Piercing Pens

Posted below is Manuel Buencamino’s answer to an open letter by S. C. Austero to “Tita Cory, Senators, Congressmen, Businessmen, Media people, Leftists, and all Bleeding Hearts Out There.”

In the letter that sounded like it was sent out straight from Malacañang’s propaganda bureau, Austero berates Aquino, et al for “sabotaging” the Philippines, declares he chose to forgive Arroyo’s Hello Garci act because it was what the bishops taught us. He also naively believes Mrs. Arroyo and company’s story about the Left-Right conspiracy, and sees nothing wrong with the current regime’s authoritarian tendencies.

Here is Buencamino’s reply:

Dear Schubert Caesar Austero,

I am angry too. Really angry. And depressed. I hope this letter makes at least one of us feel better. It’s honest. It may be too frank at times but we need to take stock of ourselves and the opposition. (more…)

The chair of Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) in Bulacan was killed the other night. This brought the number of political killings this year to 26, based on Karapatan’s tally.

Santiago “Ka Santi” Teodoro, chair of Bayan’s Bulacan chapter, was driving a car when unidentified assailants shot him. His wife, who was with him at that time, survived the attack. His comrades condemned the attack.

The killing occured even as left-leaning party-list representatives are being accused of participating in a plot to bring down the Arroyo government. Anakpawis Rep. Crispin Beltran remains detained at a police hospital while his four colleagues are under the House of Representatives’ protective custody as the police threatens to arrest them.

According to Karapatan, in Central Luzon alone, 12 activists were killed this year. The number of political killings since 2001 could be as high as 6000, the human rights group said.

(A Press Release from the Concerned Artists of the Philippines)

GMA’s pronouncement that she is God’s plan for the country is an affront to God’s being. He or She should sue for libel.

As many would already know, this technique is not new as it was used by our Spanish colonizers. They grabbed the natives’ lands, made them their slaves, captured, torture and/or killed those who resisted, and claimed that all that was happening was the will of God. They tried to console the turmoil in the grieving souls of our forebears by preaching that there will anyway be a final judgment day –only, it is in the afterlife.

History tells us that not everyone bit that propaganda. The Katipuneros and their supporters knew that a large part of salvation had to come from actions by the people themselves. They resisted and trounced the God-quoting Spanish colonizers. But, only to be betrayed by the Americans, whose cause for aggression was, as claimed by then U.S. Pres. Mckinley, a signal from God (through his dream). (more…)

Among the traditional political parties in the Philippines, it is Liberal Party that I admire the most. Its leaders–and many of its members–are less trapo than the other traditional politicians from other parties (especially Lakas).

Mention Liberal Party and these honorable names would come to mind: Ninoy Aquino, Jovito Salonga, Evelio Javier, Bobby Tañada, Franklin Drilon, and Grace Padaca, among others. LP members, along with the national democratic movement, fought the Marcos dictatorship. In 1991, its senators led the successful anti-US bases campain in the Senate.

LP is different from all other traditional parties because its existence does not depend on personalities. Like the progressive party-list groups we now have in Congress, LP has an ideology. (more…)

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo just lifted the State of Emergency that she declared last week.