Electric Vehicles will
end Climate Change
By DANIEL ESCUREL OCCENO,
danielocceno@ymail.com
December
23, 2009
From the early
articles about the conference in Copenhagen on Climate Change, I read
that the main focus was to market electric cars because with the
explosion of China, India, and even Brazil now developing an
automobile industry of more than 2 billion consumers wanting
self-owned automobiles so imagine in just 5 years if the working class
in those three countries bought regular gasoline or diesel engines for
their private use to go to work every day or shopping on weekends.
Introduction of
unleaded gasoline (In the United States from January 1, 1996; the
Clean Air Act banned the sale of leaded fuel for use in on-road
vehicles) and the catalytic converter – a device used to reduce the
toxicity of emissions from an internal combustion engine reduced air
pollution, but according to the conference it is not enough to prevent
Global Warming destruction.
The need to market
electric vehicles cannot be mandated with legislation. It would
destroy the world economy. Private industries must take the initiative
to provide price-competitive models for consumers wanting
transportation that would save the planet.
The Philippines with
the Electric Jeepneys on the road is on the right path, but more
entrepreneurs are needed for the self-owned transportation markets
like electric automobiles and electric motorcycles.
Take those really
small electric cars and remove the roof and you can have an electric
TRIROTA, an electric motorcycle with three wheels, Trirota Motors.
With our typhoon seasons, I would want the roof.
You Filipino college
kids graduating in April or May, the AYALA GROUP are building
communities where you can go to school and work and live and shop and
recreate without the need for cars or motorcycles.
It was called the
University of Missouri college campus when I was eighteen, but
dormitories instead of high rise condominiums with a Catholic Church,
school, and shopping malls. But today I would need airline tickets to
go to the Texas Bowl to watch Mizzou against Navy instead of walking
for thirty minutes to Tiger Stadium to recreate with fifty-yard-line
tickets so I believe it is possible.
There was even a
McDonalds on campus for breakfast before taking a test: a sausage
McMuffin, hash brown, and ice tea with no ice. I use to dream that,
but the dormitory cafeteria food was already paid for.
The Ayala Group
developments might be in various parts of the country, and you can
save the money from your first full-time job by walking and using
public transportation, ELECTRIC JEEPNEYS (Bacolod, Cebu, and Metro
Manila). Micro-financing jobs! Investing probably.
Mass production of
electric cars flooding the markets will reduce carbon emissions ALL
OVER THE WORLD, but it will also increase consumption of electricity
once traveling the roads, streets, and highways.
Developing Countries
cannot meet the current output for demand for electric power now
causing power outages with over usage. Many towns and villages of poor
nations do not have electricity for every household, schools, and
business buildings. But the major cities of developing nations and the
majority of the developed nations accused of Climate Change can
adequately provide electricity for dwellers and would likely meet the
increase demand consumed by electric automobiles.
For areas in the
Philippines far away from the metropolises, I prefer Solar Energy. The
argument against Solar Power is that the city drinking water will be
depleted to provide electricity for millions of users.
A supplemental source
for individual buildings with solar technology would at least provide
electricity throughout the country, individually. The rooftops of
buildings can collect rainwater needed to use to create the
electricity providing an outdoor solar generator with power to provide
electricity for a house.
Taipei 101 (Taipei
Financial Center) in Taiwan has plans on being "the world's tallest
green building" with solar power technology with a rooftop rainwater
collection to provide the building with electricity so surely a one
story cement molded Spanish-designed three-bedroom house for
retirement in the Philippines can also have electricity from the sun.
Picture the entire
concrete land of former gasoline stations covered with a roof of solar
panels or solar technology to charge generators that will recharge
electric vehicles. You have a warehouse with solar technology on the
rooftop providing a recharge station for electric motorcycles,
electric buggy cabs (electric golf carts with motorcycle wheels),
electric automobiles, electric jeepneys, and electric commercial
busses providing mass transportation for people that do not want an
automobile running on fossil fuel.
Rice farmers can
continue living using candles for light at night, coconut shell
charcoal to cook with, and an electric buggy for the wife to shop at
the nearest municipality after taking her children to school.
All that is needed is
for an entrepreneur to sell the electric engines to turn four wheels
and recharge technology safe during monsoon rain because the mechanics
that handcraft our tricycle cabs can easily outfit a buggy around that
electric engine. Total cost with labor around 80,000 Philippine Pesos
and the locals here in Gubat would not miss fossil fuel.
Daniel Escurel
Occeno is a writer for children in the Philippines.
www.gubatnet.blog.com
A repeated police
failure
By CHITO DELA TORRE
December
19, 2009
Extreme justice is
extreme injustice. – Cicero (106-43 BC) Roman orator and statesman. De
Officiis
The regional
leadership of the Philippine National Police must look into the
reasons exactly what it’s taking so long for police officers in
Samar to arrest
persons wanted for criminal cases. It’s always a big question mark,
why police officers can’t execute arrest warrants even when such
officers are strongly believed to know enough of the circumstances of
the wanted persons, such as their birth places. Such strong belief
develops from a fact that most police officers assigned in a town are
original natives and have long been, and still are, residing in that
town. This is worsened by the fact that some of those wanted are
known to civilians to be present, alive and often visiting places
within the town, after a short period of time of having gone outside
of the town to hide and elude arrest, notably in Tacloban, Manila or
Cebu.
Of course, this murmur
is not overheard only in
Samar island. It
is also true in Leyte, and in Tacloban.
According to a source,
one tall but lanky person who committed a crime while working for the
National Food Authority and became a fugitive from justice during the
early martial law years, disguising sometimes as a bombay (wearing a
turban and growing beard), returned only recently to Tacloban with a
tall tale of having been free all the time. Another source said that
one who had long been suspected to be a big-time illegal drug trader
and left his home had lately been visiting his expensive home in a
barangay very the downtown section of Tacloban.
In Basey, there are
those who were ordered by one court to be arrested more than eight
years ago. Some of them were being made to pay for the damages caused
upon one whom they forced to convey on a motorcycle late one rainy
night and abandoned without paying for the ride when the motorcycle
slid while climbing up an eely slope leading to the riders’ barrio.
The victim, up to now, feels a painful leg that was recommended for
amputation due to a grave injury and continues taking in medicines and
applying medications recommended by government and private doctors.
Two of the riders were often seen either in the town proper or in some
barrios, unmolested by the police.
There are other
unsolved crimes. Unsolved, because the police officers do not arrest
the perpetrators.
A few years ago, a
snatcher who lived in the slum area by the seaside at the northern
section next to Tacloban’s old bus terminal, was brought on civilian
arrest power to the police station. An officer in the police station
asked for the snatcher’s immediate release because the snatcher was
“our asset”. An “asset” is any civilian person whom the police
authorities use to surveil operations of snatchers, holdup men,
thieves and other criminals and to identify suspects of crimes. That
asset who was caught in flagrante delicto spent the mandatory
detention hours in the station, but the officer who stood up in his
defense suffered due embarrassment.
Not every police
officer deserves his badge. Among them are scalawags not so unlike
the scalawags during the Elpidio Quirino presidency years up to the
short-lived regime of a Estrada administration. The worst scalawags
among them are themselves the masterminds of crimes and criminal
syndicates. Some of them are willing (bad cops for hire) tools of
politicians and those who behave as though they are somebody higher
than the laws of the land – and there are deplorably many of them
around the Philippines. Unless they are removed and duly punished,
there will be rebels. They may not be existing members of the
communist party of the Philippines or of the New People’s Army or of
the armed national democratic front, or any extreme leftist
organization. They could be anybody who gets fed up with what can be
observed among the bad eggs in the police.
And I say this
emphatically. There are more good police officers than the bad ones.
Yet, the civilians do not find it easy to haul them out of the police
service. Yet, too, fellow officers themselves know “according to the
best of their knowledge and belief” who are those among their peers
and seniors who are doing evil and criminal acts, except that they
just don’t react.
That is why when I
looked into the website of detained general Danny Lim, who filed his
certificate of candidacy for senator, I firmed up my own personal
belief that indeed there are those who are worthy of the police
uniform who want to cleanse the police ranks of corrupt and abusive
police officers. Some of those who have thrown up their support for
Danny are one with him in weeding out the corrupt and the abusive.
The only problem is visitors of Danny’s website would not yet know
with certitude when will this happen and who will lead in the crusade
at every police station level.
The “Kelguy”
samarnews.com contributor that I featured in Insight last December 10
had many things to say about the good and the bad police officers.
His years of being an immigrant to the Philippines had enabled him to
witness how the police work and behave. I even surmise that, compared
to any ordinary Filipino citizen presently living in our country,
Kelguy has a much better frame of reference for his criticisms against
the police, and his accolades (where due) likewise.
Yes, some police
officers are suspiciously living in luxury. Viewing how poverty is
like in the world of the Ampatuans in Maguindanao and elsewhere in
Mindanao, one become quizzical about how ordinary police officers have
become richer than when they were during their first two years in
active police service. There are scanty rumors about a policeman
winning in the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes lotteries, but there is
more talk about some policemen winning in the illegal lotto, or the
jueteng, or masiao, or getting hefty weekend bonuses from un-arrested
illegal numbers games operators as they are either partners of the
financiers if they are not themselves the operators, or they are the
gambling protectors.
(By the way, the word
scalawag, or scallywag is given this meaning: mischievous person: a
rascal or scamp Scalawag is thought variously to derive from the name
Scallaway of Scotland's Shetland Islands, or from an obsolete Scots
word scallag, "a farm servant." Its first recorded appearance in the
United States is understood to be 1848, with the spelling scalaway. In
western New York State a scalaway meant "a mean rascal." During
Reconstruction a scalawag referred to a Caucasian southern operative
who assisted the federal government in implementing its policies
throughout the South, often profiteering in the process. But its
earlier political meaning, first recorded in 1862, was "an intriguer,
especially in politics." - Microsoft® Encarta® 2007. © 1993-2006
Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.)
Always remember
you’re unique, just like everyone else. – Tumblebugs.
An insight from
‘Kelguy’s’ samarnews.com comments
By CHITO DELA TORRE
December
10, 2009
This Thursday, I was
amazed to find out that “Kelguy” or “Kelly Guy” [very obviously an
American long residing in the Philippines and based in Tanauan, Leyte
although married to a Samarnon, I would suppose (based on his
reactions), and an avid reader and reactor-contributor to the feedback
section of
www.samarnews.com that is maintained by now world-famous webmaster
Engr. Ray P. Gaspay, president of Catbalogan Cable Television Media
Advocates Nucleus (CCATMAN)] does read and study a lot about the
Philippines, in addition to his own personal observations about what
is happening in the Philippines, including the New People’s Army
activities in Samar. When the United States of America got a blow
from critic “Domingo de Ramos” of Catarman, capital town of Northern
Samar, Kelguy came out with a severe lecture, citing Philippine
“protectional” Constitutions and provisions in the past and present
fundamental laws of the Philippines. My astonishment extended to a
find that this Kelguy also reads the website
www.chanrobles.com which is very particular with laws and Supreme
Court decisions. Both the aspect of constitutional law and
www.chanrobles.com’s world are my favourite research itineraries,
that’s why I can relate to Kelguy’s basis of logical thinking.
“Please don't take
this as any form of verbal / text abuse. I just disagree with your
logic. I could go through all of the Constitutions and demonstrate
where it is our Government, elected or appointed officials, along with
the Laws that have been generated and enacted that have us in the
position we are in today. As long as people are willing to vote with
their wallets vs. their educated minds, the whole viscious cycle is
destined to repeat. When everyone realizes our problems start and end
at the ballot box, then and only then will things get better.” –
Kelguy
Our own people in the
Philippines, especially Leytenhon and Samarnon, should aspire to
become like Kelguy – one who reads a lot about the Philippines. From
readings about our own country, every Filipino could articulate
strongly, accurately, emphatically, convincingly, and effectively.
Since the internet is far inexpensive than renting old books or buying
new ones, or borrowing at the risk of returning the borrowed books
already with pages missing from careless skimming, I would advise –
when other resources are not possible and feasible – a reach-out
through the internet.
Additionally, I found
out that Kelguy appears to be very conversant, not only with the
goings-on and idiosyncrasies in his own native country that is America
but also with history even where America has not been an actor. To be
adept in historical research and reasoning is to equip one ready with
reliable information. Kelguy, if he is across a table in a
conversation with anyone or a group, could just be likened to a
walking encyclopedia, an attribute of a wide reader and at the same
time one who has a deeply reliable and working memory power.
Yes, I do remember
that I once was described or referred to as a “walking encyclopedia”
and a “walking dictionary” during my college activism years within the
then most prestigious academic institution in Cebu City – the
Southwestern University (where many fellow Basaynon and Leytenhon
studied and graduated between 1966 and 1974 [1974 was the last year
that I spent in Cebu] – but, after having been “de-briefed” by the
military (during my detention in Lahug, and during my
release-under-surveillance [which continued until 1981), and during my
employment years under the martial rule of President Ferdinand E.
Marcos), I soon found out I was losing a lot of what past years of
study siphoned into my brain.
Kelguy’s comments – no
matter how truly harsh they often seem to Filipinos who are averse to
Americans and American interventions in the Philippines and in the
lives of Filipinos, whether in the
Philippines
or anywhere abroad!! – could help enrich one’s own repository of
knowledge and enlighten Filipinos on many things about history. I
surmise his working memory power does it.
A good memory builds
confidence even for those who can learn new information and new
knowledge when dished out from that memory bank. I remember now, some
students, even from such schools in Cebu City as Colegio de San Jose
Recoletos, San Carlos University, University of Southern Philippines,
Cebu Institute of Technology and especially the University of the
Visayas (where most learners enroled from Leyte and Samar!! even up to
today for quick master’s degree conferment!!) used to come to me
especially between 1968 and 1972, either at the SWU student
publications office or the office of dean Ricardo Gabuya or at 9-C
Maples Apartment on Ascencion street where a famous two Rama families
lived, to seek for information most of which could actually be found
in history books, encyclopedia and dictionaries (English, Tagalog,
Spanish, Cebuano, Hiligaynon and Waray). Among those who came became
a lawyer and an undefeated lawyer while another became a successful
American citizen.
Having lost so much of
that power, today, I am retreading the pathways to learning, little by
little. I have to do that, with some practice at memorizing, because
with an ageing age, I have been noticing that my memory has been
failing me for many years now. I thus have for years now been reading
material on Alzheimer’s disease, one disease afflicting the brain that
struck my mother-in-law after 40 years of making the best dresses via
the former Nelly’s Dress Shop at Salazar St. in Tacloban until she
gave up herself to Our Creator in the early morning of May 27, 2007
while I was doing my research on the mysterious threat via the
computer at a room opposite hers. (Ah, my frequent rudiment at
memorizing... it’s the game known as Pairs that is built into my
cellular phone, that’s why no matter how old and obsolescent is my
model mobile phone, I don’t want to part with it, and that’s why no
matter how many times my now two years old grand daughter drops it to
the floor, I still use that memory tool.)
Don’t’ be afraid to
junk RH bill
By Fr. ROY CIMAGALA
December
8, 2009
DEMOCRACY is freedom
in search of inspiration. It waits to be given substance, meaning,
orientation and direction. By itself, it simply is a mold, a system
that requires a lifeblood to warm up and start functioning. It needs
to be given life.
So it depends on the
vital elements of the citizens that have it – how they are as a
people, their culture, their history, their beliefs and aspirations,
their sense of life and purpose, etc. These get factored in and
eventually get integrated into one workable whole through the
democratic processes.
It can only be perfect
to the extent that the people involved in it are. It reflects and
mirrors them. But it can also project and mold them. It collects the
sentiments of the people, but it can also cause other sentiments too,
generating a kind of spiral that is open-ended.
That is why we have to
take care of it. Democracy needs to be guided, and we the people
involved, especially our leaders, should keenly feel the
responsibility for it.
Relevant to all this,
let me quote some lines from John Paul II’s Centesimus Annus, kind of
dense but I must say all worth it. Let’s bear with it. Here it goes:
“Authentic democracy
is possible only in a State ruled by law, and on the basis of a
correct conception of the human person.
“It requires that the
necessary conditions be present for the advancement both of the
individual through education and formation in true ideals, and of the
‘subjectivity’ of society through the creation of structures of
participation and shared responsibility.”
Then it warns us of a
clever attitude that actually undermines authentic democracy.
“Nowadays there is a
tendency to claim that agnosticism and skeptical relativism are the
philosophy and the basic attitude which correspond to democratic forms
of political life.
“Those who are
convinced that they know the truth and firmly adhere to it are
considered unreliable from a democratic point of view, since they do
not accept that truth is a determined by the majority, or that it is
subject to variation according to different political trends.
“It must be observed
in this regard that if there is no ultimate truth to guide and direct
political activity, then ideas and convictions can easily be
manipulated for reasons of power.
“As history
demonstrates, a democracy without values easily turns into open or
thinly disguised totalitarianism.” (46)
In the current debate
for the RH bill that now exposes a few Catholic leaders not quite in
step with Church teaching and discipline, this subtle anomaly of
democracy distorted by agnosticism, relativism and the mere majority
rule emerges.
It is argued that one
just cannot be completely for or against it, since there are many good
things about it and a few questionable elements, and that the Catholic
Church just cannot have its “Humanae vitae” legislated because of the
separation of Church and state.
There are a lot of
misrepresentations in these claims, gratuitous short-cuts to favor
precisely the questionable elements in the bill. This bill has already
been scrutinized by many bishops and leaders in the Church and the
consensus has been that it is a dangerous bill.
Of course, the bill is
crafted to appeal to democratic sentiments – nothing wrong about that
– but given the context in which it was created and developed, it will
require complete naivete and an almost invincible ideological bias not
to see the danger it poses on people’s morals as understood from
Church doctrine.
At the very least,
that bill is highly divisive. And so if only for that reason alone, it
should be dumped. It’s actually not needed.
The good things it
contains can continue to be done without the law. And the bad things
it contains can also be done. No one can stop anybody from doing it.
Just don’t make it a law.
Let’s conclude with
some words of St. Paul addressed to those who tend to make exceptions
from Church teachings. From his letter to Titus, we have some relevant
points:
“Speak the things that
become sound doctrine….In all things show good fidelity, that they may
adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things.” (2,1ff.)
After all, democracy,
while respecting pluralism, should also carry the bedrock foundations
of a people’s beliefs. Dialogue and consensus-making are no excuse to
sideline the faith. One’s faith is nothing to be ashamed about in
public fora.
This is not a call for
fanaticism. Rather, it’s for democracy to be properly inspired.
The Withdrawal of
Support of Rep. Nikki Prieto-Teodoro on the Reproductive Health Bill
Media Statement by the
Philippine Legislators Committee on Population and Development
Foundation, Inc.
4 December 2009
We, supporters of the
reproductive health bill, are appalled with the sudden withdrawal of
support of Rep. Nikki Prieto-Teodoro, wife of Lakas-Kampi-CMD
presidential aspirant Gibo Teodoro, on reproductive health.
We can only surmise
one simple and plain reason: in search of ways to increase Gibo’s
popularity and enhance his “winnability” in the coming elections, Rep.
Teodoro decided to drop the RH bill like a hot potato expecting that
support from the Catholic hierarchy for his husband’s presidential
candidacy will follow.
Dismayed over the
confusing statements made by Rep. Teodoro, we were compelled to answer
some of the issues she raised.
She said she would
rather spend the country’s meager resources in directly feeding the
poor, clothing the naked, giving shelter to the poor and educating
them. In a country where 50% of families consider themselves poor,
2.9 million families experienced hunger and did not have anything to
eat in the last 3 months, 4.5M Filipinos are homeless, and 40% of the
youths are out of school, we ask: how can the government, with its
meager resources, support a ballooning population which has reached
92.2 million this year.
Contrary to her claim
that House Bill 5043 is “defanged and toothless” in addressing her key
advocacies which are food, shelter, education and clothing for poor
Filipino children, passage of the RH bill will in fact help address
these needs.
The reproductive
health bill is a pro-poor legislation. It will ensure a strategic
balanced approach on population and development issues. The bill will
help couples to plan the family size that they want, address unmet
need on family planning, thus ensuring quality education and health
for their children.
Experiences of other
East Asian countries have shown that development is brought about by
correct governance; effective economic, education, and health
programs; and reproductive health and family planning policies.
Rep. Teodoro’s claim
that majority of maternal deaths are caused by the lack of proper
medical facilities and care and that the reproductive health bill does
not address this lack of basic health care services, is baseless.
Improving maternal health is one of the main components of HB 5043.
Eleven mothers die of childbirth and pregnancy complications
everyday. With modern technology, nearly all maternal deaths can be
preventable.
However, the problem
lies in poor women not being able to plan their pregnancies,
unavailability of emergency obstetric care, pre and post natal care
and skilled birth attendants during actual deliveries.
The National
Statistics Office reveals that only half of all Filipino mothers are
aware of danger signs of pregnancy-related complications and where to
go in case of complications. HB 5043 establishes a reproductive
health program that includes accessible and affordable maternal health
care services. Specifically, it mandates local governments and public
health facilities to employ adequate number of midwives or other
skilled attendants. It also ensures the establishment and operation
of hospitals with quality emergency obstetric care, and regular review
of maternal deaths.
We however agree with
her that it is our impoverished children who suffer the most; that
children’s innocence is broken because they have to struggle to meet
their basic needs. Indeed, our children are the ones suffering due to
lack of political will and integrity of our lawmakers and government
leaders.
We are dismayed that
Rep. Teodoro’s latest pronouncement on reproductive health runs
contrary to her claim as defender of the rights of children. Even the
United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child recommends to the
Philippine government to adopt the Reproductive Health bill in order
to ensure access to reproductive health counseling and provide all
adolescents with accurate and objective information to prevent teenage
pregnancies.
From primitive to
sophisticated barbarianism
By Fr. ROY CIMAGALA
December
1, 2009
WE seem to be swinging
from one outrage to another these days. In the local scene, we just
had that shocking massacre in Maguindanao. Everything in it was just
unspeakable. Is it still possible to have such brutality at this stage
of our national life?
This looks like our
version of America’s 9/11 carnage. The deliberate malice put into it,
the conscience-less killing of everyone in the group irrespective of
whatever, in short, barbarianism in its distilled form, is simply too
much for an average heart to bear.
I normally don’t like
to talk about this kind of events. Silence is a preferable option if
only to lighten the ugly scenario. Talking adds fuel rather than
douses water to the sickening situation. But this one grates at the
guts and one simply has to instinctively react.
Let’s pray that this
incident will yield us tremendous lessons we need to learn quickly and
permanently. Let’s remain positive and hopeful! Let’s do everything to
make this a thing of the past, never to happen again in the future.
But as if this
black-eye to humanity is not yet enough, we also are now witnessing
another form of barbarianism in the world stage, perpetrated by highly
educated people, the elite of the world of sciences and technology,
the cutting-edge in human knowledge, but, sadly, not much more.
Lately it has been
discovered by hacking the computer of the Climate Research Unit of
Britain’s University of East Anglia that many of the data made to
support all this hysterics about global warming and climate change are
not all true.
Some important data,
significant to the issue but contrary to their position, have been
dumped, and there appears a massive and systematic effort to
manipulate the public to believe in their assertions. More and more
shenanigans are now exposed. What the hell is this!
Though there are many
global warming skeptics who also are scientists, these have been
effectively sidelined and projected as obstructionists to what they
call as obvious pieces of evidence of global warming.
Al Gore, the
self-appointed patriarch of this group, managed to make the film, “The
Inconvenient Truth,” that mesmerized a lot of people and won him a
Nobel Prize. I heard that he is raking in a lot of moolah!
But the first time I
heard about global warming, I checked the relevant write-ups in the
Internet, and while I followed the arguments of the supporters, I was
also aware that there were dissenters who sounded to me also serious.
I was amazed that the
doubters and deniers were not given a fair chance to present their
ideas to the public. Dialogue and discussion between the two camps
were discouraged. That’s when I started to look deeper into the issue
and to probe into who the people, pro and con, involved are.
I just wanted to have
glimpses of whether they are competent scientists who also are
believers, or just scientists but not men of faith and vulnerable to
play politics or to ideological biases.
Sorry, I have to use
these criteria in this increasingly maddening world driven by all
sorts of man-made inventions but putting God aside. That’s my basic
guiding principle. Science has to go with faith. Any attempt to
separate the two is immediately suspicious to me.
This issue cannot be
resolved by science alone, especially if it’s a science already
prostituted by politics and ideologies. Faith has to come in. Our
human condition demands it.
And I found out that
while all sorts of people can be found in both camps, the supporters
tend to be non-believers and just contented with being “pure”
scientists, while the doubters and deniers are at least open to the
faith.
Of course, there are
many who are neither strong supporters nor strong deniers, but are
just swept away by the bandwagon effect of the controversy. They like
mouthing hand-me-down clichés just to be with the flow.
Among these are
clerics and other religious people whose pronouncements peppered with
global warming terms sound really funny and ridiculous. I just pray
for them and hope their embarrassment will not be too biting.
Of course, many public
officials like to play Pied Piper mostly for the fund of it. I often
wonder whether they really know what they are talking about.
This is now the
modern, very sophisticated barbarianism that seems to be committed
flagrantly and with impunity against the whole of humanity, and not
just Maguindanao.
Let’s pray, learn our
precious lessons and move on!
