GRPundit

In my hometown Silay, shabu (meth) was selling for P30 a packet. That's roughly HK$5, or 60 cents US. Tricycle drivers were using it to stay awake. Other folks used it as a substitute for coffee in menial yet laborious jobs, because, as our helpers would say to me, "'To Jam, indi ka na ya ka batyag kapoy" (you become impervious to fatigue when you use it). Our helpers live in a shanty neighborhood, and they were also telling me that many of their neighbors had gotten hooked on drugs. These are simple folk who live in houses made of flimsy material like plywood. Unlike those of us who live in well-fortified homes or gated communities, they don't have fences to keep drug-crazed thieves or worse outside of their homes. Imagine your daughters walking home through neighborhoods like that at night through dark, cramped alleys with all the drug pushers and junkies hovering around in plain sight, following them with their eyes. They did not feel safe at all, and tha...

There is definitely kid gloves treatment of adults in the Philippines. People do not learn to take care of themselves, and self-reliance is a foreign concept. It amazes me how many people there ask for a handout. The previous poster mentioned the babying being from Spanish culture. This may be true because Mexicans have a very similar culture; everything is done in family groups, and personal responsibility is not promoted. It is as if the individual does not matter. Financial upper-class individuals are often mal-adjusted, self-important people who have no sense of community or nationalism. These types are the ones on Wall Street (in the U.S.), who have no problem screwing millions of people out of their savings(banker bailout), because they were raised with the me, me, me attitude. Perhaps mandatory military service ought to be required in the Philippines, and elsewhere, to force allegiance to their country. It would also toughen them up. Actually, a boxing gym has this abili...

While Leni Robredo is “waiting for something to happen to the president”, she spends her time in numerous PR activities. Nothing new there, but today I saw a couple of pictures that bothered me. Here is Photo 1 , taken Aug 24, 2016 at the Jesse Robredo exhibit that was mounted in Gateway mall, a property owned by the family of Mar Roxas. Here is Photo 2 , taken Aug 29, 2016 at the launch of a Jesse Robredo book in Fully Booked BGC. What do you notice about these two photos? The design of the visuals is very reminiscent of the imagery associated with Philippine presidents. Photo 1 shows a classic “trooping of the guard” image. Photo 2 shows a book cover with a head bust that has a Philippine flag prominently displayed in the background. Does the late Jesse Robredo, as respected as he was, warrant this level of presidential imagery? Most of his political career was spent in Naga City. He occupied a national position for only about 3 years, as DILG secretary. But the w...

People who have seen enough in the business and corporate world know that sometimes the most effective performers are the ones who do not think or operate in the conventional, linear fashion that we have been trained to believe is the "right way". Recall how well-structured and well-oiled Noynoy Aquino's organization seemed to be. He had all these Ivy Leaguers working in his administration. Yet the bureaucracy grew so bad under Noynoy that we could not even get license plates for our cars or ID cards for our driver's licenses. Duterte, on the other hand, seems a lot less structured. But in 50 days, he, among other things, got rid of tanim-bala, rolled out the OFW one-stop shop, rolled out the 911 emergency hotline, reduced the processing time in several government offices, and brought the crime rate down by a significant percentage. Of course, his team is still a work in progress and I also hope they will address the administrative weaknesses you have pointed ou...

Thank goodness the people now know better. No amount of foreign bashers will sway the Filipino people. They try so hard to instill fear among the common people. As if to say that we should only now start fearing for lives since we could be the next target of the PNP or the vigilantes. Many yellow supporters would even condecendingly say, "kayong mga Dutertards, sana hindi mga mahal nyo sa buhay ang maging next casualty sa war on drugs." The people know better. They know what it was to fear for the lives of their sons and daughters who would commute everyday to and from school/work. Everyday we hear news and stories of young men getting holdupped, young women getting harassed or raped, kids being abused by their own family, students going missing, innocent citizens getting ran over by drunk/high drivers, and just the number of casualties by criminals. And everyday, we fear for the lives of our loved ones because of these experiences. The fear-mongering these foreigners and...

Many people have noticed over the past few days that the old yellow troll accounts on social media and the blogosphere have been reactivated. Someone is funding them again. Rappler and Inquirer are also now heavily censoring pro-Duterte comments on their websites. This made me realize something—the yellow media will never be fair to Duterte. Ever. The yellow media are a lost cause. It is time for the president's team to switch from a reactive approach to a proactive approach. The best way to counter the yellow media's black propaganda is not to keep trying to correct them (reactive), but to build a new communications infrastructure around President Duterte and his men that is completely independent of the yellow media (proactive). President Duterte is an easy sell. People always want to see him and know what he's doing. He has his own crowd-drawing power. With internet technology and access to government channels, it is not impossible to build a communications infra l...

As far as I can tell, the vast majority of drug users/pushers etc are not being summarily shot. The streets are not littered with corpses. There are no packs of feral policemen picking off drug addicts. I hear no gunshots at night, even though there are plenty of drug addicts wandering around my neighbourhood. I'm here on the ground, and whatever the newspapers are saying is clearly nonsense. As for those 700 who have (apparently) been executed, what of it? There are 8000 documented murders every year. You and I both know that most murders aren't even investigated here, so the true figure is probably in the tens of thousands. Most of them would have been ordinary people who upset the local criminal clans. And we're worried about 700 drug dealers? Thing is, the Philippines is not even close to being a functioning country. I've spent all my life living in civilized places, and when I came to the Philippines I quickly learned that what makes sense in those countries ...

It becomes more and more apparent that the opposition is driven rather by politics than by genuine concern for society. No better solution can even be guaranteed by the opposition and, yet here [we] are, prematurely guaranteeing basically this 'war on drugs' to be a failure? In the real world, 'wars' tend to be messy. [Many people's] arguments.. count casualties ascribed to police actions or operations, and yet are harmfully silent on how such numbers pale into insignificance as far as the number of lives ruined by the drug trade and woeful lack of priority the opposition has given this problem are concerned. The opposition-versus-Duterte is a picture of how hypocrisy-versus-sincerity, respectively, looks like–In fact, the previous administration has made the practice of hypocrisy so familiar that Duterte's sincerity stands-out so brightly as a breath of fresh air & welcome change! ------------------- This is a GRP Featured Comment. Join the discussi...

The best defense would be to FULLY expose the previous government and Aquino for all it's propaganda, corruption and stupid incompetence. Show the world that they enriched themselves with drug money. The Duterte admin knows far more than they are willing to expose. I say, go ALL the way. Show and expose how they fixed the election. Get rid of Robredo, De Lima and all that yellow human garbage that hinders progress. Lock up the people who have betrayed the public trust! Destroy the people who are behind the black propaganda and expose them as the traitors that they are. Show the world that there is a serious reason why this country needs a cleansing. I said it before and I'll say it again. Duterte will enter the International History books for how he became President and for what he is doing. The international establishment is scared of people like him being successful, because they do not want "outsiders" to win elections anywhere. What matters here is the p...

People were being killed before Duterte was elected; we just didn't hear about it, for obvious reasons. TIME magazine is a joke, and it cannot be taken seriously. America, and its mainstream, corporate hacks, will lecture other countries on various 'human' issues – but is friends with radical countries who have horrible civil liberties/ rights records. The U.S. likes to invade foreign, sovereign countries, which it has no right to do. The military is for defense, not imperial nation-building and other political bullshit. A prime example of un-American, imperial action was the Philippine-American War, circa 1898. The U.S. placed Filipinos in camps and murdered them. These imposter, traitorous frauds who conducted this action were fascists and not Americans. We have these same traitorous assholes now with the neocons (Bush, Clinton, Fox News types, Obama), who support the U.S. fucking with the middle east, and screwing with affairs in the Ukraine. Another example of U.S. ...

Notice how the TIME article compares the Philippines to other Southeast Asian countries on how similar our action was towards drugs. SEA countries are also very supportive of Duterte's War on Drugs. The West fails to realize that we had to resort to these types of drastic actions because our situation is a far cry from theirs (the West). Western countries had the privilege of being powerhouses since the dawn of time. SEA countries,on the other hand, had been conquered and raped repeatedly in the past by these same western powerhouses. And our countries had been trash ever since. As much as we want to have a "civil society" that's comparable to western society, we can't do so without taking drastic measures because we never had the privilege that western countries had. And yet, white nations are so adamant in pushing their "perfect" and "humane" ideologies towards us. Simply put, the west don't understand our situation. SEA countries d...

I agree that Filipinos should not care too much about the opinion of foreign media who know nothing about the realities on the ground and are obviously pursuing the agenda of foreign powers who want Duterte out because he refuses to be a puppet. But I also think Duterte's team should seriously look into what transpired this past week. What we saw here was a coordinated attack. New York Times, the Guardian, 60 Minutes Australia, Time magazine, BBC all came out with scathing one-sided pieces on Duterte one after the other, on the same week that Leila de Lima was staging her supposed senate investigation, and right on cue, Leni Robredo comes out and gives statements feigning concern about the negative news that Duterte's drug war is getting in the foreign press. This was a carefully orchestrated attempt to stoke the emotions of the populace. What these agitators didn't count on was that De Lima's senate hearings would totally backfire on her. I hope Communications Se...

Rishi Iyengar writes for Time magazine and graduated from Columbia University (according to his Twitter profile), but the way he argued his assertion that drugs are not really a serious problem in the Philippines is so amateurish that you would think a college intern wrote his article if you took away the Time logo and hid his "credentials". Consider what Iyengar wrote: "When it comes to illicit opioid use, the Philippine prevalence rate is just 0.05, compared to 5.41 in the U.S., and 3.30 in Australia. For cocaine, the Philippine figure is only 0.03. In the U.K., it is 2.40, in Australia 2.10 and in the U.S. also 2.10. "In other words, the statistics show what any visitor to the country may easily see: Filipinos are not degenerates, who need to be protected from themselves, but are mostly a nation of decent, sober, law-abiding and God-fearing people. The most revealing Philippine statistic is this: 37% of Filipinos attend church on a weekly basis. Less than 2...

Here's another example of how the Western media is being used to demonize Duterte, similar to how Marcos was demonized to build up the image of the Aquinos in the '80s: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-37172002 This BBC article is better than the one in Time magazine, but it makes one major flawed assumption: it is assuming that the "police officer" that the female hitman says is her boss is ordering the killings for Duterte. But there is no evidence anywhere in the article to support that. Think about this: why would Duterte hire hitmen and pay them P20,000 for each minor drug pusher killed? Duterte barely has enough budget to pay for the guns and bullets of the legitimate police and the AFP. On the other hand, who has the most to gain by having these small-time drug pushers killed? Who has the most to lose if they decide to surrender, or are caught by, the legitimate police? Who has the means and motivation to conclude that it makes better economic sense t...

Western media, especially Time magazine, was heavily used in the 1980s to build up the Aquino brand and to demonize Marcos. The same strategy is being applied on Duterte today. There's a recent article on Time written by a writer named Rishi Iyengar who should be sent back to journalism school. This guy wrote a report about Duterte and the war on drugs, and the main Philippine national government official he interviewed was—don't laugh—Senator Leila de Lima. Yes, believe it. He also included a token quote from PNP chief Bato de la Rosa, but only so he could depict the "closeness" of Bato to Duterte as some kind of blind loyalty to a mass murderer. Iyengar's main interviewee was Leila de Lima, the accused drug lord protector herself. Maybe Iyengar should also interview Lucifer about the Christian faith. Other minor interviewees of Iyengar among government officials: Mike Rama, the former mayor of Cebu who is also an accused drug coddler; and Chito Gascon, the d...

Saw the video of Leila de Lima's press conference today with Senate reporters whom she was feeding cake and pancit because her birthday is coming up. While she was denying Duterte's latest accusations against her, I was reminded of the time she defied a Supreme Court order and arrested the sick Gloria Arroyo at the airport years ago. I remember wondering at that time, what kind of person is capable of doing something like this? Even if, granting for the sake of argument, Arroyo was guilty, how can a government official—the Secretary of Justice, no less—flout a Supreme Court order so flagrantly, on live national TV, and not care about the consequences? People didn't know much about De Lima back then, but after all the revelations that have come out about her in the past days, and after hours of psychoanalysis with friends who are equally hooked on this teleserye, here's our theory on why De Lima is capable of extreme brazen acts. We call it the "AIDS"...

Speaking of yellow brand-building, there was an item in the news today that is a good case study on how the Yellow Ecosystem for Brainwashing the Masses operates. (What is the Yellow Ecosystem for Brainwashing the Masses? Read this... http://grpshorts.blogspot.com.au/2016/08/looking-into-propaganda-machine-of.html ) The CHR head, Chito Gascon, an old-time yellow lackey who was appointed by Noynoy to the CHR in 2015, said that charges of crimes against humanity can be filed at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for the "extra-judicial killings" that Gascon claims are being perpetrated by the Duterte administration. Observe how the Yellow Ecosystem played this out: 1. First, Gascon name-drops the ICC and UN as if he speaks for them, but he actually doesn't. The heads of the ICC and UN probably don't even know who he is. 2. Then, the yellow media (i.e. Rappler, ABS-CBN, Inquirer) spin Gascon's statement into a headline that sounds like it was the ICC it...

Many victims have died way before Duterte cast an eye towards the presidential seat. The have died in the hands of the police, in the hands of people seeking revenge, in the hands of mindless drug-addicts, even in the hands of politicians. The situation here in the Philippines has never been normal. Our culture is abnormal. So many people here are willing to cheat or kill just to get what they want. From taxi drivers all the way up to politicians, they are all willing to cheat everyone for their advantage. Now I don't condone all the killings done under the current administration, but don't expect people to suddenly give a crap about alleged criminals dropping dead. No one – not the politicians, not the CHR, not the activists – did anything major to deal with innocent victims dying everyday in this country. Only the rich, the powerful, and a handful of middle class citizens received justice when they were greatly wronged. So why should the common people now have to care tha...

Naming the airport after the Aquinos (as well as roads, schools, "awards", putting their faces on P500 bill, etc.) is a classic tactic of yellow brand-building. They are doing the same thing now with Leni Robredo, trying to legitimize her by arranging for her to be given "awards", visited by "dignitaries", interviewed by this and that on anything and everything, so her existence will have some kind of relevance. They need to do this because Robredo has no real, concrete achievements or track record that they can play up. She does not even have a real electoral mandate or fan base. I suspect this is why the US has not gone all out in their efforts to prop up Robredo. The "awards" she has been getting are from minor, insignificant organizations. Perhaps the US also sees that even if they succeed in installing her as president, she won't last because she has no real following and no crowd-drawing pull. With the amount of praise and mileage the...

"Extrajudicial killings" is defined by law as killings due to the political affiliation of the victims; having a specific method of attack; and where there are reports of involvement or acquiescence of state agents in the commission of the killings. As the term is used in international instruments, extrajudicial killings are killings committed without due process of law, i. e. without legal safeguards or judicial proceedings. Enforced disappearance on the other hand is defined as deprivation of liberty for political reasons committed by or with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State. These are disappearances or abductions attended by an arrest, abduction, or detention of a person by a government official or organized groups or private individuals acting with the direct or indirect acquiescence of the government. It involves the refusal of the State to disclose the fate or whereabouts of the person concerned or a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of l...

Just watched Day 2 of Senate hearing. Tables were turned once again on De Lima, without any effort it seems from the PNP or Duterte's senate allies. This must really be karma at work, or Duterte's magic is really strong. De Lima opened the session by saying she had asked ABS-CBN, Inquirer, and GMA 7 to submit their "kill list" databases and methodology for compiling the lists. However, only GMA 7 submitted. Strange. If those lists were being prepared properly, shouldn't these media groups have their databases and methodology on hand at any time? Or were those lists haphazardly done? Sandra Cam showed up in the middle of the hearing and sat directly behind De Lima. But Cam disappeared after a while, so viewers were not treated to scratching and hair-pulling. A group of women wearing dark glasses, masks, and headscarfs sat in a row on one area–I don't know why De Lima made them dress like jihadist terrorists, but they were her witnesses. (No offense mean...

Just finished watching Day 1 of De Lima's senate hearing on "extra-judicial killings". It was very informative, but I think not in the way De Lima expected. If her goal was to discredit Duterte's war on drugs, I think it may have backfired because the two witnesses she presented ended up confirming many of the things Duterte has been saying. The first witness was a woman whose live-in partner and his father were killed. The second witness was a woman whose mother and father were killed. 1. Both Witness 1 and Witness 2 confirmed that all the slain victims—yes, ALL, including the dead parents—had a history of selling drugs, and only planned to stop after Duterte won the election. Witness 1 actually stressed several times that "si Noynoy pa ang presidente" when her slain live-in partner was actively dealing drugs. I don't think De Lima meant to include this in her script. 2. Both Witness 1 and Witness 2 confirmed that the killings took place just be...

The problem with the "disente" crowd (i.e. Mar Roxas, Risa Hontiveros, Winnie Monsod, wannabe hangers-on like Leni Robredo and Leila de Lima etc) and their oligarch backers is that they only care about themselves and about appearances. Notice how the words they use to criticize Duterte like "unpresidential" and "foul-mouthed" are all premised on some form of pakitang-tao. It's like they don't care that the guy has cut processing times at government offices, given OFWs a one-stop shop, significantly lowered the crime rate after less than 2 months in office. They just fixate on how he talks, his broken English, his bombastic demeanor, and fret "oh, what will the world think of us?" Mas importante pa ba ang iniisip ng UN at ng mga ambassador at mga foreign media kaysa opinyon at kapakanan ng mamamayang Pilipino? Even the very use of the word "disente" by this oligarch-backed group as their tagline reeks of condescension and d...

Duterte's obsession with destroying the vast network of the illegal drugs industry–even it means resorting to violent means—is right on the money, since their influence affects all levels of society. However, illegal drugs' immediate impact is most felt on everyday people like you and me: they keep us in a continuous state of confusion, vigilance, and disparity on how to keep their influence out of our doorsteps through their sale and use. Our country's oligarchs know very well that, in order to keep society in a constant state of delirium while they fleece the country's wealth, they have to keep the people pre-occupied on how to eke out a living and entertained with brainwashing methods every single moment of the day. Injecting our society with mind numbing propagandas (media "tele-basura" programs), rampart consumerism, and sale and use of illegal drugs are all effective strategies the oligarchs employ to take the masses' attention away from what t...

I just watched De Lima's latest presscon denying the allegations against her, and even threatening Duterte to "stop, or be sorry". She said to the president, "Ayaw kong mapahiya kayo", claiming that whatever evidence he has against her is fake. Now I'm even more convinced that whatever intel Duterte has on her must be really damaging. You know why? Because if the info was really fake, De Lima would have waited for Duterte to expose it first, then debunked it after, to make him look bad. But instead, she's pretending to be concerned for the president and "advising" him kuno. Big red flag right there. De Lima's presscon was long and full of dramatic statements, but there were no specifics. She did not even have any response to the specific accusations Sandra Cam made against her. So what was De Lima's real motive for holding this presscon? I think she did it to try and gain sympathy again and paint Duterte as the bad guy. She po...

I just want to comment on this "misogynistic" tag that "feminists" are trying to pin on Duterte because he exposed De Lima's affair with her driver. As I understand it, feminism is about gender equality, not discriminating against a person or treating them differently because of their gender. So what is the problem? Why are feminists saying that Duterte should not have challenged De Lima because she is a woman? Isn't equal treatment what feminists want? Why then do these feminists want Duterte to treat De Lima with kid gloves just because she is a woman? I also don't buy the argument that Duterte's expose about De Lima and her driver was a personal attack. Duterte is way off the charts when it comes to non-conformity with traditional social norms and sexual mores. I don't think he would have cared if De Lima was sleeping with a thousand drivers if said drivers were not connected to criminal acts or the war on drugs. This is not about De L...