STATEMENT OF JOEY DE VENECIA III DISMISSAL OF IMPEACHMENT CASE DUE TO INSUFFICIENCY OF SUBSTANCE
November 26, 2008
This is a sad day not only for us the complainants and the minority lawmakers, but more so for the Filipino people. Our right to take President [...]

POLITICS | CORRUPTION  The House Justice committee on Wednesday junked the fourth impeachment complaint against President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, declaring the complaint “insufficient in substance.” Read the story

Reaction: Joey de Venecia Calls Junking ‘Sad Day,’ Vows to Bring Case Vs Arroyo ‘Straight to the People’

POLITICS | CORRUPTION  The Philippine Daily Inquirer reports that “a resolution extending the term of (President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo beyond that year has quietly found its way into the powerful House committee on constitutional amendments.”

ECONOMY  By Sonny Africa  |  While the Philippines has been made vulnerable to external financial shocks as a result of the US crisis and made internally weaker by globalization, the Arroyo administration is still pushing for more of the same through the constitutional amendments.

POLITICS | CORRUPTION  “For refusing to endorse a sham and bogus impeachment complaint against the President and for supporting my son’s call for truth and justice, I was removed as a Speaker of the House of Representatives,” former House speaker Jose de Venecia said. Read the story

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.”

Satisfaction rating remains among lowest since 2004
For her performance as chief executive, respondents of the latest IBON nationwide survey gave Pres.Gloria Arroyo a failing grade of 70.2, while her net satisfaction rating remained at a low -75.6— one of the lowest she received since she assumed office in 2004.
71.02% of respondents gave Arroyo [...]

by Alphonse F. La Porta
Alphonse F. La Porta (a_laporta@yahoo.com) is a retired U.S. Foreign Service Officer, who has served as ambassador to Mongolia and in Southeast Asia.
Southeast Asia is an essential component of Asia’s economic and political ascendance that broadly impacts on United States interests in this increasingly integrated world. Energizing U.S. relations with [...]

By Fr. Shay Cullen

Since the historic victory of Barack Obama, the first African-American to be elected to the most powerful presidency in the world, world opinion has turned more favorable towards the American people. It recognizes and cheers the fact that they have come to their senses and turned out to vote for change – [...]

By Alphonse F. La Porta | 
Indonesia, surprisingly to many observers, is a successful Muslim-majority democracy that would resist a return to autocracy. As we approach the turn of administrations in Washington, effective United States approaches to the Muslim world and Asian regionalism call for a deeper relationship with Indonesia.
Indonesia, too often overlooked in the panoply [...]

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) today expressed dismay over the reported decision of the Office of the Ombudsman dismissing the graft charges filed against former Agriculture Undersecretary Jocelyn Bolante and 10 other personalities by the late community journalist Marlene Esperat in connection with the multimillion peso fertilizer fund scam.

Political activists in the Philippines do not only have to contend with the seemingly never-ending assassinations of their colleagues. Lately, according to them, the Arroyo regime has resorted to filing criminal charges left and right against activists, in some cases bringing those arrested to areas in the country where political activism is weak or nonexistent, such as Oriental Mindoro, apparently so that they are deprived of crucial support from their family and colleagues.

Multisectoral alliance Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) today said that the political persecution of activist leaders in Southern Tagalog shows how the Arroyo administration continues to brazenly use the country’s trial courts to silence its staunchest critics.
The group issued the statement as activists led by members of Bayan’s Southern Tagalog regional chapter trooped to the Department [...]

By By Ralph A. Cossa  |  The first bit of more general advice is to remember that the United States only has one president at a time and, like it or not, that president is George W. Bush until Jan 20, 2009. I start with this reminder since many experts are already talking about things that President-elect Obama should be doing now to hit the ground running. But the most important thing he can do between now and January 20 is to do nothing that undermines the incumbent president’s ability to conduct foreign policy.