GlobalBalita Series April #1

Welcome to GlobalBalita.com!

GlobalBalita.com is dedicated to publishing articles about Filipinos and all that affect them.
The new site will still have all the content you’ve come to love here—we’ve just made it a lot easier to navigate through. We will also introduce the Pinoy Forum (an online message board) where you can have discussions or share your opinions with other Filipinos. Look for that in the next month.

We’re still making enhancements to the site and would love your feedback on the progress thus far. You can now subscribe to our RSS Feed, making it easier for you to see the latest articles. Feel free to comment or email perrydiaz@gmail.com.

Thank you for following PerryScope.org and all of its contributors. The site was successful because of the readers. We look forward to meeting you here at GlobalBalita.com where you can find all the previously published stories from PerryScope.org as well as new ones.

LATEST FROM GLOBAL BALITA

We have nine very interesting news, opinions, and stories today:

1. Billy Esposo in his article, "How Tony Blair can complicate the peace process," writes: "Unable to see the big picture, the nation finds itself grasping at straws and clinging to false Messiahs and palliative solutions that do not address our real core problems."

2. Tony Abaya in his article, "Second-Round Vote," writes: "If our constitutional geniuses had thought of inserting a run-off or second round vote in the 1987 Constitution, every president elected since then would have enjoyed the support of the majority of voters from Day One and, perhaps, would have governed with more consensus and support from the electorate, instead of the endless bickering that marks every presidential term in this country."

3. Atty. Ernesto B. Francisco, Jr. in his article, "Ombudsman takes 80 million Filipinos for fools," writes: "This latest move of the Office of the Ombudsman (“Ombudsman”) to spare First Gentleman Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo and other individuals prominently mentioned in the World Bank reports from preliminary investigation and from the risk - no matter how remote - of being charged before the Sandiganbayan, coupled with the ploy of passing on its job of investigating them to the National Bureau of Investigation (“NBI”), is totally disgusting and sickening."

4. Hong Kong columnist Chip Tsao's controversial article, "The War at Home," has created worldwide furor over his insulting article in regard to the Spartly baseline issue." He writes: "There are more than 130,000 Filipina maids working as $3,580-a-month cheap labor in Hong Kong. As a nation of servants, you don’t flex your muscles at your master, from whom you earn most of your bread and butter." Read some of the readers' comments.

5. Ellen Tordesillas in her article, "Mikey, truly the son of Gloria and Mike," writes about Congressman Mikey Arroyo's effort to get House support for Charter Change which many believe is an attempt to keep his mother stay in power beyond 2010.

6. Herman Tiu Laurel in his article, "For truth and justice," writes: "For one, DNA examination of the alleged Dacer-Corbito bone fragments by the University of the Philippines Natural Sciences Research Institute stated thus: “Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) analysis targeting the 121 bp intergenic region of the COH and tRNAlys genes of the mitochondrion gave NEGATIVE RESULTS for the presence of human DNA.” In lay language, what Herman was saying is: the bones claimed by the government to belong to Dacer and Corbito are not human bones.

7. Reginald Tamayo in his article, "Wanted: Honest leaders and people," writes: "In our search for the new breed of leaders, honesty to one self and to others should be the first criterion. Anybody who presents himself as a leader but knows too well that he cannot do the job is a dishonest leader."

8. Bert M. Drona in his article, "THE FILIPINO MIND: Decolonizing the Filipino (Mind) - A Brief Sketch," writes about the nationalist struggle to "decolonize" the Filipino.

9. Ben Serrano in his article, "The search for that elusive lasting peace in Mindanao in the eyes of the Presidential wanabees," writes: "With 2010 presidential election fever is about to start (until November 30 when they filed their certificate of candidacies), we have not seen or heard any of among eight or nine presidentiables talking about Mindanao. What are their agendas for Mindanao? How will they do it?"

Once again, GLOBAL BALITA TODAY strives to bring to your "doorstep" interesting articles for your reading pleasure.

All the best,
Perry Diaz

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How Tony Blair can complicate the peace process

AS I WRECK THIS CHAIR
by William M. Esposo
from Philstar

An event of the past week demonstrated anew the pathetic state of the national mind and how it fails to see the big picture. Unable to see the big picture, the nation finds itself grasping at straws and clinging to false Messiahs and palliative solutions that do not address our real core problems.

Such is the case of Peace Process Presidential Adviser Avelino Razon’s proposal to engage former British Prime Minister Tony Blair as an adviser for the Mindanao Peace Process. Whether Razon [...]

To read more, click here How Tony Blair can complicate the peace process

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Second-Round Vote
by Antonio C. Abaya
from Standard Today

The framers of our 1987 Constitution were not thinking when they prescribed a multi-party political system but failed to provide the mechanism for making that system function more democratically.

I am referring to the absence of a run-off or second round ballot. We have been so used to the American-style two-party system, in which one party usually gets 50 percent plus-1, or the numerical majority of votes cast, that when we switched to the more democratic multi-party system, our constitutionalists failed to make provisions to make sure [...]

To read more, click here Second-Round Vote

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‘Ombudsman takes 80 million Filipinos for fools’
by Atty. Ernesto B. Francisco, Jr.

This latest move of the Office of the Ombudsman (“Ombudsman”) to spare First Gentleman Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo and other individuals prominently mentioned in the World Bank reports from preliminary investigation and from the risk - no matter how remote - of being charged before the Sandiganbayan, coupled with the ploy of passing on its job of investigating them to the National Bureau of Investigation (“NBI”), is totally disgusting and sickening. This is too much. This also proves that the Ombudsman really takes 80 million [...]

To read more, click here ‘Ombudsman takes 80 million Filipinos for fools’

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The War at Home

Read the comments from readers at the end of the article. Interesting comments.
— Perry Diaz

Source: http://hk-magazine.com/feature/war-home
by Chip Tsao

The Russians sank a Hong Kong freighter last month, killing the seven Chinese seamen on board. We can live with that—Lenin and Stalin were once the ideological mentors of all Chinese people. The Japanese planted a flag on Diàoyú Island. That’s no big problem—we Hong Kong Chinese love Japanese cartoons, Hello Kitty, and shopping in Shinjuku, let alone our round-the-clock obsession with karaoke.

But hold on—even the Filipinos? Manila has just claimed sovereignty [...]

To read more, click here The War at Home

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Mikey, truly the son of Gloria and Mike

by Ellen Tordesillas
Mikey Arroyo, son of Gloria and Mike Arroyo, who represents the second district of Pampanga in the House of Representatives, must really take all Filipinos to be stupid.
He thinks we could not see through the deception in the still- to- be filed resolution of Camarines Sur Representative Luis Villafuerte “calling upon all members of Congress to convene for the purpose of considering proposals to amend or revise the Constitution, upon a vote of three-fourths of all the members of Congress.”

In all his interviews about his having approached former [...]

To read more, click here Mikey, truly the son of Gloria and Mike

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For truth and justice

by Herman Tiu Laurel
from The Daily Tribune

“It is in justice that the ordering of society is centered.”—Aristotle

If we are a topsy-turvy society today, it is because justice has been overtaken by power politics and the use of force and deception. This is what can be observed in many of our most celebrated crime mysteries, from the Ninoy Aquino, Lean Alejandro, and Popoy Lagman assassinations to the present and highly charged Dacer-Corbito case. Even though all have been marred by still many unanswered questions, accusers in the present instance do not have [...]

To read more, click here For truth and justice

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Wanted: Honest leaders and people

by Reginald Tamayo

Looking for new breed of leaders is one of the most widely talked about topic nowadays. This is understandable considering that 2010 election is fast approaching. It is our wish as Filipinos to have leaders that can inspire and enrich our lives, leaders who can serve our best interests and liberate us from poverty. We don’t need leaders who manipulate us, peddle lies and leaders who are greedy, and immoral.

Do we have these new breed of leaders today who have a sense of mission and direction to [...]

To read more, click here Wanted: Honest leaders and people

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THE FILIPINO MIND : Decolonizing the Filipino (Mind) - A Brief Sketch

by Bert M. Drona

A few decades ago, our great nationalist Prof. Renato Constantino (1919-1999) wrote: “The true Filipino is a decolonized Filipino.”

During the late 1960s, Filipino nationalism was approaching its zenith when President Marcos, constrained by the Constitution with its presidential term limits but wanting to stay in power, declared Martial Law. Marcos glibly equated Filipino nationalism with communism to rekindle the “fear of communism” and thus gain support from the middle class, the Catholic Church and most of the elite. With his US-supported dictatorship, Marcos issued proclamations that allowed [...]

To read more, click here THE FILIPINO MIND : Decolonizing the Filipino (Mind) - A Brief Sketch

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The search for that elusive lasting peace in Mindanao in the eyes of the Presidential wannabes

by Ben Serrano

BUTUAN CITY- In past elections and even until now, when 2010 election fever is about to commence (or has started?), no Presidential wannabes have presented specific, measurable, attainable, reliable and time bound plans for solving that elusive peace and development in Mindanao.

While we are bragging to be the “food basket” supplying 60% of food supply requirements of the whole archipelago, we end up sometimes empty basket full of promises, hopes and aspirations in the boulevard of broken (LEGACY) dreams.
While Mindanao inhabitants now close to 17-M (16-M I think) [...]

To read more, click here The search for that elusive lasting peace in Mindanao in the eyes of the Presidential wannabes


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