Let’s hope the Supertyphoon doesn’t do as much damage as expected.
More news on Plan A, and on Plan B. What’s Plan C? Elections as scheduled. What’s Plan D? Adding elections for a constitutional convention, which could then produce a charter before the 14th Congress can get its act together and mount a 3rd impeachment.
News of divisions within the President’s cabinet, and outright hostility toward Defense Secretary Avelino Cruz, Jr. (a former law partner of Justice Carpio) may just be sour graping and an attempt to find a scapegoat on the part of Palace lieutenants (as Max Soliven seems to think).
Update: see the Malaya cover story on how it thinks the President herself pulled the plug.
Still, the Inquirer editorial reacts to criticisms of the Supreme Court and says three dangerous ideas are being floated:
These misinterpretations – that the high court’s deliberative process is ultimately political, that last week’s vote was a defining exercise in patriotism, that the Supreme Court oversteps its constitutional boundaries when it takes judicial cognizance of plain reality – all undermine the high court’s place in our democratic project. Of the three, politicization is the worst offender, because it subverts the judiciary’s very nature – not in one swoop, but slowly, in small doses of political poison.
Comelec AKO thinks the Chief Justice is simply out to get elected. Amando Doronila takes up the cudgels for the justices, too. J.A. de la Cruz says, don’t pin the so-called “people’s initiative” woes on “the firm.”
Are the Democrats capable of snatching defeat from a widely-assumed victory? The Guardian wonders. Visit electoral-vote.com for daily updates on the congressional race in the USA.
Features: Newsbreak on just how disappointing the Ombudsman is (very). Susan A. de Guzman on a Fabian de la Rosa exhibit at the Jorge Vargas Museum. Ruby Towers earthquake remembered.
My column for today is Memorial landscape. Also, Billy Esposo waxes nostalgic for some of the great departed.
The Manila Times editorial says historians should be sorting out lingering unresolved questions in Philippine history.
Seah Chiang Neeh on a growing danger to Singapore’s ruling party due to its leadership being divorced from the everyday experience of the public.
Here’s one of the most curious editorials I’ve ever read: the Japan Times on Japanese who end up disappointed with Paris.
More views on the Supreme Court’s decision from Atty-at-work and Red’s Herring, who delves into the hybrid nature of the Philippine legal system. In Philippine Commentary, he delves into survey methods.
The Ignatian Perspective suggests how OFW’s can help the motherland.
Blogs react to The Explainer on ANC: in Ako si PAENG, and in Blog@AWB Holdings.
The Filipino Mind reproduces Roland Simbulan’s prescription for ensuring the University of the Philippines resists the globalization bandwagon.
Technorati Tags: Blogging, constitution, history, people’s initiative, philippines, politics, president, Washington DC
What’s Plan D? a constitutional convention, A ConCon Railroad? It’s a tight time-bound plan that requires presicion and steady fast execution – like defusing a time bomb, or it explodes on everybody’s faces — blowing Malacanang operators’ heads off, figuratively of course.
And of course, ‘THE’ CONTINGENCY PLAN becomes more ‘the’ plan as execution of plans A and B meet obstacles. At what point will the contingency plan be preferable? Will it be triggered by contingent events or will it be set into motion deliberately?
Btw, MLQIII, what’s ‘the’ contingency plan? Can the Explainer have an episode with an Insider from the Palace? Or, would we settle for The Speculator? Auto golpe is one speculation. Are there others?
mlq3, thanks for the Manila Times editorial link. This cleared up some historical misconceptions of my own:
“Correcting historical errors could be painful. The people of San Juan, Metro Manila, felt bad when the NHI transferred three years ago the marker announcing the first shot of the Filipino-American War from the Pinaglabanan Bridge to a corner of Sociego and Silencio streets, Santa Mesa.”
All the while, i thought the plaque was stolen.
Re: infighting
In the Philippine Star, “Without Senate, con-ass will fail” Secdef Cruz ridiculed the “Cabinet members who pushed for the “legally harebrained” people’s initiative”. He said they “should admit their immense mistake to the President.” And then he dismissed Plan B “It has to include the Senate,…Congress has two houses. To convene, it means the participation of two houses,”
Meanwhile Malaya adds an intertesting twist ro rhe alleged infighting. ‘Fearing JDV plot, GMA dumped PI’ – Impeach provision scared Mike.” The report said GMA called Raul Gonzalez from HK and hollered at him to stop attacking Cruz.
Malaya thinks JDV is still a serious force to be reckoned with. I believe they’re wrong. JDV , like FVR, is a spent force who remains speaker only because GMA still finds him amusing.
Anyway, any news of a house divided is good news. Unless, of course, it’s just another Malacanang moro-moro to keep our attention focused on something else besides killing cha-cha under Gloria.
What’s nice about this latest development is that the administration is now falling apart. We all know something’s got to give, this is the start of the end of their partnership. The greed that breeds in the administration has set the bomb ticking in the “coalition”.
mlq3 said: “Here’s one of the most curious editorials I’ve ever read: the Japan Times on Japanese who end up disappointed with Paris.”
I have gotten feedback about disappointment with Europe in general. There are many reasons for this. First, the strength of the Euro, the Pound Sterling and the Swiss Franc has made most European cities forbiddingly expensive. London, Paris, Brussels, Berlin, Munich and Zurich count among the most expensive cities in the world (although Tokyo would surely be in the same league). For many Asians, the high price tags for eating out or shopping are disheartening. And even prices for the Tube in London or the Metros in many European cities are not as cheap as they once were. Train fares are expensive, too. And for those who would like to rent a car and drive around, petrol in Europe is extremely expensive. A liter of gasoline would be the equivalent of almost P100 per liter.
Secondly, I have heard numerous horror stories regarding crime, particularly theft and muggings. To be fair, the perpetrators are mainly foreigners – usually Africans (Moroccans, Algerians, Senegalese, West Africans) or South Americans (Colombians, Peruvians, Argentinians). Most of these are fleeing the harsh economic conditions in their countries. But they stay in Europe and devote themselves to crime and drugs. Cities like Paris, Rome, Madrid, London are besieged with these unlawful elements. I have had many friends and relatives who had traumatic experiences in Europe as tourists.
Of course, the legendary Parisian snootiness remains. I think Parisians take pleasure in doing this, specially to those who can’t speak French (quels barbares!). Yet, despite its renowned pomposity, France registered almost 80 million tourist arrivals in 2005, the largest tourist destination in the world (Spain, with more than 60 million, is second). Europe in general accounted for more than one-half of international tourism in 2005, according to the World Tourism Organization, with 444 million arrivals out of 808 million worldwide. So, despite the inconveniences of high prices, crime and multiplicity of languages, France and the rest of Europe must be doing many things right. History and richness of culture are always a big attraction. Barbaric Americans may have Disneyland but, in the end, it becomes boring. Countries like the Philippines should study and take note.
testing. hindi lumalabas ang post ko.
buti na lang hindi napadaan sa french suburbs ang mga hapon.
abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2596942
Supertyphoon slams RP. So is Gloria still pushing through with her HK vacation and private meetings w/her bankers or is she going to attend to typhoon victims?
In the last typhoon, newspapers published a picture of Gloria attending to the fallen trees around her palace. She wasn’t pictured anywhere near typhoon victms until a few days later. Unless of course fallen trees are the same as human victims. She did the same thing with Guimaras oil spill and the landslide in Leyte.Arrived days after the disaster.
During the time of Marcos, Imelda and children would be out passing relief goods to typhoon victims even in pouring rain. Maybe it was all for show but you can be sure those victims appreciated the presence of the first family during their moment of need.
It’s not just a question of p.r. It’s more than that. It’s about the human touch., the human asppect of governance.
Arroyo is like George Bush whose first reaction to the New Orleans disaster was to tell the pilot of Air Force to fly low over New Orleans so he could see the disaster first hand. He was flying back to Washington from a vacation in his Texas ranch.
You think Gloria will skip her vacation and go straight to northern Luzon or will she just ask her pilot to fly low on her way home?
Let’s see what this 48-inch wonder will do. Let’s see kung meron siyang malasakit sa kanyang kababayan.
Maybe we should be content with “the peso is strong, the stock market is up…”
John, what do you mean by that?
By the way, Carl presents a sound analysis.
MB, I’m taken by what you said, “private meetings w/ her bankers” in HK. So, that’s where the loot is. Not in Germany, after all.
The only honorable thing left for Nonong Cruz is to resign and oppose Charter change as it is being manipulated by the administration, if he is really that sincere.
Who’s ‘persona ingrata’? The justice appointed by GMA as CJ or GMA sworn in by CJ Davide at EDSAII?
Of course, the legendary Parisian snootiness remains.
To be fair, I didnt experience this legendary snootiness when I was there last august. All the french people I spoke to from the hotel concierge to the vendors on the street were anything but snooty. In fact they were nice.
True Carl, there’s still lots of snootiness in the French capital but try disarming the snooty ones with a smile – usually it works as no doubt, Jeg must have done during his visit to Paris.
Lemme tell ya, there’s lots of snootiness too in London. My husband and children who are English will tell you that they prefer service in Paris.
but snootiness in London and Paris is nothing if you compare that to the snootiness in Belgique – ugh! snooty and slooooooow, what a lethal combination!
the first thing the con-con should abolished are the useless provision on the anti-dynasty, peoples initiative and the party lists. the congress will not pass any law to give life to the first two and the party-list was inserted by the commies of the 1987 concom to support the insurgents with the pork barrels. how clever!
mlq3 said: “Are the Democrats capable of snatching defeat from a widely-assumed victory?”
A very propitious question indeed. It’s amazing how, in U.S. politics, the Democratic Party has been outflanked and outperformed by the Republican Party in the past 25 years. The party of Franklin D. Roosevelt, which once prided itself with being in touch with the American common man, lost its connection with average Americans beginning in the late 1970’s. Ironically, this was the period when the Democratic Party could have taken advantage of the Republican Party’s continuing fallout due to Watergate. But the party lost its bearings during the administration of Jimmy Carter, who, because of his lack of experience and vision, led the party astray from the everyday concerns of common Americans.
After Barry Goldwater’s disastrous 1964 Presidential campaign and Richard Nixon’s doomed presidency, ending in Watergate, the Republican Right was thought to be an endangered specie in American politics. The most significant stimulus for a Republican resurgence started out quietly as a grassroots campaign. It was started by a simple citizen who was concerned about too much intrusion of government into everyday affairs and too many taxes being imposed on ordinary Americans. Howard Jarvis and Proposition 13 came from humble origins. But its effects proved to be a political juggernaut which changed American politics for the past 3 decades.
Oddly enough, Howard Jarvis conceived Prop 13 in reaction to the massive tax increases that Ronald Reagan had imposed on California when he was Governor. Reagan had been forced to do this because the state coffers had been emptied by the huge deficits his predecessor, Democratic Governor Pat Brown, had incurred. At that time, Reagan believed in balanced budgets.
Because of the immense tax burdens on California residents, particular property taxes, Howard Jarvis thought of Prop 13. Through a “people’s initiativeâ€Â, Prop 13 recommended to cut California’s notoriously high property taxes by 30 percent and to cap future tax increases. Proposition 13 was on the ballot in 1978. It was an unqualified success and changed marked a turnaround in American politics. And the fortunes of the Republican Party.
By this time, Ronald Reagan was no longer Governor of California. As a matter of fact, the sitting Governor, Gerry Brown, was the son of the man Reagan succeeded and who had run up the massive deficits which prompted Reagan to raise taxes.
Sensing a political opportunity, Ronald Reagan enthusiastically embraced Howard Jarvis’ initiative and promoted it as if it were his own. This was the start of the vaunted “Reagan Revolutionâ€Â. This was the prelude to the Reagan-inspired income tax cuts in 1981. Prop 13 also incited a nationwide tax revolt at the state and local levels. Within five years of Proposition 13’s passage, almost half of the states passed similar laws limiting politicians’ powers to increase taxes. And much of those tax limitation measures remain the law of the land today. From the that time on, rightly or wrongly, the Democratic Party has been labeled the advocate of an intrusive federal government and of high spending and taxes. (Empirical evidence points to the opposite. The Reagan administration and both Bush administrations have been the most profligate and spendthrift, running up billions and billions of budget and trade deficits and debt. The Democratic Clinton administration was able to stem the hemorrhage on spending and debt, but tell that to your ordinary ignorant American voter.)
The modern-day Republican Party rose out of the desire of ordinary American citizens to limit the growth and intrusion of central government and to protect the rights and prerogatives of citizens at the state level. In other words, it was for less central government and more regional freedom and initiatives. Furthermore, alliances with conservative religious groups on hot-button issues such as abortion and gay rights have strengthened the hold of the Republican party on the grassroots. Religious groups equate the intrusion of central government with liberalism and a soft attitude on moral issues which they deem important.
For this reason, the Republican Party, except for the Clinton years, has outmaneuvered the Democrats most of the time in the past 25 years. Bill Clinton was an enormously gifted politician who had the pulse of the American heartbeat and knew how to adjust accordingly. That is why Clinton is hated so much by Republican strategists and die-hard conservatives (but not by ordinary Republicans, many of whom voted for him). But, generally, the Republican strategists have had a better feel of ordinary Americans than have Democrats. This was particularly evident when a spoiled, decadent, rich draft dodger like George W. Bush could resonate better with average Americans than a genuine war hero like John Kerry.
So the history of the past 25 years cannot be ignored. The Republican Party may be on the defensive, but it can certainly still pull out a few surprises. Despite the stupidity, greed and shortsightedness of the people at the helm of the party.
just like jeg, i haven’t encountered any snooty behavior in Paris when i visited in ’92 and ’98. can’t say the same for the UK though where i have been at the receiving end of boorish behavior both from cab drivers and old ladies (not the queen:-). i have been similarly lucky in Germany where i have been to the most as the locals there have been hospitable. one time, i thought i was being followed by a skinhead, but it turns out that he just wanted to point out that the belt of my trench coat was untied. very helpful fellow.
Manolo re your link to Roland Simbulan’s speech I don’t know if you were being factual or sarcastic when you described its contents.
Jeg, anna, cvj – – – I think the French get particularly disarmed when one tries to make an effort to speak their language. Besides, as I pointed out, how can almost 80 million tourists be wrong? The numbers speak for themselves. 80 million tourists in one year is a fantastic amount of people, especially in a country that has a smaller population than the Philippines. Imagine the multiplier effect that has. The number of hotels, restaurants, retail outlets, food, beverage, wine, furniture, real estate, cars, buses, trains, airplanes, etc. that are utilized to accommodate that number of people. Imagine the employment and the income that generates!
The fact is Europe really has developed its tourism industry very well. Spain and Italy are also noteworthy. England, I love and find very interesting. London has a fantastic array of cultures. There is a tremendous selection of food and entertainment (England is beginning to rival France as a gastronomic center). Then there is the West End and the splendor of the theater. Of course, being more familiar with the English language also facilitates getting aroung. But the unpredictable weather and the forbiddingly strong pound really make one think twice before venturing there. Overall, I find the casual and cheery attitude of the “Limeys†much more to my liking than the formality of the “Frogs†(as the Brits like to call them, no offense intended).
“Are the Democrats capable of snatching defeat from a widely-assumed victory?â€Â
‘Widely-assumed’ is the key [hyphenated] word. I saw a map on CNN this morning and there was an equal number, more or less, of blue and red states as far as their projections go. The vast majority of the states, CNN placed in the gray.
Check that. Not ‘vast majority.’ Perhaps just a simple majority.
Paul, read the speech and see for yourself.
Carl, the only place I’ve ever been pickpocketed is in Paris. But I love love love that city.
“I think the French get particularly disarmed when one tries to make an effort to speak their language.” Absolument! C’est la verité!
The only place I’ve ever been pocketed was in Rome. I love Paris too in the Fall, Spring, Summer and even when it snows…
Carl, the only place I’ve ever been pickpocketed is in Paris.
MLQ3, that’s just payback for when our French client was pickpocketed in Greenbelt. 🙂
The French are noted for their snootiness. They get millions of tourists. The Philippines is noted for its hospitable courteous smiling folks. We scrape the bottom of the tourism barrel. So hospitality has no bearing in tourist attraction. The tourism officials should take note of that. We have been bombarded enough with the line that tourists come because of our people. So far it hasn’t worked. Let’s try snootiness. Maybe it will.
On the U.S. elections: Firstly there was an intellectual divide between the Republican and Democratic party. Political parties evolve with the evolution of their economic systems and structures and thence their culture. .
The dichotomy between the republican and democrats were based on the basic conflict between Hamilton (strong state) and Jefferson (libertarian) over how the U.S. Union would be managed. Independent strong states or strong central rule from the Federal Government over the states. That contradiction still somewhat prevails today. Hamilton was a forward thinking practical theorist. He understood the power of money and the ideas behind it. He is primarily responsible for establishing the idea of a national monetary authority in the U.S. Jefferson did not like the idea. Jefferson was a farmer and Hamilton believed in the power of goverment assisting industry for the state to become powerful. The Southern states never forgave the Republicans (Lincoln) and big industrialists for freeing the slaves. Democrats ruled the South since Civil War reconstruction.FDR then LBJ reversed the trend. FDR insitituted what the Republicans believed to be akin to socialism (Keynesian principles)- the social welfare state – LBJ expanded it under the Great Society policy and he forced the passage of the Civil Rights Act and liberalized immigration to non-whites. The Reagan revolution started the process of reversing both Johnson’s and FDR’s welfare state policies. That led to ther mass migration of whites to the suburbs and the rise of the so called Southern States. It is ironic that most Southern States are where the goverment has the military industrial complexes. Hence today you have the division between the Blue and Red States. Though the Blue states have mnore of the population elctions are not decided on a presidential level by voters cast.
That is why even if polls show that Democrats ahead nationally in the mid term Congressional elections, local state issues dominate who will win regardless of party affiliations.
Bill Clinton ran on a Republican platform of reforming welfare and balanced budgets. With the emergence of post industrial development both sides are lost on where is the center as the middle class is disappearing in the U.S.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/30/AR2006103000712.html
“There is good reason to suspect that despite the high interest, turnout will not exceed 1994. The problem is that a national poll is, well, a national poll, and does not measure attitudes of voters within states and districts.”
“People vote when there is a reason to do so. Republican and Democratic agendas are in stark contrast on important issues, but voters also need to believe that their vote will matter in deciding who will represent them. It is here that the American electoral system is broken for many voters.”
I hope this is not way out for people in trying to understand evolution. Most especially for people in a work in progress state.
“the party-list was inserted by the commies of the 1987 concom to support the insurgents with the pork barrels. how clever!”
what a stupid comment. not all party list reps are RA Left communist groups.
“One hears the argument that the recent initiative was not really the people’s undertaking, since their political leaders dragged them into signing it. But haven’t we always been led by our leaders in any given endeavor? “Kung saan kayo, diyan kami” [“We are wherever you are”] is a common saying of the rank and file. This must have been true of the 10 million registered voters who signed the initiative petition of Sigaw’s Raul Lambino et al., 6.3 million of which were verified. But this doesn’t invalidate their signatures.” ‘Bel Cunanan’ of the Inquirer
She reads and writes English and she obviously knows what she writes about. But is she aware or understands what she writes?
I think not.
The PI or recall or referendum is supposed to be a peoples right to question or recall people or a law. Hence the PI is only for an amendment to the Constitution. If citizens could petition for the repeal of a harsh law can the citizens also petition for the abolishment of the agency tasked with implementing and enforcing the harsh law? Was that the intent of the framers of the Constitution? The petitioners are asking the Comelec to approve a petition to abolish Congress and steps on how to do it with 1/2 of the chamber to be left intact and steps to define the merging of the executive and legislative functions of the government.. They do not like the how entire Senate is working out. So abolish it. In effect destroying the principles of check and limitations embedded in the present Constitution.
Now you have this woman writer saying , so what if the leaders are the ones who initiated it?
She implicitly admits it is not a real people’s initiative as it was intitited by whom she called the ‘leaders’
That essentially means it is okay for the government to lead the people in a peoples initiative.
Monkey see monkey do.
And they are scratching their heads on why it was tossed out without any further deliberations as infirm.
Now more on the New New Deal for a post industrial economy that is the U.S. They are calling it ‘The Hamilton Project’ in honor of the first Treasury Secretary of the U.S. Alexander Hamilton. (The Modern Founder of Dirigist Economics)It is being pushed by some Democrats. It simply is a program to keep the U.S. ahead of all other countries in the world. And you believe that there is a free market!!!!The most notable name in the group is former Treasury Secretary of the U.S. Robert Rubin.
http://www1.hamiltonproject.org/views/papers/thp_strategy.htm
While the U.S. is moving to maintain it’s technological superiority in the world, the World Bank is moving to keep countries poor and backward by making sure developing economies follow their orthodoxies that beggar nation states.
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/10/30/calling_bad_business_good.php
An important example of this emerged recently at the World Bank, where the U.S. holds a decisive share of votes and where an American sits as president. Last month the Bank issued a report entitled “Doing Business 2007: How to Reform.” The annual report ranks 175 countries in terms of the “ease of doing business” within their borders. It evaluates nations based on 10 categories related to taxation, licensing, financial and trade regulation, legal infrastructure and labor.
All of this looks fine on the surface. But unfortunately, the things that lead a nation to success in the rankings are not what working families in this country would regard as good business practices.
“On October 13, a group of prominent Democratic senators sent a letter to World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz charging that the report encourages countries to violate internationally recognized labor standards. Signed by Richard Durbin of Illinois, Joseph Biden of Delaware, Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, Paul Sarbanes of Maryland and Daniel Akaka of Hawaii, the letter decries the report’s favorable ranking of countries that lack minimum wages, fail to regulate overtime and condone union busting. “Rewarding lax or non-existent labor standards,” the senators write, “contradicts ILO [International Labor Organization] policy, which encourages countries to establish a minimum wage and regulate hours of work and to pass and enforce laws protecting freedom of association and collective bargaining.”
Hi Phil,
France receives millions of tourists yearly making it Europe’s top tourist destination.
French “snootiness” has little to do with the phenomenon.
Quoting Carmen N. Pedrosa in her Oct. 30, 2006 column, From A Distance: “The issue is not about a people’s initiative by the Lambino group or those opposed to it but as Panganiban himself said in 1997 – a matter of free speech. That was true then and true also today. The wiser decision should be to bring the issue before the sovereign people in a plebiscite. That is the only way the people can decide whether they want to go along with the Sigaw ng Bayan petition or not. Short of that then we should stop calling ourselves democratic. If we are expounding the Constitution of a democratic republic as the overarching issue here, then it follows that the sovereign people will have to decide. The Puno opinion upholds that right while the Panganiban-Carpio opinion rejects it.”
Pedrosa positions her arguments to drive home this point. The bias is evident, which is naturally her prerogative. Impressing a point of view upon readers is not of salient concern in this rejoinder. This process does not warrant any question. But substance does.
The generalization that the SC’s non-decision for a plebiscite should necessitate us to “stop calling ourselves democratic†is sweeping in scope and, therefore, fallacious. This flawed conclusion renders Pedrosa’s premise that the issue is “a matter of free speech†moot at least, and invalid at most. Any merit of her writing this column is, in the context of logic, lost. Ironically, the writing and publication of her opinion is in itself an exercise of free speech. This fact constitutes contradicting herself.
Justice Reynato Puno’s opinion deserves appropriate merit for the valid points it raises. The people’s voice is indeed sovereign in a democracy. But, Puno’s musings and ponderings of the ideal are simplistic. In the real world, we must never discount the fact that the political representation of “we, the people†is always hostage to motivations of those we elect to represent us. To believe otherwise, however poetic your discourse may be, is naiveté.
As “masterful†as Puno’s treatise may have been written, that is not the point. The point is, Sigaw ng Bayan’s people’s initiative, like that of their predecessor’s, PIRMA, is at the onset flawed in its legality by virtue of inadequacy to its provisions in our Constitution. The wiser decision is for them to have lobbied for a clearer interpretation of the law from the Congress before expending time, effort and money in a misguided endeavor which only warrants folly. Otherwise, they should have lobbied their proposal of “amendments,†or semiotically apt “revisions,†to members of Congress who are within authority to vote on the matter or they should have lobbied for a Constitutional Convention.
What escapes my comprehension of people like Carmen N. Pedrosa is, with the clout of her pen, she could impact and affect the lives of our people and, in effect, serve the people’s voice regardless of a bi- or unicameral system of government. Even a percursory observation of our people’s lives is rife for sourcing productive causes. For instance, social reform for the poorest of our poor needs her voice. That is a people’s initiative more worthy of her pen.
P.S. Regarding my handle, “ronnie.pedfan,†which refers to Veronica Pedrosa, I am a fan of the daughter’s works, not the politics of the mother.
Madame Carmen Pedrosa should ask Justice Puno why he saw it fit to have 1.5 million votes of the “sovereign people” invalidated when they voted for the Party list representatives in 2001.
THe sovereign people have spoken in an election yet Justice Puno was one of those who determined that their voice was of no importance.
Regarding survey.
There is no question that statistical method used is important to validate the findings of a study or a survey conducted.
But this is also a means to validate a conclusion before a survey is conducted.
Conclusion first, methodology later with all the framing of the questions, the sampling method used, the choice of the respondents and the margin of error tailor fit to the targeted outcome of the poll.
The difference lies on whose interest will the survey or study
serve.
If I were in a marketing firm and I am using a testimonial/poll survey related – advertising strategy attesting to the popularity of the product, will I be dumb to distribute the questionnaire in a market where my rival product is more popular ?