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Miyerkules, Mayo 25, 2011

noynoy aquino first SONA

President Noynoy Aquino’s first State of the Nation Address (SONA)

President Noynoy Aquino will be giving his first State of the Nation Address (SONA) soon. If his army of speechwriters will have their way, his speech will be all about giving people “hope”. Hopefully, it will not be full of motherhood statements similar to his election platform and inauguration speech. Heaven forbid that Conrado de Quiros have his way in writing it lest it be full of allusions to myths and legends again, and nothing of real substance. One thing is for sure; P.Noy’s first SONA will be filled with what he will refer to as a list of the former administration’s “faults.”
P.Noynoy Aquino will have another opportunity to lambast the former administration and to stress that he is “not superman” and that he “hopes that the Filipino people will have ‘reasonable’ expectations of him” or something to that effect or anything to lower peoples’ expectation of his performance for the next six years. We’ve heard it all before, but we’re crossing our fingers this time that he will give enough details in his speech to give AntiPinoy.com and his other critics, something they can sink their teeth into.
If dealing in real estate is all about “location, location and location”, in government addressing the country’s problems should be first and foremost all about the “economy, economy, and economy.” As economic expert Winnie Monsod had warned: “The President must be specific in his budget message during the SONA so that both houses of Congress can clearly understand what government plans to undertake annually for realizing such agenda.” For his part, blogger Benign0 also offers key performance measures for evaluating how successful the President is in meeting his corruption eradication promises. Obviously, people are waiting for P.Noy to speak clearly and realistically about how he is going to tackle the economy. Unfortunately for P.Noy, there is no way he can wing it this time.
Why should P.Noy prioritize the economy? P.Noy has to prioritize the economy because the economy affects everything. Those who challenge the President to look into their causes like the environment, the Mindanao peace deal, human rights abuses, etcetera, etcetera, need to wait until the economy has picked up before the administration can even begin to start drawing something on the drawing board.
Those groups who want P.Noy to look into the environment and climate change should not hold their breath because achieving an economic boom does not go hand in hand with being environmentally friendly. It’s sad, but that’s reality. It just “ain’t gonna happen” under P.Noy’s watch. Why do you think some countries like the United States and Australia haven’t signed the Kyoto Protocol until now? It’s because signing it means that their economies will be compromised.
This is precisely the reason why talks about the environment in G-20 summits keep getting stalled because not all industrial countries like China and India are prepared to reduce their green house gas (GHG) emissions. For many of them, it is because they feel it is unfair to emerging economies to come to an agreement to prevent further damage to the environment when countries like the US and the UK have achieved their economic prosperity without signing up to such in the past. Although it all sounds very greedy, economic stability is also vital to achieving cultural stability. Only when people have moved on from the struggle of providing for the most basic needs such as food, shelter and clothing and enjoy “luxuries” such as education and recreation can people think about the environment. And this situation can only be achieved through prioritizing the economy.
Looking at the big picture
P.Noy has to look at the big picture and not just Gloria Arroyo’s picture to delete vengeance from his agenda. So many times before P.Noy has been quoted criticizing former president Gloria Arroyo for overspending, something he claims resulted in a P340 billion budget deficit. It should be stressed here that the huge spending done by the former administration was not all for travels and huge dinners. As Senator Edgar Angara said, expensive dinners and too many travel entourages notwithstanding, if former president Arroyo did not pump-prime the economy, it would have contracted like other European nations did. To quote:
Angara, the chair of the Senate finance committee, does not see the country going bankrupt after Ms Arroyo leaves office next week.
The deficit was still “manageable,” he said, noting that a deficit of 3.45 percent of GDP or gross domestic product (P340 billion) was “sustainable.”
Some European economies had contracted because the ratio of their budget deficits to GDP ranged from 12 to 14 percent, he said.
“The deficit is part and parcel of public finance management. If the economy grows, the deficit and debt will lessen proportionately,” he said.
Angara said that the country would not have achieved a 7.3-percent growth in the first quarter if Ms Arroyo did not spend that much.
Ms Arroyo has described this as pump-priming the economy.
“If she did not pump-prime, the economy could have contracted,” Angara said.
The deficit that Escudero is going on about might be the biggest but “it was also the biggest economy ever,” said Angara.
In the second quarter of 2007, the economy posted at 7.5 percent the fastest annual growth in 20 years, the highest since the 7.7 percent in the third quarter of 1986, the year the dictator Ferdinand Marcos was overthrown. The economy finished 2007 with a 7.3-percent growth.
Despite Senator Angara’s acknowledgment however, I’m pretty sure that P.Noy will highlight the huge deficit mentioned above in his first SONA as more of a burden passed on to him. But to put things in perspective, the United States of America is in danger of sliding back into another recession despite a brief rebound after the first recession, this even after spending almost $862 billion to stimulate the economy. Doomsday sayers are predicting that the US could be headed for “a terrifying reprise of 1937 when the US economy fighting its way out of the Great Depression crashed a second time ” according to TIME magazine.
The difference between P.Noy and US President Obama is that, Obama does not go around every other minute harping about how it was all George W. Bush’s fault. In contrast, it is a safe bet that P.Noy will keep blaming GMA for all the ills of the country up until the last few days of his term. Never mind that his own late mother, former President Corazon Aquino is responsible for the 1987 constitution which is part of the reason why the economy can’t compete with the international market. Come to think of it, Filipinos hardly ever heard former President Arroyo complain about past administrations, which includes again Cory Aquino and her own Administration’s poor economic track record, for all the ills of the land.
It has been reported that some of the leading economists in the US are even recommending adding another $150 billion in stimulus spending just to keep the threat of “double-dip” recession at bay. But most US voters are already of the opinion that the first stimulus spending did not work so there is a growing discontented group questioning the proposed additional spending because of the rising budget deficit. To put it simply, ordinary folks do not trust the US government to handle the economy this time.
While Obama is worried about the voters who don’t understand the long- established economic theory of John Maynard Keynes on stimulus spending, P.Noy critics hope that the head of the Philippines (who should be more knowledgeable than the average schmoe) can understand why there was a need for former President Arroyo to spend and ward off the effects of the recession that gripped the rest of the world in the last quarter of 2008.
But we can’t really expect P.Noy to acknowledge anything good that “evil” Gloria has done during her term. To do that would be like dishonoring the promise he gave to his supporters and that is, to prosecute GMA and her cohorts at all cost. Good luck to him then and the rest of the public who will have to endure six years of another Aquino administration devoted to “witch hunt.”
Hard Act to Follow
Like it or not, P.Noy has to admit that the accomplishments of GMA will be a hard act to follow. Apart from the fact that she did what she had to do with little regard for what her detractors said, she also had the luxury of implementing her policies for nine years instead of six. This meant that there was a bit of continuity on the projects that she started. Her last SONA in 2009 stated this:
Had we listened to the critics of those policies, had we not braced ourselves for the crisis that came, had we taken the easy road much preferred by politicians eyeing elections, this country would be flat on its back. It would take twice the effort just to get it back again on its feet—to where we are now because we took the responsibility and paid the political price of doing the right thing. For standing with me and doing the right thing, thank you, Congress…
The strong, bitter and unpopular revenue measures of the past few years have spared our country the worst of the global financial shocks. They gave us the resources to stimulate the economy. Nabigyan nila ang pinakamalaking pagtaas ng IRA ng mga LGU na P40 billion itong taon, imparting strength throughout the country and at every level of government…
Compared to the past, we have built more and better infrastructure, including those started by others but left unfinished. The Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway is a prime example of building better roads. It creates wealth as the flagship of the Subic-Clark corridor.
We have built airports of international standard, upgraded domestic airports, built seaports and the RORO system. I ask Congress for a Philippine Transport Security Authority Law….
Some say that after this SONA, it will be all politics. Sorry, but there’s more work….
Sa telecommunications naman, inatasan ko ang Telecommunications Commission na kumilos na tungkol sa mga sumbong na dropped calls at mga nawawalang load sa cellphone. We need to amend the Commonwealth-era Public Service Law. And we need to do it now….
Kung noong nakaraan, lumakas ang electronics, today we are creating wealth by developing the BPO and tourism sectors as additional engines of growth. Electronics and other manufactured exports rise and fall in accordance with the state of the world economy. But BPO remains resilient. With earnings of $6 billion and employment of 600,000, the BPO phenomenon speaks eloquently of our competitiveness and productivity. Let us have a Department of ICT….
In the last four years tourism almost doubled. It is now a $5 billion industry…
Our reforms gave us the resources to protect our people, our financial system and our economy from the worst of shocks that the best in the west failed to anticipate….
They gave us the resources to do reforms para palawakin ang suportang panlipunan and enhance spending power….For helping e raise salaries through joint resolution, thank you Congress.
Cash handouts give the most immediate relief and produce the widest stimulating effect. Nakikinabang ang 700,000 na pinakamahihirap na pamilya sa programang Pantawid Pamilya.
Our preference is to invest in projects with the same stimulus effects but also with long-term contributions to national progress….
Sa pagpapamahagi ng milyun-milyong ektaryang lupa, 700,000 na katutubo at mahigit isang milyong benepisyaryo ng CARP ay taas-noong may-ari na ng sariling lupa. Hinihiling ko sa Kongreso na ipasa agad ang pagpapalawig ng CARP, at dapat ma-condone ang P42 billion na land reform liabilities dahil 18% lamang ang nabayaran mula 1972. Napapanahon dahil it will unfreeze the rural property market. Ang mahal kong ama ang nag-emancipate ng mga magsasaka. Ii-mancipate naman natin ngayon ang titulo….
Nakinabang ang pitong milyong entrepreneurs sa P165 billion na microfinance. Nakinabang ang 1,000 sa economic resiliency plan. Kasama natin ngayon ang isa sa kanila, si Gigi Gabiola. Dating household service worker sa Dubai, ngayon siya ay nagtatrabaho sa DOLE. Good luck, Gigi…
Nakinabang ang isang milyong pamilya sa programang pabahay at palupa, mula sa PAG-IBIG, NHA, community mortgage program, certificates of lot awards, at saka yung inyong Loan Condonation and Restructuring Act….
Whether you believe her statements above or not, it has become hard for ordinary folks to believe that former President Arroyo did anything good. This is because the Philippine media were good at highlighting her inadequacies but played down every good intention that she had. Sadly, the media in the Philippines has never been balanced in reporting the good stuff that came out of Malacanang while GMA was still running the show. Filipinos just have to look outside of the Philippines to see that there were other nations whose economies were run to the ground by their administrators (think Greece) and you will appreciate the fact the GMA did a good job despite the odds.
P.Noy now has acquired so many options since he has taken on “the most difficult job in the land”. He can continue with what GMA has started in order to achieve continuity; or improve on the policies; or sit down with those who are clamoring for the change in the Constitution and discuss the merits of removing and replacing some parts that prevent our country from moving forward (think protectionism clauses); to change the system of government from a presidential to a parliamentary system, among other things.
The Philippines is P.Noy’s oyster. He has to prioritize the things that will benefit every citizen in the long term not just those who supported and financed his campaign. It would be too disappointing if P.Noy devotes most of his State of the Nation Address to the blame game. It is time for P.Noy to put his sleeves up and get his own hands dirty. He has to make up his mind about whether his administration will be about spending to stimulate the economy or about austerity if he prefers to have an image of (false) humility. He just has to be careful not to get stuck in analysis paralysis because of his preoccupation with maintaining an image of someone who is the opposite of the GMA. It’s just plain unproductive.


http://antipinoy.com/noynoy-sona/

 

Martes, Mayo 24, 2011

 HISTORY CHANNEL-ancient mysterious Rosetta Stone(in essence, the Rosetta stone is a tax amnesty given to the temple priests of the day restoring the tax privileges they had traditionally enjoyed)

Rosetta Stone

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_Stone

The Rosetta Stone is an Ancient Egyptian granodiorite stele inscribed with a decree issued at Memphis, Egypt in 196 BC on behalf of King Ptolemy V. The decree appears in three scripts: the upper text is Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the middle portion demotic script, and the lowest Ancient Greek. Because it presents essentially the same text in all three scripts (with some minor differences between them), it provided the key to the modern understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs.
Originally displayed within a temple, the stele was probably moved during the early Christian or medieval period, and eventually used as building material in the construction of Fort Julien near the town of Rashid (Rosetta) in the Nile Delta. It was rediscovered there in 1799 by a soldier of the French expedition to Egypt. As the first ancient bilingual text recovered in modern times, the Rosetta Stone aroused widespread public interest with its potential to decipher the hitherto untranslated Ancient Egyptian language. Lithographic copies and plaster casts began circulating amongst European museums and scholars. Meanwhile, British troops defeated the French in Egypt in 1801, and the original stone came into British possession under the Capitulation of Alexandria. Transported to London, it has been on public display at the British Museum since 1802. It is the most-visited object in the British Museum.
Ever since its rediscovery, the stone has been the focus of nationalist rivalries, including its transfer from French to British possession during the Napoleonic Wars, a long-running dispute over the relative value of Young's and Champollion's contributions to the decipherment, and since 2003, demands for the stone's return to Egypt.
Study of the decree was already under way as the first full translation of the Greek text appeared in 1803. It was 20 years, however, before the decipherment of the Egyptian texts was announced by Jean-François Champollion in Paris in 1822; it took longer still before scholars were able to read other Ancient Egyptian inscriptions and literature confidently. Major advances in the decoding were: recognition that the stone offered three versions of the same text (1799); that the demotic text used phonetic characters to spell foreign names (1802); that the hieroglyphic text did so as well, and had pervasive similarities to the demotic (Thomas Young, 1814); and that, in addition to being used for foreign names, phonetic characters were also used to spell native Egyptian words (Champollion, 1822–1824).
Two other fragmentary copies of the same decree were discovered later, and several similar Egyptian bilingual or trilingual inscriptions are now known, including two slightly earlier Ptolemaic decrees (the Decree of Canopus in 238 BC, and the Memphis decree of Ptolemy IV, ca. 218 BC). The Rosetta Stone is therefore no longer unique, but it was the essential key to modern understanding of Ancient Egyptian literature and civilization. The term Rosetta Stone is now used in other contexts as the name for the essential clue to a new field of knowledge.

POVERTY IN THE PHILIPPINES(case study)

POIntroducti 

 English Project by Zena and Brian, March 6, 2008

(Poverty in the Philippines)

Is work, child's play?
Poverty in the Philippines(case study)

http://www.globaleducation.edna.edu.au/archives/secondary/casestud/philippines/2/child-lab.html


The Philippines, made up of a group of many islands, is a land of considerable beauty yet there are many contrasts. The country's wealth is not evenly distributed and a large percentage of the people live in poverty. In 1991, 40 percent of households lived in poverty. This has fallen to 32 percent in 1997 (World Bank, 2000). This still equates to millions of people living in urban slums or in rural areas that lack sanitation, safe water and other services that we take for granted. The challenge is to reduce poverty in light of a rapidly growing population.
Due to the poverty and lack of opportunities in rural areas, each year many people migrate to the cities looking for better economic opportunities. Most families are impoverished and children are often forced to earn an income. The types of jobs include selling items such as newspapers, cigarettes and lollies, or odd jobs such as car-washing, hauling or domestic work. Other possibilities include working in factories, construction sites, ports or small backyard industries, while some resort to scavenging or begging. The following are two examples of the lives of street and urban children in the Philippines.

Julie
Julie is a 10 year old girl who lives in Manila with her family. Julie's father is unemployed and her mother sells flowers in clubs near their home. Being the youngest of six children in her family, she has always accompanied her mother selling flowers from 10pm till 5am. Julie has been exposed to this lifestyle since she was five years old. Living in poverty has forced Julie to resort to the same job of selling flowers and key chains like her mother. Julie is exposed to drunks and street fighting as she sells her goods on the streets during the night.


 
Kids at tip
Children sifting through rubbish at the local tip.
Evelyn
Evelyn and her family migrated to Manila from the island of Samar when she was six years old. Evelyn, being the third of six children, came with her parents to Manila looking for better economic opportunities. Her father has irregular work as a jeepney driver while her mother is a market vendor. Evelyn and her older siblings were forced to work due to poverty and her parents unstable income.

Living conditions
Each year more people migrate from rural areas to the cities looking for better economic opportunities. Families come hoping that they can find a better lifestyle. Most have low education levels and lack marketable skills. Consequently they find it difficult to find ongoing stable employment. As a result they usually end up living in blighted areas.


 
Makeshift housing
Families rely on makeshift housing.
 
Under bridges, beside rivers, adjacent to landfills and near railways are just some examples of sites where these poverty stricken families may reside when they first come to the cities. Houses may be made from cloth, cardboard, corrugated iron, scrap wood, boxes, tarpaulins and rope. Living conditions are usually very poor, the areas are overcrowded, shelter is temporary and insubstantial and there can be a lack of basis needs such as water and sanitation. Access to health services is usually very poor or non-existent.

Impact on health
Children working on the streets are exposed to many hazards. Children who spend many hours working on the street are more susceptible to respiratory infections, pneumonia and other illnesses, and face a high risk of injury or death from motor vehicles. They can be used as accessories in drug deals, robberies, swindling and extortion. Some are even forced into child prostitution or other criminal activities.

Education
Street children often face difficulties in gaining an education and leaving the streets for the following reasons:
  • they have limited access to quality education available in the areas where they live and work;
  • irregular or low family incomes cannot cover the costs of school enrolment, uniforms and school projects; and
  • once enrolled in school, a high proportion of these children are forced to drop out, especially as school expenses rise in later years.
In the long term there is little chance of these children gaining meaningful employment, leaving the streets and breaking the cycle.

The Street and Urban Working Children Project
The Philippines' Government targeted street children and their parents as a vulnerable group that needed greater attention. In 1994 the Department of Interior and Local Government, with funding assistance from the Australian Government's overseas aid program, embarked on a five year project called The Street Children Nutrition and Education Project. Today this project continues as the Street and Urban Working Children Project.
The target group for this project are street and urban working children and their families. They are defined as:
  • children aged 5 to 17 years old;
  • children of urban impoverished families who spend a significant amount of time on the streets, usually not protected, supervised or cared for by responsible adults;
  • those who have adopted the streets for their living and/ or source of livelihood;
  • those who are street/community based and working, either in or out of school;
  • those who have already been taken away from the streets but still need continued rehabilitation and care.
It should be noted that the vast majority of street and urban working children do live at home with a family, however the time they spend with the family may be minimal.

Project strategies
It is 7am and the non government organisation (NGO) bus pulls up in one of the poorer neighbourhoods in Manila. They load up the bus with children to take to the Old Fortress for the day. Arriving at the fortress there is a large grassed area at the front set up with tables and chairs where the children will spend the day. They will do basic schooling, literacy and numeracy and take part in value formation classes. At the end of the day each child will take home 1.5kg of rice as an incentive to return.
This is an example of how the project works in one area of the Philippines. In other areas children participate in vocational training including some income generating activities with money being passed on to the children. The aim is to increase their skills for future paid employment when they are older.
Parents of these children are also encouraged by the rice incentive to attend value formation classes for adults. The content of these classes includes the importance of health and education, caring and nourishment for their children, family values and morals, and the importance of keeping the children off the streets.
For the whole family the hope is with education and training, there will be improved access to economic opportunities and to social services. The schooling, vocational training and interaction with the NGO are all hoped to generate an increased level of participation in the community and ultimately to keep the children from working on the streets.
Another objective of the project is construct social development centres in each Local Government Unit (LGU) to effectively deliver social services now and help sustain the project after its termination.

Street Children Nutritional and Education Project

  • The rice has increased school attendance and improved the quality of participation at school.
  • the rice provided sufficient incentive for parents to regularly attend value formation training programs.
  • over 6,100 children reduced the time spent on the streets by 20% or more, and more than 2,600 children had been drawn from the streets completely.

What is life like today for Julie and Evelyn?
Julie
Julie is a bright and diligent student who was given the opportunity to be part of the project receiving rice, school supplies and a school scholarship. Julie dreams of becoming a nurse, "to help her family and the poor and sick people". She believes her dream will come true with the assistance from the project. The rice assistance and school scholarships have inspired her to study harder.
Evelyn
Evelyn now receives regular supplies of rice which has enabled her to concentrate more on her studies. The rice assistance has supplemented the families food, allowing money that would have been spent on rice to be spent on school projects. Evelyn is an active and diligent student who excels in her class and is determined to finish her schooling, and become a teacher to serve the poor and special children like her.

Lunes, Mayo 23, 2011

                                my fira