Ermita's autumn in New York

To the chagrin of some quarters who had hoped he would no longer show up in the Palace, chief of staff Eduardo Ermita returned to his post yesterday, but continued to fuel the ever louder murmurs of the supposed irreconcilable rift with DILG secretary Ronaldo "Goebbels" Puno. The issue was no longer the bribes scandal allegedly masterminded by the latter without a by your leave from the latter.

The issue this time was over who sent the list of nominees for the Comelec vacancies to the poll body. Irregular, Ermita said. Normal, Goebbels shot back in a fashion which somehow looks credible because he seems to really believe what he is saying. "Rift, what rift?' he asked in the manner of one who's savoring the upper hand but who self-consciously wants to look magnanimous.

Ermita was at least greeted by a congratulatory press release (warning:you might find the image offensive) on the success of his mission from the Palace, based on his own account. Ah but for the small kindnesses one gives oneself in times like these.

For it was Fall in New York, where he was dogged by the pesky human rights activists, and the aunt of Jonas Burgos, who confronted him in a forum, where he had
a civil but tense exchange with former PCGG commissioner and defense assistant secretary Ruben Carranza Jr., now a fellow at the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ).

Ruben, a former student of UN special rapporteur Philip Alston, whose report on the Philippines was dismissed by Malacanang, says he can't believe Alston believed anything Ermita said at the meeting in the UN.

The Erap pardon in perspective

The most erudite analysis of the Erap pardon I've read so far is this post from Leon, the boy blogger from outer space. He should know. His dad was in the thick of heroic efforts to recover Marcos ill-gotten wealth when there was still a hint of a glimmer of a small hope in the GMA administration.

Here, Leon gives the tongue to palace mouth Ignacio Bunye as the latter made the official announcement.

Glorietta 2: the gas blast was a palace conspiracy

An independent team of undercover probers has published its report on the Glorietta incident.

Without question, the blast was a palace conspiracy to divert attention from the scandals facing the administration.

The spooks in their safe house

Erap in his own tortured words, days before the pardon

The Philippine Onion has this exclusive on the state of Erap's mind in the days prior to his release. Who are you to judge him?

Pardon me, madam, but I can't pardon you

Just less than thirty minutes ago, this man announced that former President Joseph Estrada, whose impeachment and subsequent extra-constitutional ouster I supported, was granted executive clemency, his civil and political rights restored.

While I feel sympathy and compassion for the former president, I believe the aspiration for justice and fairness for the population at large trumps these feelings.

I probably had sleepless nights after I 'stole' a few pesos from my mother's wallet to buy cigarets in childhood. My mother eventually pardoned me, but that was just between the two of us. I will never be charged and convicted of plunder, as I have no political ambitions, low or high, and thus will never have the chance to be pardoned.

Mrs. Arroyo, your purported act of compassion and reconciliation also shows how weak and cold you are, because the move cannot but be motivated by the preroragatives of political survival. If and when you are convicted of high crimes in the future, we will not pardon you.

Here's the transcript of the announcement, courtesy of but without permission from DJB:

Whereas this administration has a policy of releasing prisoners who have reached the age of 70,

Whereas Joseph Ejercito Estrada has been under detention for six and a half years,

Whereas Joseph Ejercito Estrada has publicly committed to no longer seek any elective position or public office,

In view hereof, and pursuant to the authority conferred upon me by the Constitution, I hereby grant executive clemency to Joseph Ejercito Estrada, convicted of plunder by the Sandiganbayan of plunder and imposed the penalty of reclusion perpetua.

He is hereby restored to his civil and political rights. The forfeitures imposed by the Sandiganbayan remain in force and in full, including all writs and processes issued by the Sandiganbayan in pursuance hereof, except for the bank accounts he owned before his tenure as President.

Upon acceptance of this pardon by Joseph Ejercito Estrada, this pardon shall take effect. Given under my hand, at the City of Manila, this 25th day of October, in the year of our Lord, 2007.

Signed,
Gloria M. Arroyo

Attested,
Ignacio R. Bunye,
Acting Executive Secretary.

Are you planning to pardon this guy too?

Cool way to cool the globe

IS this a whacky way to cool the globe? It doesn't seem so.

DESPITE growing interest in clean energy technology, it looks as if we are not going to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide anytime soon. The amount in the atmosphere today exceeds the most pessimistic forecasts made just a few years ago, and it is increasing faster than anybody had foreseen.

Henning Wagenbreth

Even if we could stop adding to greenhouse gases tomorrow, the earth would continue warming for decades — and remain hot for centuries. We would still face the threat of water from melting glaciers lapping at our doorsteps.

What can be done? One idea is to counteract warming by tossing small particles into the stratosphere (above where jets fly). This strategy may sound far-fetched, but it has the potential to cool the earth within months.

Mount Pinatubo, a volcano in the Philippines that erupted in 1991, showed how it works. The eruption resulted in sulfate particles in the stratosphere that reflected the sun’s rays back to space, and as a consequence the earth briefly cooled.

Or we can also shoot missiles with the appropriate payload.

NBN: intrigue and witness-tampering as hearings resume

The NBN hearings resume today. These two stories Paid witness to appear at NBN probe---Puentebella which came first, and Lacson:ex-ZTE consultant asks money for testimony suggest witness tampering, and there seems to be agreement as to the facts cited by the admin congressman and Ping Lacson. But what's the real story?

Glorietta 2: After bomb theory bombs, nature and source of gas remains mystery

Notwithstanding their hedging about continuing to look at all angles, the authorities yesterday virtually ruled out a bomb blast in the Glorietta 2 incident. For NW, the absence of a blast crater or any other signs of shear and gashes on the equipment and walls of the basement is a sufficient condition to discard the bomb hypothesis. The sample testing positive for RDX is irrelevant, although doubting Juans and Juanas don't think so.

Crude but fairly informative and convincing presentations were issued by the PNP - Inter-agency anti-arson task force (IATF) Thunderbolt to the media here and here. There are diagrams, charts, photographs (many without labels and captions) and in sum the presentations are much more than I expected from our police, whose efforts must be recognized. The only spoilers are the faces, in news clips, of security adviser Norberto Gonzales, DILG secretary Ronaldo Puno, and palace mouth Ignacio Bunye, shameless clowns who had engaged in earlier fear-mongering.

Ayala Land casts doubt on theory

At noon yesterday, Ayala Land president presented an enumeration of facts to the press (and posted in their website at my request), tending to cast doubt on the gas explosion hypothesis. ABS-CBN chose to spin the story as Ayala Land Rejects PNP industrial blast theory which is a reasonable interpretation. The enumeration was reportedly finished only Tuesday night and shared with the authorities only yesterday morning. It appears that these so-called facts do not have much relevance to the preliminary findings. Here's a list of the facts Ayala presented:

GLORIETTA 2 BASEMENT

1. Basement dimensions: 178 sqm floor area; approx. ceiling height: 2.28m

2. Diesel fuel tank: Last used in June during last power outage; capacity: approx. 14,000 liters; estimated content on day of incident: 6,000 liters; the flash point of diesel contained is 72 degrees Celsius and auto ignition temperature is 220 degrees Celsius. There are no maintenance reports or observations by maintenance personnel of any aberrations to the diesel tank.

3. Fuel transfer pump: transfers diesel fuel from storage tank at basement 2 to day tank at the roof deck.

4. Ventilation: basement is ventilated by air entering the approx. 2.4m x 2.4m opening at stairwell connected to delivery bay area

5. Ambient room temperature: estimated range from 28 to 30 degrees Celsius

6. Grease trap: separates grease from wastewater entering the sump pit; maintained daily for one hour together with cleaning of basement.

7. Sump pits (there are two types of sump pit):

a. Kitchen sump pit (approx .1.5m x 1.5m x 2m): Wastewater from kitchens of five restaurants in Glorietta 2 enters the sump pit. The grease trap separates the grease from the wastewater (grease is extracted daily, every morning). A pump in kitchen sump pit pumps out wastewater to the main city sewer line automatically (there is a standby sump pump).

b. Waste sump pit (approx. 1.5m x 1.5m x 2m): Wastewater from toilets in a portion of Glorietta 2 is dumped into sump pit (21 water closets; 20 lavatories; 8 urinals). Due to the nature of customer use of toilets in restaurants, waste is seldom solid and mostly liquid (per our sewage expert opinion approx. 98% liquid). Wastewater enters sump pit and is pumped out to street sewer by a sump pump (there is a standby sump pump). Therefore, there is constant flow of mainly liquid wastewater from the toilets into the sump pit and on to the city sewer. Wastewater entering the sump pit stays in the sump pit for less than 24 hours. The usual decomposition process brought about by large amounts of solid matter in house septic tanks does not occur in this commercial sump pit.

The major element casting doubt on the gas explosion theory is the claim in item 7, which tends to show that there could not have been any significant methane generated by the sump pits, and the claim in the conference that there was nothing out of the ordinary reported by maintenance personnel in regard to the waste water system (the two sump pits and corresponding pumps). However, a maintenance man interviewed by police belies the latter claim. In regard to the amount of methane present, it depends on how much waste had accumulated contrary to the claim of a 24-hour maximum residence time. Also, it is possible that gas could have come from the sewer lines to which the pumps were connected (backflow) and this would have provided enough methane.

What can we make of the diesel tank and the role of the fuel in the explosion? The photos in the presentation show a rupture in the lateral joints of, and a hole in the steel plate covering. There appear to be no signs of soot anywhere. The diesel flash point seems irrelevant here, this parameter indicating the lowest temperature which generates enough vapor which, alone, can be ignited, but at which combustion stops if the ignition source is withdrawn. At temperatures below flash point, there is still some vaporization, and if the tank had a leak (not evidenced by police photos), these vapors would have escaped and mixed with the more volatile methane. The auto-ignition temperature is entirely irrelevant. If the tank had no leak, then, I suspect the methane ignited first, heating the tank, vaporizing the contents very quickly, rupturing the cover. The diesel fumes mix with the methane in part of the explosion. If you look inside the dieseltank you'd see that there is some fuel left (but not yet measured). The explosion could have bled the air dry of oxygen very quickly and/or had snuffing effect.

The claim that maintenance personnel reported no aberration with the diesel tank is also not very useful, since the last time the generators were on was in June.

In any case, what should be the most intellectually satisfying proof of the gas explosion theory would be a computer simulation or real scale model simulation or both.

RDX again

To some, the RDX positive test constitutes a loose end. I suppose the foreign investigators would have tested a sample from the same material (found on the ground floor by an Army man) but could not replicate the result. That should be the end of that. No need to explain further that RDX is also found in other (non-explosive) substances.

In the press conference, no reporters confronted Ayala Land spokesman Alfie Reyes about his earlier televised claim the basement was under the control of the Makati Supermarket operators, which he no longer repeated.

Mr. Ayala said the corporation would do right whatever the final findings. While it is easy for them to purchase reasonable doubt at a reasonable cost in the criminal and civil proceedings that will follow, let's hope he keeps his word.

(Glorietta 2 constitutes a mere 0.34 percent of total Ayala Land revenues).

How a Filipino insurgent was tortured. Damn, I wish our confirmation process was like theirs

I've been following the confirmation hearings (on C-Span and the NYT) of Michael Mukasey, George W.'s nominee to replace the unlamented Alberto Gonzales, and wish that our processes were as rigorous.

Last night, Mukasey was grilled by senators (mostly Democrats, among them Stephen Whitehouse of Rhode Island)) about his views on executive privilege, non-disclosure agreements, and the public's right to information. His answers were diametrically opposed to those of his predecessor.

However, Mukasey failed to assuage fears in regard to the use of torture in extracting information from terrorism suspects. He hedged big time in regard to water-boarding, saying that if water-boarding is determined to be torture, then it would be unconstitutional. The senators could not extract any more information on his views on the matter, stopping short of physically and mentally torturing him on the matter any further.

What really caught my attention was the account recounted by one of the senators of how a US soldier was prosecuted for using water-boarding on a Filipino insurgent in 1901.

I wish I could get my hands on the transcripts of Raul Gonzales's confirmation hearings, though I understand that he has never been confirmed and that the Gloria just keeps re-appointing her sycophant on a temporary basis. What is the limit to the executive's power to reappoint? I don't know, but this clearly runs counter to what the Constitution intends.

I am tempted to make a bigotted remark about people with the surname Gonzales, but I know better because I have so many friends with that surname and I have no wish to inflict a tortured argument on you.

Glorietta 2: accidents, beliefs, surprises, and relief

"The opinions for which people are willing to fight all belong to one of three classes which this scepticism condemns. When there are rational grounds for an opinion, people are content to set them forth and wait for them to operate. In such cases people do not hold their opinions with passion; they hold them calmly, and set forth their reasons quietly. The opinions that are held with passion are always those for which no ground exists; indeed the passion is the measure of the holder's lack of rational conviction. Opinions in politics and religion are almost always held passionately.

The extent to which beliefs are based upon evidence is very much less than believers suppose."

Bertrand Russell in Sceptical Essays

My early doubts about the bomb hypothesis in the Glorietta blast arose after seeing the footage of the area and the anecdotes of those in the vicinity during the incident, and early reports that the blast had been determined to have emanated from the basement, and assumptions about the 'reasonableness' or cost-minimizing behavior of terrorists, and the materials and equipment the basement was said to contain. For example, why would terrorists plant a bomb in the basement (one investigator speculated that 10 kilos of C4 could have been used) when much more impact could be expected at better locations?)

In my earlier post, I said:

I have not closed my mind to a methane-based explosion, more consistent with the footage I’ve seen. Likely I will be proven wrong.

At least three media reports today tend to lend more support to the accident hypothesis: the Inquirer's, ABS-CBN's, and GMA.tv's investigators doubt bomb theory. What stands out in all these reports are the early signs of NCR police director Geary Barias's independence. Whether this is due to character or fear of being contradicted by parallel efforts of foreign investigative agencies, it is still a hopeful sign that the real facts will come out from the official probe. We must aslo note that Barias's refusal to rule out the accident hypothesis appears to be a direct and courageous contradiction of the Gloria and the Venable and silly national security adviser, who claimed that terrorists were on a fund-raising effort by way of demonstration, perversely trying to make political hay out of the tragedy. Surprisingly too, Senator Panfilo Lacson, whose democratic impulses I doubt, counseled circumspection and sobriety in contrast to the amateurish, naive and messianic Senator Trillanes, whose belief in the incredible Operation Greenbase made me cringe in disbelief. (Disclosure: Geary Barias's activist brother Manny, with a medical practice in the US, is a long-time friend).

Here's part of GMA.tv's report:

On whether the blast might have been caused by other factors besides a bomb, Barias said "anything is possible."

He said investigators confirmed that the origin of the explosion was located at the basement of the Glorietta 2 and not on the first floor.

Barias said there was a possibility that the blast was caused by an accident rather than an explosive device. "We are also looking into that. All angles are being explored."

Last Saturday before a National Security Council meeting in Camp Crame, Barias told reporters that investigators took samples from the first floor and found no trace of nitrates.

"The explosion damaged the floor, under which revealed an underground which serves as a tool room. There was supposed to have been an oil, water, and grease depot there," Barias said then.

Later in that meeting, the PNP Crime Laboratory and the Philippine National Police (PNP) Bomb Data Center said they found traces of RDX, an ingredient used in explosives including C4 which is used by the military.

But on Sunday, Barias said that the presence of RDX would have to be verified by "additional testing."

In a television interview, Alfie Reyes, corporate spokesman of Ayala Land Inc. which owns the mall, said he would leave the issue of what caused the blast to investigators.

He clarified that the basement where the blast might have originated was being occupied by one of their tenants at the Makati Supermarket. "We are also trying to obtain information from them because they are the ones who know what is in that basement and what activities, if any, occurred in that basement," Reyes said.

He added that the Makati Supermarket had access and security control over the basement.

An investigator at the area told the Philippine Daily Inquirer Sunday afternoon that tests done by bomb experts from the US revealed no traces of RDX or any other explosive material. "Their results are negative for any solid explosive material. They have a different style [of detecting RDX]."

The investigator, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to reveal details of the investigation, also explained that the Americans took a swab sample of the explosive material from the bombsite and smudged it on the TV screen of an analysis machine which gave them a chemical composition of the sample. "We asked them to calibrate their machine and try again. They still got a negative result," the source said.

The PNP Crime Laboratory, on the other hand, drops a certain liquid into debris recovered from the bombsite. "When the sample turns a certain color, then it will indicate the kind of chemicals present. But it could be that the samples are contaminated," the source said.

The source said that at least six Americans from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the US Navy Seals and an Explosive Ordnance Division (EOD) unit have been helping out in the probe. Later in the afternoon, experts from Australia also arrived.

The American experts, the source said, tested six samples from different locations at least three times. "There were samples taken from 500 meters from the blast site and also at the seat or source of the blasts, in this case the hole that was caused."

He also confirmed that the blast originated from a bunker oil container the size of a 20-foot container van located near a septic tank. The area also contained aircon exhaust vents, a generator set, empty diesel tanks, and fuel that might have emitted dangerous fumes.

"The confluence of the mixture of gases trapped inside a confined space will look for an outlet and needs release," the expert said.

The source also noted that the blast did not cause fire, as compared to explosions caused by C4 or TNT which would cause black or gray smoke. "The kind of damage we saw is consistent with enormous pressure being released. Gases like methane don't show up in the kind of tests already done," said the source.

The source said investigators should be finished with their probe of the basement before midnight Sunday.

I heard the interview by ANC's Lia Andanar Yu of Ayala Land spokesperson Alfie Reyes, and it was apparent that he was already laying the groundwork for a legal defense against what could be a large liability suit. He pointed out that the basement was under the control of the tenant, Makati Supermarket. I wonder what else were in the basement aside from a 4000-liter diesel tank, a waste oil/water separator (I suppose a centrifuge; having worked in a diesel power plant ages ago, I know how such things work), grease, and a septic tank. A very explosive combination.

Some pundits had seized upon a PNP chemist's hesitation about mentioning C4 as early 'evidence' of a coverup. But one test of one sample indicating trace amounts of RDX is far from conclusive. More than eight semesters of chemistry (basic, organic, inorganic, quantitative, qualitative, biochem, phychem) taught me that most tests have varying rates of false positives, when a test is wrong for various reasons, whether the intrinsic limitation of a test or the carelessness of a lab technician.

(Aside: It took me a long while to get over the fact that I tested positive for shabu during the last renewal of my driver's license. The colorimetric drug test (urinalysis) also tested for cannabis, and I was tempted to taunt the technician that the test was wrong on both counts. I did not because the technician had made up her mind based on my appearance ---profiling? (I hope you get this joke). Eventually, I refused to take the more expensive confirmatory blood test and asserted my rights and returned to the clinic, and without paying any additional fee, got a negative result. The other test mentioned in the GMA report, is diffusion spectroscopy, a much more expensive one but with lesser tolerance for error.
When I was with the Ministry of Energy in the early 80's, I was involved in the field and lab testing of the effectiveness of a colorimetric method (a marker dye added to the potential contaminants) for testing 'adulteration' of regular and premium gasoline with diesel and kerosene. If the sample tested positive, a second test, called RON test (research octane number which measures the anti-knock characteristic of a fuel) using, guess what, a bomb calorimeter, was used as a confirmatory test. Before the marker dye, the primitive method was a field test using a hydrometer to test the density (or specific gravity) of a sample compared to 'pure' gasoline).

What we really need to see are the hypothesis-testing protocols of the investigators, laying out a series of logical if-then-else statements. While it might be too much to expect that they would be familiar with Karl Popper's obsession with the falsifiability of hypotheses as a fundamental criterion in scientific statements, I am willing to be surprised, as I was with Dean Jorge Bocobo's post on gaseous deflagrations.

If the investigators eventually come to the conclusion that it was an accident, we might all be relieved to know that the Islamists and military rebels are not that stupid and that the Gloria is not that ruthless. Perverse? Perhaps...

The CSI on Glorietta 2; RDX, C4, etc; and the economics of speculation and terror risk mitigation

As of midnight last night, government blast forensics experts still could not conclude whether the explosion in Glorietta 2 which killed 10 and injured more than 100 others Friday was that of a bomb. Although traces of RDX (Research Department X), which constitutes 90% of the plastic explosive C4 were detected from the debris, it was pointed out that this has pharmacological uses (among them as a rat poison). Thus the speculation continues unabated as to the perpetrators, their motives, and the final effects.

The admonition against speculation came a bit late, because by then many had formed their own conclusions. Also, the right to speculate is an inalienable human right, the exercise of which is a matter of survival in a situation where the supply curve for truth and information, especially from official sources, hardlly ever satisfies public demand. In any case, speculation has not yet been declared an exclusive privilege of the executive. “Don’t speculate too soon,” the Venable national security adviser was advising. (So when is speculation timely?) Not so soon after, the security adviser was peddling his speculative take that ‘terrorists’ were on a fund-raising enterprise and that the blast was a simple demonstration of potential for the benefit of benefactors.

Having read and heard the reports, speculative and otherwise, in the past 36 hours, I was beginning to fear I would have nothing left to speculate on, as the ‘facts’ came in trickles. On second thought, I concluded, that would never happen, because I bet, even after the official reports are issued, classified, disseminated, and regurgitated, many of us would still be speculating on which facts were suppressed, how and which observations were ‘doctored’, and how the final and official versions of the truth were spun. In fact, even before the Glorietta incident, many of us were in the midst of speculating on the NBN and the Malacanang and House bribes.

(A broad aside: I suspect the speculation industry is one of the large emerging contributors to the national economic output. But being mostly in the informal sector, the value therefrom might not be reflected in official estimates. Maybe if these did, we might be growing at more than 10% annually. Or, conversely and more plausibly, our unrecognized and underpaid statisticians might have included such output but forgot to warn us, which explains our disbelief).

The output of the speculation industry is siginificant because of the abovementioned market conditions. On the supply (sellers) side, there’s a large pool of unemployed and underpaid/employed and self-proclaimed analysts/pundits who think they are bright, or at least brighter than those offering official truths. Thus, the supply curve is almost flat and also hardly distinguishable from the X-axis. This explains why, notwithstanding the large demand, the marginal price is close to zero in equilibrium. If you can think graphically, you’ll agree that the price-quantity product would still be a significant part of GDP.

(Another broad aside: some of the buyers are also self-generators, meaning they supply their own demand. If they are full of themselves they offer their excess supply to the informal and formal markets; otherwise they find time to appreciate the speculation and insights of others in the market. Most buyers, I suspect, are of the passive/voyeuristic kind (the gotum), experiencing gratification without ever thinking how to use the information to introduce changes in their lives and society at large. In the market I describe, the sellers are called speculators, the incident speculated on is called speculatum, and the elements or parts of the speculatum are speculatees, whose motives, means, opportunities and ideologies are the subject of the speculation or speculating; and the master of the speculatees is called the sputum).

The market conditions I describe are real and I am led to conclude that this type of speculation never creates a bubble that will burst or explode in our faces. In sharp contrast to speculation in commodity markets, where speculators have been known to lose their shirts and underwear, the players in our kind of speculation have nothing to lose: one is always better off speculating than having to swallow the shit our government excretes.

The economics of terror risk mitigation

What if the incident was indeed Islamic or rightwing or leftwing terrorism? I assert that the latter two are more reasonable and more predictable without rigorous discussion and proof. Let me tackle the first. These guys and girls are not so bright and we can probably treat the events they perpetrate as random acts impervious to benefit-cost analysis on their part, especially when some of them don’t value their own lives. Suicide bombers, unfortunately, are part of the equation and the amorphous inequalities we have to confront. So what then? I contend that the reasonable thing to do is to take the risk as part of life and mitigate the risk rationally. There is a large bodega of economics literature which shows that people don’t really behave reasonably, much less rationally. This is why, in the face of a large set of risks, our prioritization in terms of costs and benefits, leaves much to be desired. We always confront a large set of dangers to our well-being and we need to think of priorities soberly. Yes, terrorism is a real threat. But there are other graver threats the mitigation of which costs less. Think about poverty and environmental problems. We should allocate resources and attention guided by the facts, I hope.

Let me also point out that the risks from terrorism are inequitably distributed. On the side of victims, these are mostly urban and upper class, while the costs of mitigation, I suspect, are borne by taxpayers at large. You think that’s fair? To the extent that mall operators enhance security, well and good, as that cost will inevitably be passed on to shoppers.

The CSI on G2, RDX, C4 etcetera

I can only hope that the forensics experts are professionals, especially after observing that NCR police office director Geary Barias has maintained an open mind after premature disclosures. He has refused to jump to conclusions, though he is privately entitled to his own speculations. I have yet to see or hear of any systematic data gathering insofar as eyewitness accounts (a good collection is provided in Manolo Quezon’s blog) is concerned. Also, in a competent CSI, investigators are supposed to re-enact the incident. Including a time/space account of where the fatalities and other casualties were.

Were the dead properly autopsied? Have all the injured been interviewed? Have all the footages been examined?

Barias has said that he still could not rule out an accidental gaseous explosion as the blast has been determined as coming from the basement. What did the basement house? He said there was sewage ‘grease’. He could have meant waste oil and solid waste sludge. Have his investigators interviewed people in charge of the solid waste management system in the mall? I have not closed my mind to a methane-based explosion, more consistent with the footage I’ve seen. Likely I will be proven wrong. But I reserve and assert my right to speculate.

GMA and JDV: Liars, paradoxes, dilemmas

How will the standoff between JDV and GMA finally be resolved? In the past decade, at least three groups of economists have been awarded the Nobel prize for economics for expanding theory and application of game theory, which applies when each actor’s move/s depends on her/his expectation of the opponent’s move.

The classic example, unfortunately, is the prisoners’ dilemma, which was originally meant to illustrate how two actors, mistrusting each other in a one-shot game, would, acting in their own narrow-minded interests, forego the best outcome. This is because the two prisoners find it in their own best interest to betray rather than cooperate with each other. The sub-optimal equilibrium applies when there is no allowance for learning or repeated interactions between the players.

In the case of JDV and GMA however, it is in our best interest that once they’ve decided on their strategies, the outcome should be final and they both finally rest on their laurels and in their graves. This means that we need to design a game where there are no further interactions. How? Life without parole for both of them, and they self-destruct.

The Liar’s Paradox

A related problem in logic and philosophy is the Liar’s paradox. GMA says in a televised interview that she has asked for an investigation of the bribery scandal. Clearly, she is saying “I’m a liar.” Anyone who takes that statement at face value would face an unsolvable problem. How can she be telling the truth as she says she is lying. The argument is circular and the only solution is by appreciating a context outside the original statement. This is why Rene Saguisag’s demand for an independent inquiry acquires relevance.

Goodbye to long-winded arguments

In the early 1990's I had never-ending arguments with environmentalists about why the National Power Corporation did not include wind energy in its power portfolio. I would always answer that the costs were too high. I said I would agree if there were a democratic process where power consumers would be made aware that the wind option would significantly increase their bills.

Now here is a PCIJ feature by Jaileen Jimeno which finally proves the point, self -serving it might be for me. Since 2005, the power facility Jimeno discusses in the article has been operating.
I must point out , however, that she missed one important point, the economics of wind energy. Since the early 90's , costs have fallen by 80% while costs for the alternatives, especially for fossil fuels, mostly oil and coal, have been steadily increasing. Thus, it is no surprise that wind is now competitive and will become more so henceforth.

NBN: The devil hides the detail

The devil, it is said, is in the detail. Unfortunately for us, our senators and journalists have not shown much resolve in examining details, maybe out of plain incompetence or laziness. In this case, too, it is the devil herself hiding the detail.

When I first learned that the NEDA had refused the Senate’s request for the NBN documents, I couldn’t believe it. After the initial denial, I wanted to puke. I was so mad that for the first time this year, I honked my horn on the way to Greenbelt to watch a film in the Spanish movie festival. And I was doing 80 instead of my usual wimpy 60 kph.

You may not know it but the documents requested, at least some of them anyway, had already been made available to the media and posted in at least one website. I’m referring to (1) the minutes of the joint NEDA-ICC cabinet committee and the ICC technical board held March 26, 2007, and (2) the evaluation report of the NEDA infrastructure committee dated March 29. .

In a previous post, I pointed out that even these two documents in themselves constitute the smoking gun in the allegations of scandal in which the president was a willing conspirator, at worst, and as an accessory at best. Let me now explain in greater detail.

During that joint meeting, the ICC secretariat presented to the members a status report on the the NBN project . In the form and substance it had been presented to the last meeting, the minutes said, the NBN, covering the needs of national government agencies and city and municipal branches, and 23,549 elementary and high schools in the country’s first and second class municipalities, the whole project would have an economic internal rate of return (EIRR) of only13.01% Because the hurdle rate of NEDA is 15%, the NPV was a negative (-) P1.58B ), clearly a no go. Also, the Chinese government had indicated that it would not fund the connectivity to the schools, and the alternative to be explored was to replace the connectivity to 23,549 barangays (no mention in which cities and municipalities) and the NPV would be P652.13M and the EIRR would be a marginally improved 15.8%.

Recall that during the Senate blue ribbon hearings, Neri had asserted that the project, regardless of modality and financing sources, had an NPV more of than P10B and an EIRR of close to 30%.

IN any case, the presentation of the secretariat’s ended with the following recommendation:

In line with the government’s thrust of promoting digital infrastructure development for provision of ICT services across the country to address the digital divide, the Secretariat favorably recommends the project subject to the resolution of the above issues, especially on the replacement of school beneficiaries with barangay offices.

Three days later (!), the infrastructure committee of the NEDA-ICC issued its report. With the figures cited by Neri in the Senate hearings. But first, let me discuss what transpired after the presentation of the secretariat.

“Neri noted that the terms and conditions for the proposed loan for the project are not as concessionary as those for other Chinese-assisted projects such as the Northrail and the CEP projects. With an annual interest rate of 4% and repayment period of 10 years, inclsuive of 3 years grace period, Secretary Neri added that the terms are actually almost commercial.”

On project costs

Secretary Neri noted that among the alternatives being presented by the Secretariat were one in which the schools not covered by the CEP were considered, and one which excluded said schools. He inquired on whether school site engineering cost amounting to almost P1.4 M will be dropped in the event that the schools will be dropped from the project. He also sought clarification if the expense would be the same if the barangay offices, instead of the schools, are considered the project beneficiaries. The Secretariat confirmed that the site engineering cost will be dropped if the schools are excluded and that the cost would be the same if the barangay offices, instead of the schools, are considered as project beneficiaries. (Note that the locations of the schools and the barangays are not in the same geographical area.

On economic benefits

Secretary Neri inquired on how savings will be generated as a result of the retirement of old equipment. The Secretariat clarified that savings will be generated as the proponent will no longer have to buy expensive and non-readily available spare parts for the old analog system, as well as eliminate the cost for regular site inspection/network trouble-shooting and the required manpower due to the computerized /automatic network management feature, thereby resulting in savings in terms of operations and maintenance costs. The Secretariat added that the old eqipment will not be sold and in fact some of them will still be used .

Secetary Nery sought clarification on how VoIP savings translate into benefits for the government. The Secretariat replied that with the project, the government will reduce its fixed line subscription by as much as 50% and its fax and mobile phone costs by about 80%.

With regard to Secretary Nery’s inquiry on how the benefits resulting from having a centralized IDC are quantified, the Secretariat explained that the IDC can host all government applications software and databases. Thus, eliminating individual data centers and corresponding O&M costs.

In the March 26 meeting, there were a number of issues left hanging as indicated by the following:

1. The terms of the projected loan from the Chinese government as pointed out byh Neri;
2. Skepticism over how the savings were calculated. In the project evaluation report by the Infrastructure staff, the savings were in fact referred to as assumptions and not as best estimates or calculations. How can these be included in an economic valuation?
3. Finance Secretary Gary Teves asserted that the project as represented had to be clarified with the president because, in his own understanding, the president had a different concept.
4. DOF Undersecretary Paul had doubts about the projects consistency with existing policy.

Yet, in the Infrastructure staff report of March 29, the EIRR had shot up to 30% from the 15.8% initially presented in the March 26 meeting. This is clearly a case of underestimating costs and bloating the benefits to maximize the attractiveness of the project. Let me just focus on the projected benefits in the NEDA infrastructure staff’s spreadsheet calculations:

1. The savings from foregone operation and maintenance costs of the old DOTC equipment were included throughout the project life, at more than P500M per year for 15 years. As I asserted in a previous post, only the mentally retarded would count unnecessary MOE as savings when the system would have been useless in the near future anyway. If you have a car which will have to be discarded in a year or two, you just decide to stop using it period, and this decision is not related to your buying a new car later.
2. The savings from VOIP/landline/mobile subscriptions and internet connections are dubious, to be kind. As I’ve said, the NEDA infrastructure staff, taking DOTC figures at face value, referred to these as assumptions and not as rigorous estimates.
3. As for the internet connection savings, I noticed that these were assumed to decrease by 5% annually to reflect both greater competition and technological progress. Five percent? Just this year alone, I saved more than 50% by switching from Pacific to Sky DSL. In his Senate testimony, Neri lamented the fact that commercial broadband costs in the country were as much as a multiple of a hundred to costs abroad. If he had properly studied the calculations of his own staff, he himself would have concluded that the broadband service savings are ghost benefits, especially if Neri believed that the system can be improved with better regulation and freer entry.
4. In the meeting of March 26, Neri was uncomfortable with the 4% interest indicated by the Chinese government. Yet, in the NEDA infra staff evaluation, the loan interest was assumed to be at a maximum of 3%, a 25% reduction.

In short, the real and final question is, what happened between March 26 and March 29, when so many basic and controversial questions were resolved by the infra staff ?(hint: the Senate should ask Ruben Reinoso to testify; there might even be no further need to hear from Neri).

During the Senate hearings, Neri was asked if there was anything irregular in the time lapse between the economic evaluation report and the final NEDA board approval on April 20. He replied that this was not unusual. Except that April 20 was the eve of the signing of the contract in China, witnessed by the president herself.

The Philipine Onion's exclusive with Corazon Aquino

Let me reprint in full The Philippine Onion's exclusive interview with Corazon C. Aquino"

TPO: Mam , we haven't heard from you since the outrage over "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" hit the pages.

CCA: At first I thought they were referring to my prodigal daughter Kris. But when I read the apology, I was sufficiently appeased. It was neither of us.

TPO: But didn't you file a libel case against the columnist who claimed you hid under a bed during one of the more serious coups during your administration?

CCA: What bed? Which bed? No, that was different. Louie questioned my capability to be commander-in-chief. That really tended to undermine faith in my government, right.

TPO: Uhmmm.

CCA: Hey were you ever in the Malacanang press corps. You look familiar... A hardy bunch, they never seemed to be downed by the chicken liver pate I gave them at Christmas. By the salmonella I mean...

TPO: I wasn't born yet Mrs. President.

CCA: Anyway, do you know that all you political pundits overestimate your influence? Do you know that the most popular columns are not Manolo Quezon's nor Conrad de Quiroses's. Not even that guy who calls himself DJB Rizalist. The most popular column is Dolly Carvajal's and she has advised me that Kris's influence far outshines mine.

TPO: Maybe mam, but...

CCA: No ifs and buts. I may have the persona of an outstanding Catholic, but there are things you don't know about me. If only you knew what I whispered into an ear of Chairman Abalos...

Los Ultimos de Filipinas: 'History from the Vanquished'

Premiered last night as part of the ongoing Spanish film festival in Manila was Los Ultimos de Filipinas, a cinematic account of the 'motherland's' stragglers in the Philippine-Spanish war. In terms of cinematic value, and considering technology in 1945, I would rate the movie excellent.

Before you write/right me off as harboring a colony of germs in my brain, hear this.

The executive director of Instituto Cervantos was more than ten minutes late, and apologized for the wrong thing, the absence of Spain's ambassador, who had to collect a parliamentary delegation from their country at the airport.

In April this year, there was a piano concert to commemorate the bombing of Guernica, the oil rendition of which was immortalized by Picasso in a painting which now greets the entrance of the United Nations Security Council. The Instituto's director was also late and tried to excuse himself with reference to heavy traffic. Because I was seated close to them, I heard the ambassador publicly berate the guy. "No excuses, por favor," the higher ranked diplomat reminded the lower.

Now back to the movie. It's one of the rare occasions when the victors get a view of how the 'vanquished' want to see themselves. In 1945, Jose Rodriguez explained, the Spanish government supported art partly to instill patriotism (often the refuge of scoundrels and torturers). One of the things which I find mysterious about Spaniards is why it has taken them such a long time to reflect on the rule of Franco. It has only been in recent years when the unmarked graves of the Republicans and resisters have been unearthed.

The Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm has a kinder view of Franco's rule, saying in so many words that there was a fine line between Nazism (with whom Franco was allied) and plain good old authoritarianism. Quesas.

One of the lesser known of George Orwell's works is Homage to Catalonia, where he recalls his sad tale as a volunteer in the Republican army while passing himself off as a 'journalist.' Here we see shades of Jack Reed of Ten Days fame. In his account he referred to the tardiness of his comrades as a racial trait. Some form of bigotry is woven into history and the popular imagination as a result of our humanity, I am wont to say.

NBN: The NEDA's benefits and costs and where they hid the 'smoking gun'

In the wee small hours of morning one Sunday (September 30) I chanced upon DOTC secretary Leandro Mendoza on DZMM’s teleradyo, close to faking an O (whether an Oh or an Ouch depends on your particular perversity) over his defense of the NBN deal, as if it was his first chance to do so. I don’t know how many other insomniacs caught his convoluted arguments, but the few who did were probably moved to swearing off on some nocturnal pleasures.

The friendly anchor asked him why he didn’t explain the benefits during the Senate hearings. He replied that Asec. Lorenzo Formoso was more technically competent to explain those. I’ve read Formoso’s tables and these didn’t explain how he extrapolated the baseline specs and costs of ZTE to come out with comparable figures for AHI and Arescom, nor identify the strange alchemy he resorted to make lemons into apples.

I have since then been able to look at the NEDA evaluation report (March 29, 2009) and the ICC-NEDA cabinet committtee minutes (March 26,2007). In the meeting Romulo Neri and even the finance department representatives raised relevant points which should have taken the ICC secretariat and the NEDA’s infrastructure staff months to address. But note that the final ICC approval was issued April 20. If these do not a constitute a ‘smoking gun’ to you, I can only surmise that you’ve never fired one.

In the ICC cabinet committee meeting, Neri asked the secretariat to clarify how savings could be reckoned from the abandonment of old and unserviceable equipment maintained by the DOTC. A very valid point which I examined in the infrastructure staff’s report.

If you had an old car on the brink of being unserviceable, junking it, even before you decide to buy a new one, is the rational thing to do. Yet, in the report of the infrastructure staff, ‘savings’ from deciding to stop maintaining that car were counted as part of the benefits of the NBN. As Mar Roxas would probably say, Stunning! Indeed.

In the meeting, Neri was also skeptical about the savings from the national and local government’s telecommunication expenses, and Senator Roxas was correct to raise doubts about these during the hearings. In fact, it is difficult to explain how his staff could have explained these to Neri in such a short time. It is obvious that they were just forced to accept the unverified figures from the DOTC.

I of course know that the sudden and long gap in the hearings have led to so many conspiracy theories, victimizing the bible-quoting chair of the blue-ribbon committee and the real estate agent who happens to be president of the smaller chamber. Also, Neri’s invocation of executive privilege has led to Jarius Bondoc’s invocation of his right to invoke moral choice as a citizen.

But Bondoc’s revelations may not really have that much force. As Yawyaw, my three-year-old neighbor would say, that’s all Hershey, and while delicious, not admissible in court. What should be admissible in all courts, legal and popular, are the documents and what these imply.

Last Friday, the UP School of Economics organized a forum featuring past NEDA directors general. I wasn't there so I was not able to say my piece. I would have pointed out that even during the time of FVR, the NEDA's evaluations were trumped by Malacanang's judgements, especially in regard to some power projects.

GMA ecstatic over wrong things, says former Clinton aide

Joseph Romm, assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy during the Clinton administration, was unhappy with the remarks of GMA during her recent appearance in a forum of Clinton's Global Initiative. In his post "Why sustainable development is so damn hard, Philippine edition". he quotes the president:

Yesterday, I also announced, for the second time, an initiative where we are encouraging economic zones to be set up around the geothermal sites, because not only can geothermal fields give us power, they also give us jobs because the local governments earn royalties from the geothermal power. And they, by law, they can only use most of it for electricity. So they subsidize the electric bills of the constituents. So now we are creating economic zones there, so that businesses, like electronics, for instance, power incentive electronics firms, will locate there. So aside from the subsidized power bills from the local governments, they will also have the usual investment incentives. So these areas, which are usually far from central Manila, will now have industries, as well as power."

At first I thought she did not have the law right, as I was thinking about provisions in the energy department's regulation (1-94) which does not really impose power rate subsidies in the use of the funds generated, see the power sector reform tracker.

The Generation Company and/or energy resource developer sets aside one centavo per kilowatt-hour (P 0.01/kWh) of the total electricity sales as financial benefit of the host communities of such generation facility, where applicable. The financial benefits are given directly to the host LGU or region, especially to the community and people affected while equitable preferential benefits are being provided to the host region. The accruals of the financial benefits are allocated for the following:

1. Electrification Fund (EF);
   
2. Development and Livelihood Fund (DLF); and
   
3. Reforestation, Watershed Management, Health and/or Environment Enhancement Fund (RWMHEEF).

This is actually the pertinent provision GMA was referring to, in section 294 of the Philippine Local Government Code (RA 7160), which reads:

Development and Livelihood Projects. - The proceeds from the share of local government units pursuant to this chapter shall be appropriated by their respective sanggunian to finance local government and livelihood projects: Provided, however, That at least eighty percent (80%) of the proceeds derived from the development and utilization of hydrothermal. geothermal, and other sources of energy shall be applied solely to lower the cost of electricity in the local government unit where such a source of energy is located.

On a more positive note, the system of subsidies and cross-subsidies in the Philippine power sector has been reformed a great deal since the passage of the EPIRA. For one, most of the inter-grid (among the three major island groups Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao) and inter-class (between industrial/commercial and residential) subsidies have been virtually eliminated. What remain are the intra-class subsidies in the residential sector with the ‘institutionalization’ of ‘lifeline’ rates supposed to be for the poorest among the poor in all the franchise areas.

The new system of lifeline rates is much better than the old one, where each franchise area had almost complete leeway over them, but still is not good enough. For instance, in the Meralco area, households consuming up to 100 kilowatt-hours a month are subsidized even though this threshold is way above what poor households consume on average (as determined by the official povety count). Historically there are two possible motivations for such lifeline rates.

The more compelling is the notion that the poorest households underconsume electricity because they don’t consider the positive effects on the children’s education and their own access to media and social connectivity have on the rest of society, coupled with unwarranted coupling because of limited possibilities for pleasure at night.

The other is with society’s desire to work toward equality of opportunities and incomes/outcomes. Most economists agree that this objective could be pursued much better through outright cash handouts rather than subsidies for specific goods.

What alarms me in the Philippine context is the ‘populist’ attempt by the current administration to work for the granting of special electricity rates to many special zones, defeating the purpose of the power sector reform act. It is in this light that GMA’s announcement must be viewed. She had no hand in the enactment of the local government code but instead of working to revise the pertinent provisions, it panders to some special interests. Note that the subsidized rates are based on a fixed total to use for subsidization and would have the effect of raising residential rates in the affected communities. In my own estimation, greater industrial activity would lead to more pollution. While the increase might not be that much in the overall inventory, it is the intent and the pandering to special interests which is worrying.

Chinese Embassy leaks Philippine Senator's letter of apology

More from the Philippine Onion:

Before the end of office hours Friday, the Chinese Embassy in the Philippines leaked excerpts from the letter of the senator who chairs the foreign relations committee, and its terse reply.

What we gleaned from the English translation of the embassy's response, provided by the Taiwanese diplomatic office (otherwise known as the Manila Economic and Cultural Office or MECO), was that PROC officials gave some welcome comfort to the Philippine senator. (Read this with some grain of salt; officially, China claims Taiwan is part of its sovereign territory).

When she went ballistic like a wayward missile in a hearing on the NBN, the senator berated China as the cradle of corruption in the East. In her letter, she pleaded temporary insanity and revealed that she was also afflicted with a rare disease which leads to involuntary movements of her mouth and tongue. "Only during full moons do I understand what I'm saying," the senator confessed.

"Don't worry," the letter from the Chinese embassy said, "we have our own share of crazy people."

Sources in the senator's office said the letter from the Chinese ambassador came with kyamoy, dikyam, 200 pieces of white rabbit. siopao, and pansit. Amazing, said she, but where's the Maling?

The apology was accepted without protest, as was the reply.

The Agony and Crucifixion of Jarius Bondoc

Apparently, there is unanimity in anonymity, at least among some journalists in the Phlippines. (According to an obscure theorem in set theory, one can always find a set small enough to discover homogeneity.) In The Big Picture last Thursday, Ricky Carandang featured an exclusive with Jarius Bondoc, followed by a forum with Juliet Javellana and John Nery of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and Vergel Santos of Business Day. At first, they all said they had no right to pass moral judgment on Bondoc for ‘ratting’ on Romulo Neri in the NBN scandal. Then. near the end of the show, they all agreed that what Bondoc did was ‘unethical.’ They would not do what he did, they said self-righteously and apparently satisfied with themselves.

So a fine thin line must be drawn between ethics and morality. Where that line is and with what pen it is drawn escapes me, and probably all the rest of you not familiar with the workings of the press, whether in the Philippines and elsewhere, populated in the main by innumerate high school graduates accepted by journalism departments teaching kids arithmetic and algebra are instruments of repression.

I do not contest the assertion that, owing to special circumstances, some news sources need to have their identities protected. Especially if their ‘outing’ would threaten their physical survival. What I’m uncomfortable with is that continued institutional protection of anonymity encourages cowardice and fiction in newspapers. I think that if we phase out that protection, we will eventually be braver and stop tolerating scandalous behavior.

Let me mention three cases, if memory serves.

The first, on a Dr. Kelly, one of the weapons inspectors in Iraq before the invasion. A BBC radio reporter was fired after it was determined that he molested and abused the facts and his notebook in his story on Kelly, who lent credence to suspicions that the alleged threat was ‘sexed up.”

The second, Deep Throat, in the Watergate scandal which led to the resignation of Richard Nixon. The sore throat’s family eventually decided to identify him. In that case, however, Woodward and Bernstein had other sources whom they followed up from the Throat’s leads.

And there is a third instance, one that Carandang mentioned in his program but of which he had no clear grasp. An American woman reporter (J. Miller) was ordered by a court to identify her source on the ‘outing’ of ex-CIA agent Valerie Plame, whose husband had earlier been sent to Niger and whose report dismissed or dissed reports of Iraq’s nuclear weapons program. She was detained for contempt but was eventually released. (Scooter Libby was convicted by the court but was pardoned by George W.).

I’m trying to recall a lesson on the vision and aspirations of my favorite philosopher. He said that if we value our humanity, we have to reclaim our ‘wholeness’ and integrity. If we continue with specialization as capitalism suggests, we will eventually end up being mushrooms, believing wholeness and integrity are concepts alien to the other. That to me is The Real Picture, big and small.

Jon Stewart Apologizes to Filipinos

Breaking news from The Philippine Onion:

Producers of the The Daily Show with Jon Stewart have apologized to Filipinos who took offense at the segment starring Samantha Bee titled "Are we ready for a woman president?" In that segment, the word 'slut!' was scrawled on a tv picture of former President Corazon Aquino.

The alleged slur came on the heels of the outrage sparked by the season opener of Desperate Housewives, which had the character played by Teri Hatcher wanting to verify whether her doctor came from a med school in the Philippines. ABC, show producer, has already clarified that it did not mean to disparage Filipino health professionals.

In the public apology, Jon Stewart explained that they had the wrong Philippine woman president. But in a further insult, Samantha (won't let it) Bee asked Philippine journalists to check the word 'satire,' used to refer to the program.

Anonymous sources told the Philippine Onion that in a forthcoming episode, Bee is shown further taunting Filipinos (she called them Flips). "Supercallifragilisticexpialidocious! I totally misunderestimated your low self-esteem. You get piqued by such petty issues. "Get a life!" she said. The segment is titled "Are you ready to impeach your woman president?"

If you lose your sense of hunor, Bee said, I will stop eating Filipinos. (A brand of delectable Spanish cookies).

How safe is Manila Water?

If you read the papers, and only those, you may never know. This is a dilemma which plagues consumers of many kinds of products. If one consumer has doubts about the quality of a product, it might happen that what she spends verifying product quality might not be worth it. She can spend time and effort and finally know that the product was sub-standard. Then what? The government regulatory agency might say that they would do something about it? In the meantime what?
In the past year or two, cancer survivor Pinky Tobiano has been publicizing results about water quality tests conducted on samples in Metro Manila. Initially, I was alarmed about the test results in regard to bacteria. But lately, after watching her on the show of Korina Sanchez, where results in regard to lead content were discussed, I was alarmed. How can this be happening?
In the mid nineties, I wrote a paper discussing the benefits and costs of eliminating the lead content in gasoline and the paper concluded that a well phased-out program in regard to lead in gasoline was beneficial. But water is a more essential product than gasoline and I ask myself why government could be so far behind in the regulation of lead in water.

If you are reading this and you have children, call me, even if I may not have the best advice. Somehow, I will, and can tell you how to direct your ire.

NBN: FG: How could I?

Swamped by reporters at the airport yesterday, the gentleman asked rhetorically,
How could I, not knowing this guy, have told him to 'back off?' According to sources in the Philippine Onion, what the gentleman actually said was "Fuck off!" That we can believe, if we can also believe that the gentleman is a model of propriety and transparency and accountabilty in government. He was in suit and tie at the airport. But he might as well have been nakedly directing his non-lethal weapon at the mouth of, guess who? The former elections official. Stunning!

In otras palabras, what the gentle man said was, if you don't scratch my back, I will kick your ass.

Who will set limits on Sky?

I recently read a news item that the dominant CATV company in the Philippines, Skycable, will replace the content of six channels starting next year. In an news report, the cable company's spokesman exhuded confidence that consumers would not switch to other providers because of the company's decision. What is the source of his confidence? Simple. As the dominant player in the field, the company just doesn't care. As far as I know, cable rates are not regulated and quality of service is not in their vocabulary. In the United States CATV rates are regulated in areas where there is no sufficient competition. But who is minding the store in regard to CATV? The simple answer: No one!

Earlier today, I visited the website of the National Telecommunications Commission and the only information that was returned in response to my queries were on potential regulations in regard to 'chatrooms' on cable channels.

In retrospect, I remember why I decided to subscribe to cable back in October or November of 2000, and that was because of Erap's impeachment trial. The coverage by the free networks were simply unsatisfactory. Also, that was also the time of the mesmerizing saga of the US elections, Gore vs. Bush and the related court battles. But at the time, Sky rates were nowhere near the clouds. Now, almost eight years later, there is not enough competition in CATV services, and we have to contend with the bad taste of the country's leading network.

One of the channels which will be axed starting next year is Jack tv, which carries The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, one of the best comedy shows providing incomparable international political commentary. One of the guests last week was Bolivia's Evo Morales, who showed Stewart the extent of his dumbness.

Our right to rate government: XXX

Featured last week in The Big Picture were guests discussing the MTRCB rating of the documentary ‘Rights’ which should have been screened in time for the 35^th commemoration of Martial Law. The film, according to its producers (I have yet to see it) deals with recent human rights violations in the country. Kiri Dalena, one of the two in the first segment of the show, had to defend the intent of the film. In my book, she shouldn’t have had to. Movie-making is not journalism and is not bound by rules of fairness, because that is for viewers, with all their pre-dispositions, to judge. But in the next segment, A certain Erik F. Mallonga, who chaired the MTRCB’s second review committee for the film, sounded reasonable but the subtext of his message was: I have the power, and I deem the film not subversive at all, so let it be shown to the public above 13.

I must admit I was disappointed at the host Ricky Carandang who had kid gloves on, tolerating Mallonga’s power trip during the show. In his column in Manila Times Monday (October 1), the power-tripping censor states:

I found the documentary to be a finely crafted and aesthetically appealing 30-minute collage of human-rights violations; it was a riveting mix of actual video footages and dramatic reenact­ments on this subject matter. The First Review Committee ruled that the film’s scenes were allegedly “presented unfairly, one-sided, and undermines the faith and confidence in the government and duly constituted authorities, thus not for public exhibition.” As the filmmakers were absent during the first review, they forfeited the opportunity to defend or justify their position that “Rights” be given a “General Audience [G]” or “Parental Guidance [PG]” rating. The filmmakers came in full force during the second review...

What struck both filmmakers and the Second Review Committee members, however, was the earlier judgment that the film “undermines the faith and confidence in the government and duly constituted authorities.” We, in the Second Review Committee, honestly thought otherwise. There was nothing in the movie that called for a revolution, rebellion, overthrow, armed uprising or insurgency against the government. There was no incitement to sedition. There was no “clear and present danger” to the stability of the government that the military and police have to respond with armed might. (In contrast, the board found the Erap’s account of his overthrow seditious, and Mallonga did not elaborate further).

Mr. Mallonga, if you were not a censor, only one or two people would actually care for your opinion and since I don’t know you, I have no right to rate your intellect, especially in regard to evaluating artistic merit. But people like you, who pretend to know better than us viewers, in modern civilization, should have been kept in your mother’s womb, if it could still accept you.

There have been a number of ‘artists’ who have accepted posts in the MTRCB. They probably rationalized to themselves that “better me than them’ and you should be thankful “I’m more intelligent and liberal.” Sorry Mr. Mallonga, but I protest being one of your subjects. The right thing to do, for anyone who sees herself/himself as an intellectual, is to simply reject the nomination. You also do not appreciate that it is innately wrong for government to ban material on the basis that such might “ undermine faith in government.” If the public uses all its senses it might realize that government undermines faith in itself, in the most indecent ways.

If I were you Mr. Mallonga, find a more decent job, and let’s see if you deserve more than the minimum wage. Otherwise, I recommend that you seek the advise of Rep. Teddyboy Locsin on how to make yourself happy alone, and start to grow hair on the back of your palms.