Piercing Pens

Ladies and Gentlemen:

We’d like to present the Honorable BAD, err, VAT boys and girls of the Philippine House of Representatives:

Photo from HOR website. Here’s the credit and caption from the site: (more…)

The House of Representatives, voting 126-11, with no abstention, approved House Bill 3555, the proposed law that seeks to increase value added tax or VAT from 10 percent to 12 percent.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue defines VAT as “a business tax imposed and collected from the seller in the course of trade or business on every sale of properties (real or personal), lease of goods or properties (real or personal) or vendors of services.” According to BIR, it is an indirect tax so ” it can be passed on to the buyer. ”

The Arroyo administration, which is pushing for VAT, keeps on claiming that the proposed increase in the said tax would not affect the ordinary people. On the other hand, the opposition and the activists say otherwise. (more…)

I failed to watch yesterday’s episode of Mulawin, but this Mulawin blog reported that Gabriel has transformed into a Ravena and already had his first kill.

The usual complain I heard about the new twist in this “telefantasia” series is that what happened to the character being played by Dennis Trillo is unfair. Imagine living your life peacefully desiring nothing but being with the love of your life and suddenly realizing one day that you’re actually a monster! Ansakit di ba?

I just read that former Vice President Teofisto Guingona is now the country’s ambassador to China.

He’s now with the administration again. It’s weird. He should be in the streets leading the militants and the opposition in protest like what he did during the Estrada regime. There are many issues for him to take up–not just foreign intervention and the surrender of the national patrimony but also the administration’s anti-people policies such as the increased VAT.

According to INQ7, the Social Weather Stations reported a drop in the number of hungry Filipino families–those “families who had nothing to eat at least once in the past three months”–from 15.1 percent in the third quarter of 2004 to 11.5 percent in the last quarter.

The Palace would surely be glad about this piece of news. (more…)