous intellectual faculties of the so-called “elders” and “experts” of Philippine society. Over at Jolog Central, for example is an article with the title The Gall of Gloria where the following priceless specimen of the best of Pinoy thinking can be found:
Riddle of the day: What’s the difference between a fairytale and a state- of- the- nation address?
Answer, according [to] a text message: A fairytale is fiction with dwarfs as characters.SONA has a dwarf relating fiction.
Gloria Arroyo was not even an engaging storyteller. Bitchy, catty and spiteful, she looked so ugly.
["ha ha ha" - canned laughter lifted from an old episode of Iskul Bukol]
The gall indeed, that someone would tell the Filipino people such “fairy tales”. Isn’t that right Erap? Archbishop Lagdameo?
As an esteemed but humble pilgrim to the venerable Fountain of Truth about Filipinos once observed:
we filipinos are so hypocrete. we live on lies and half truth.
when I was a kid (am now 40 [years old]) our elders never give us straight answer. one day while playing to my female friend, we were both taking a bath (nude and I was 5 [years old]) I shout “ay pepe” [and] my aunt scolded me for saying bad words.
another was, when I ask my aunt again how did I come out in this world. and without hesitation she said “galing ka sa puwet”.
there’s alot more lies and half truth i learn from my elders, when we went to US at my age of 10 [years old], I was so surprised how ordinary folks explain everything as if am talking to them as the same age as mine. up to now am still wandering why we filipinos doesnt treat kids as intellectual and the future of our country, in the philippines, youth are deprive of ideas what is better for them.
As always, the still un-addressed challenge to those who presume to make such pompous pronouncements and hollow promises to the Filipino remains:
What alternative path do you propose to offer to Filipinos over the next five to ten years?
This puts a bit of perspective around the current national sport of the moment — dissecting in value-crushing detail all the bits and pieces of economic factoids mentioned in the “SONA”. Any moron can conclude out of all that that the “real situation” of the Pinoy has either (a) been mis-represented or glossed-over in the speech, (b) does not make any traditional economic indicators relevant, and/or (c) invalidated any poster-boy/girl presented by President Arroyo during her speech. Scrape out all that “discussion” with a sharpened spatula and you are left with the more fundamental question that (as with the previous one) also remains conveniently un-addressed:
How big a factor is a President, really in terms of influencing the course of progress (or lack of it) in the Philippines?
Is it just me, or does being surrounded by all the venerable “experts” here have the effect of making my questions so progressively child-like.
Enlighten us, plez, ladies and gentlemen.
Otherwise, step back and behold the substance-deficited and barren intellectual landscape of the Philippine National “debate”.
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I don’t know why,
the Cat in the Hat came to mind . . .
as oft does Alice in Wonderland . . .
Your big bad wolf looks a little like Roxas.
The dialogue between the Arroyo camp and the critic camps reminds me a lot of the dialogues here on FV. Everyone digs down and defends their starting perspective, and tries to win by knocking the opponents out. Only a few have the calm and reason to listen or bend.
Joe
“Fountain of Truth about Filipinos”
Classic!
That’s exactly one thing that’s wrong with our culture! Filipino adults don’t treat kids properly! So the kids grow up dumb! haha
May the culture of the matanda die with them. Please.
“Non-peer-reviewed.” Heh. Actually, I think the problem with that one is that it is constantly peer-reviewed. They tend to not want to hear from the non-peers.
Another silly statement. That 3500 year old (not 5000!) textbook has been “peer reviewed” so often. The problem is that the reviewers have been burned at the stake!
As for the CBCP, they haven’t fully shaken off that John Paulish phenomenology! They should realize that habemus papam novum! This present Pope is a theologian and not a philosopher and he thinks like a scientist!
The culture of the matanda is reinforced in Catholic school and even at the supposedly secular UP. Benigs you have hope, wrt this my 80 year old mother has thrown in the towel!
Most of us voters have no common sense. We vote with our emotions.
If a candidate will get you by your emotions. You are like a
carabao led by the nose already.
So, we vote a known Plunderer distributing rice, noodles, tuyo, etc… We vote anybody who will capture our imaginations and touch
our emotions. If we should have taken time to deliberate, to think,
and to see all the issues involved before casting our votes. We would not have these kinds of problems. If a paid Blogger pitch that this candidate is able. We swallow hook, line and sinkers. Believing, because he is a good Blogger. What a way to decide. I am
ready to puke…
Benigno,
You don’t have to be surrounded by anyone to make your statements so progressively CHILDISH; so definitely IT’S JUST YOU!
Case in point is this seeming fetish of yours (another deviation on your part perhaps) in re-using this “never given straight answers to kids” when you don’t even bother to defend it when it is assailed. http://filipinovoices.com/the-poignancy-of-filipino-aspirations/comment-page-1#comment-76300
Another example of something you don’t bother to defend when it is addressed- http://filipinovoices.com/triumphing-over-evil/comment-page-1#comment-66542
And you should relate the above quote with your statement in your FV article “Any moron can dismiss the SONA”. http://filipinovoices.com/any-moron-can-dismiss-the-sona
During the time of Meiji; leaders of the Meiji government wanted a social revolution and one of the decisions was to remove the privileges of the samurai class. This was such a radical cultural change that a prominent official of Meiji, Omura Masujiro would be murdered by his own kinsmen samurai. Laws, policies, etc… were formed and enforced, culture change followed. The decision for such a cultural revolution wasn’t initiated from below but came from the leadership of the government.
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I do want to hear what the Presidential candidates’ platforms are. Coming out with one’s platform early does have its advantage. Any other platforms that come afterwards that resemble it can be mocked as just a copy and unoriginal. John Edwards’ camp was able to denounce that a number of another candidate’s platform was just a copy of his. But given how he fared, if ever it be true that another candidate’s platform is a copy of his, then in his case coming in early with a platform didn’t amount to much.