PRESS FREEDOM   By Carlos H. Conde |  A Right of Reply law will undermine the Bill of Rights. It will intimidate journalists and prevent them from performing their watchdog functions because the potential cost of doing their job is rather high – fine, imprisonment or closure.

HEALTH | BUSINESS  By Carlos H. Conde |  What convinced me that aspartame is not safe are not just the studies that have found its link to cancer but also the efforts of Donald Rumsfield and the biotech giant Monsanto in ramming this product down our throats.

POLITICS   By Carlos H. Conde  |  Ignorance, or not being in the loop, has become a requisite for the job. Plausible deniability is a key part of the press secretary’s job. As such, he should be the least informed, not to mention the least loquacious, member of the cabinet.

By Carlos H. Conde |  Perhaps with the exception of the mosquito press during the martial-law years, the Philippine press has never quite shown us why it deserves to be called the “fourth estate.”

By Carlos H. Conde  |  If the US military can have its way in countries that are less friendly to Washington – Pakistan, for instance – how much more in the Philippines where Americans are given far greater access, whose people bestow on them a tremendous amount of trust that they probably will not find elsewhere?

By Carlos H. Conde |  As far as Malacanang is concerned, journalists can be pests. They can provoke people — especially hot-tempered and arrogant people like Arroyo — into doing something silly during a press briefing, like raising their voice, respond condescendingly to reporters or, heaven forbid, throw a cellphone at one of them. Or worse, Arroyo can be painted into a corner on questions about her legitimacy and all the scandals facing her and her people.

By Carlos H. Conde
While I am one with my colleagues in the press daring the Philippine National Police and the Department of Justice to file charges against Jiji Press correspondent Dana Batnag for allegedly helping Capt. Nicanor Faeldon escape at the height of the Manila Pen siege, I think such a dare is pointless. Simply [...]