ADHD nation?

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/24/2013

Daily Tribune

The country has just gone through one of the worst roller-coasters of its stock market, along with a half-day's rain that produced one of the worst flash floods along the main avenues of its premier metropolis that had commuters and drivers pulling their hair. But, in a snap — as if nothing happened — almost the entire nation turned to television and spent several days rapt in the US basketball match-up between the Miami Heat and the San Antonio Spurs. Is the Filipino nation just that easily distracted or is this symptomatic of a wider, national ADHD — Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder?

Such scatter-brained response is not mere occasional occurrence; it's a weekly, daily, even hourly, jumpiness in focus and activity — one moment hysterical over one crisis or another and the next laughing or crying with the latest sports, celebrity, or disaster spectacle — which must be one reason why this nation is going nowhere at all in solving its problems.

It was late last week that I first noticed this mania for the Heat vs Spurs. My sons were grabbing the remote from me, switching to the games, while I struggled to follow the latest developments in Syria and the Bernanke "tapering" of QE (quantitative easing) that has caused near Armageddon in the local and regional markets. This last one was really serious for some sectors of the economy as the Philippine Stock Exchange index lost at least P420 billion over the past weeks. Syria, and the US decision to arm the Free Syrian Army and its terrorist allies today, is like Poland in 1939 when Hitler invaded it — the event which many historians trace the beginnings of the Second World War to.

If these developments may be too far from the realities of Filipinos, let's look at issues closer to home, such as the triple whammy announcement of hikes in power, water, and Metro Rail Transit/Light Rail Transit fares. These threatened rate hikes are only the latest in a decade of increases, in the face of shrinking real values of the peso and people's wages and earnings, and one of the root causes of dwindling industries and the commensurately worsening unemployment and underemployment situation. We've been tracking these issues that are crying out for the people's attention, action and solution; but it's impossible to make them focus on these beyond a few days' stretch.

If it were only the tier of society that my sons count themselves in, i.e. the generation Y crowd of the middle to upper-middle class, maybe we don't have so much to worry about; but in the middle of last week when I sat around a table of pre-War and Baby Boomer generation folks, the discussion was also about the same games and who was betting on which team. When I made the point that the NBA (National Basketball Association) is an unnecessary distraction for a poor nation that's getting poorer, the septuagenarian became even more emphatic in analyzing the moves of the Heat's star player LeBron James. I was outnumbered all to one.

Late last week one mainstream newspaper, allegedly the largest in circulation, headlined on its Internet edition the sex scandal allegations surrounding Philippine embassies in the Middle East in the so-called "sex for fly" deal. But right below, it was the "James Yap posts Instagram photo with rumored girlfriend" bit. Is this to be the next frenzied focus of the Filipino people next, along with the probable dalliances of Mr. Yap's controversial ex?

I remembered then, just before I noticed the seemingly ADHD symptoms on the Filipino nation jumping about on the NBA games, the newspapers and mainstream media in general had also been headlining the seesawing games in the series. Now we know what the trigger for the ADHD symptoms of the Filipino national psyche is — the headlines of the mainstream media that broadcast media mindlessly repeat and re-echo from morning until night.

I raised this matter with my two NBA fixated sons and pounded on them that these distractions mainstream media are always triggering are not healthy for the country. My journalist son retorted, "Haven't you thought that the reason the Filipino is so easily distracted is that he wants to forget those problems?"
If that is how we as a people deal with life's difficulties, then we'll never ever get to solve anything. Clearly, that is where the Filipino people are at. Sad but true.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m., this week on "MRT, power, water rate hikes again"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

TPP: The pivot to the Pacific (Part II)

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/19/2013

Daily Tribune

While the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) started with economic light- to middleweights in 2005, it expanded in 2009 with one heavyweight, the US of A. Since then, it has added to its fold other light- to heavyweights (Canada, Mexico, Australia, Malaysia and Vietnam) to the exclusion of other major economic heavyweights.

Absent from the TPP process were China, Russia, Brazil and India, the countries that form the core of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) economic alliance representing 25 percent of the world's trade.
Song Guoyou, an Associate Professor of the School of International Relations, Shanghai Fudan University, points out that "the current TPP member countries in negotiation are mainly military allies of the US, which demonstrates the fact that the US 'has followed its traditional pattern of choosing FTA partners—offering priorities to its military allies.'"

The exclusion of China and the major BRICS countries have led to conclusions, such as this published in a London news site, World Outline, entitled "Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP): Bad news for Brazil and China?" last April 6: "…the TPP aims to go beyond existing trade agreements, such as … Apec (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) and Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), and create a single market … This single market … is likely to have implications to trade flows in America and Asia as a whole, and alter the 'Asia pivot' … The TPP has been designed to become a key source of sustained growth by guaranteeing new markets for American products, and assist in the US economic recovery … It could also become a tool for containing and undermining Chinese economic power in the Asia-Pacific region.

"By providing these strategic partners with incentives to concentrate on trade relations amongst each other, the TPP is likely to diminish the dependence of certain countries on Chinese goods. It is worth noticing that in times of tensions between China and Japan and between China… the Philippines, Vietnam, etc. … having a tool to diminish Chinese economic power in the region and the diversification of partners could represent a … foreign policy approach… On the Latin American side of the TPP … Brazil has been investing massively toward infrastructure programs designed to integrate the region and to facilitate the transport of goods and services among its neighbors… By providing promising trade alternatives… the TPP could also represent a challenge for Brazil … Having other partners to assist in the regional development could also diminish Brazil's role as the regional paymaster."

Professor Cai Penghong, director of Apec Research Center, Shanghai Academy of Social Science, expressed what may be the bottom line of the Chinese response: "…if I am asked to give a word of advice to President of China about the TPP access, I would not like to suggest China to submit an application at this moment... First, we are still wondering the real American intention. It is natural for (the) Obama administration to pursue a double trade in five years and (address) the job issue but a question still remains about its geopolitical intention. It seems that US is using the TPP as a tool as part of its Asia Pacific strategy to contain China … Second… it is unbelievable that the TPP negotiation activities are secretly conducted and non-members feel hard to assess what will happen. TPP is on the track of Apec regional integration process but APEC members know nothing. Third, it seems (to be) a trend that trade issues have been politicized…"

As reported by Peter Hirschberg, Russia is cool to the TPP. Its Economy Minister, speaking before the Apec Summit in Vladivostok in 2012, even stated that his country didn't think the TPP agreement among about a dozen Asia-Pacific countries would be concluded in the "near future."

Russia is clearly putting priority and emphasis on continuing the strengthening of the Apec. South Korea, despite its military alliance with the US, seems to want to steer clear of the US-dominated TPP for the meantime. Its Trade Minister Bark Taeho said, "We have to sit and analyze what kind of level TPP is aiming for … At a later stage, between an East Asian pact and the Trans-Pacific pact, we want to (play) some role in merging these together…" The East Asia Pact is amongst China, Japan and South Korea.

The TPP is clearly a US move for its corporate pillars to outflank China and the BRICS in trade, and a parallel instrument for the US military's "Asia pivot."
If it's a truism that a multipolar world is better for the community of nations, the reconsolidation of US economic, financial, and trade power, if successful, would be deleterious to its welfare. However, it is highly unlikely that the US and its TPP can succeed as the US and its economic allies, i.e. Europe and Japan, can hardly provide for all the needs of the world today.

Other countries are unlikely to be fully enthusiastic with the TPP, such as South Korea with its huge trade with China and Latin American countries associated with Venezuelan-led ALBA (Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America). For the Asia-Pacific region, Apec will still be the main driver for growth and prosperity.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m.; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

TPP: Trans-Pacific Partnership or Privatization?

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/17/2013

Daily Tribune

It started in 2005 as a nondescript free trade agreement among Brunei, Chile, New Zealand and Singapore to liberalize the economies of the Asia-Pacific region. How these four small economies had the ambition to even dare chart the economic course of the large expanse of the Asia-Pacific is still a mystery to us.
In fact, the question as to who among the four initiated it was not even answered in the annals of the then Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (TPSEP or P4), the precursor to today's Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), where the number of participants has since expanded, with the United States grabbing the driver's seat beginning in 2009.

From 2010 to 2012, aside from the original four countries, plus the US, Australia, Canada, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru and Vietnam also became actively involved.
Japan, too, expressed interest to participate in the TPP talks of 2012, only to soon spark contentious division in the country as the TPP was expected to force the lifting of protections enjoyed by the country's heavily-subsidized agricultural industry. Japan was not the first to face opposition to joining the TPP talks; Canada's conservative government faced it as well from its protected dairy, egg, and poultry farmers under a system of "supply management" that regulates supply and shields Canadian producers from foreign competitors through tariffs ranging from 150 percent to 300 percent.

But nowhere was the fear and loathing of the TPP more evident than in the people of the TPP driver itself, the people of the USA — many of whom had seen their industries and jobs dwindle under the regime of free trade instituted by the World Trade Organization (WTO) as well as the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta), which outsourced US industries and jobs.

US opposition to the TPP indeed raises critical issues against this newest US-led free trade agreement. Among the most vocal and effective critics are Kevin Zeese, one of the leaders of Occupy Wall Street, and the Web site, Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). Foremost among their rabid objections: 1) TPP negotiations are held in secrecy and details are withheld from the US Congress; 2) secret TPP deals, if approved by the US Senate and the President, "will override American laws in many areas"; 3) TPP will be negotiated by giant corporate interests thereby granting them veto over a country's ability to set many laws and regulations, e.g., intellectual property rights, patents and copyrights, financial services, investment and land use, service-sector rules, food and product safety, labor, environmental standards, as well as ban government-led "buy national products" laws.

On the secrecy of the negotiations, this report from Nile Bowie in CRG is significant: "One of the least discussed and least reported issues is the Obama Administration's effort to bring the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement to the forefront, an oppressive plurilateral US-led free trade agreement currently being negotiated with several Pacific Rim countries, including Malaysia. Six hundred US corporate advisors have negotiated and had input into the TPP, and the proposed draft text has not been made available to the public, the press, or policymakers. "The level of secrecy surrounding the agreements is unparalleled — paramilitary teams scatter outside the premise of each round of discussions while helicopters loom overhead — media outlets impose a near-total blackout of reportage on the subject and US Senator Ron Wyden, the Chair of the Congressional Committee with jurisdiction over TPP, was denied access to the negotiation texts."

One of the most perilous secret items being discussed in the TPP talks that has come to the knowledge of the questioning publics in various countries is the "investor–state arbitration" that will permit foreign investors in the territory of a party or country to submit a claim to arbitration under the arbitral rules of either the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes or the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law. Tribunals are composed of three arbitrators, one appointed by the investor, one by the state, and the third usually chosen by agreement between the parties or their appointed arbitrators, or selected by the appointing authority. The investor thus becomes equal to the state and to the people of a country while the national judicial systems and courts where citizens of a party or a country rely on will become irrelevant.

In this regard, popular US opposition to the TPP has focused on the participation of over 600 corporate representatives in contrast to the zero participation derived from human rights, environmental, civil rights, or worker rights organizations. Clearly, as the US government's initiative in the TPP disregards the concerns of its people, it is only pro-US insofar as it is pro-US corporations.

Dave Johnson, a Fellow of the Campaign for America's Future, makes the case in his article "Upcoming TPP looks like a corporate takeover" that "The TPP negotiations should not just be negotiated to serve the interests of giant multinational corporations. The process should be opened up to the public and democracy, so people and groups with a huge stake in the outcome … can participate … We also need strong tests and irrevocable language about withdrawing from the agreement if it is harming our economy, environment, smaller businesses, tax base and/or our working people." (More on Wednesday.)

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m. on "Mon-Satan, the GMO evil"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

Aliens over our rural banks II

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/12/2013

Daily Tribune

In our last column we reported the very quiet passage of RepublicAct (RA) 10574, which opens Philippine rural banks to 60 percent foreign ownership, signed into law by BS Aquino last May 24. A former head of a rural bank association in the country whom I interviewed sounded the alarm that foreign interests with ominous intentions will now gain not only a foothold but control of the grassroots credit network of rural banks, allowing them to push programs that may be totally harmful to the Philippine economy and Filipino people, such as those of US food giant Monsanto, which can fast track the insertion of genetically modified organism seeds and ancillary products such as pesticides and fertilizers into our food chain. This law will ultimately prove immensely deleterious to the nation, especially for future generations.

Moreover, Philippine rural banks suddenly found themselves undercapitalized when the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) introduced new rules under Basel III imposing higher capital requirements for all banking institutions the world over. The BIS has been severely criticized in the past for failing to monitor or anticipate the crises that arose from abuses committed by global banking and financial institutions of their financial powers and businesses, such as the Wall Street collapse in 2008 which caused the financial armageddon still bedeviling the US and European economies. The BIS has detractors aplenty, including US law scholar, economics researcher, and public banking advocate Ellen Brown, who wrote the article, "The Tower of Basel," which likens the BIS abuse of power, arrogance and corruption to the Biblical story of the Tower of Babel, at the same time exposing the international body's plan to issue and control the global currency.

A global currency to replace the US dollar today may be a relished prospect for many, but does anybody (except the global bankers) believe in having a band of secretive, elitist, unelected and unaccountable powers, such as the BIS, define and control such a global currency? For most Filipinos who invariably don't know a thing about how their peso is controlled, much less manipulated, by alien elements, these issues do not matter. For this reason, the Philippine economy is one of the most badly victimized by the global currency manipulators. Every cycle of Philippine economic collapse has been precipitated by massive currency devaluations caused by global manipulations — from the decontrol by Diosdado Macapagal in the 1950s, which destroyed our incipient industrialization, to the 1970s devaluation that collapsed the Lopez empire, as well as the 1997-1998 Asian Financial Crisis.

Back to RA 10574 or the Foreign Equity bill allowing 60 percent voting stocks ownership of Philippine rural banks by foreign interests, one rural bank association official said, "Now that foreign investments are allowed, rural banks are… in a better financial position to reach out and serve both the unbanked and under-banked through improved banking services." But the fact that stares at anyone who cares to open his eyes is, the Philippines, along with its banking system, is awash with cash, which only needs to be redirected by Philippine financial and banking authorities to rural banks. This is evidenced by the repeated headlines in the business papers, such as "Cut in SDA rate seen to be just a matter of time," which means the further reduction of interest rates, from four percent just months ago to two percent today and even lower in the weeks ahead, for the P2-trillion Special Deposit Account (SDA) with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.

What is the BIS' role in this? It's none other than to raise the equity requirements for all banks in the world under its aegis. Rich and powerful countries such as China would have no problem with it as they are awash with cash and are still able to retain control over their currency while maintaining public ownership and management of all major financial and banking institutions. For Philippine rural banks, however, no matter how well run, the requirement simply compels them to look for new sources of equity. Basel III is a key to pushing small rural banking systems of many Third World countries to control by foreign funds. What can and will surely follow is the rape of their economies.

The crafters of RA 10574 must have done their homework on how to justify the 60 percent foreign ownership of rural banks, which still ought to be subject to the constitutional provision protecting Filipino control; but we'll do our part now with pro bono lawyers to examine the constitutionality of this law.
Slowly but surely, the Philippines is coming under the New World Order run from the centers of Western finance (i.e. the City of London; Basel, Switzerland; Wall Street), under the direction of the unelected and unelectable oligarchs of money and power circles, e.g., the Bilderberg Group (whose last meeting at Grove Hotel, Hertfordshire, England on June 9, came complete with a no-fly zone).

But that should no longer come as a surprise since everything in the Philippines, from the top — its president, the entire banking system — down to the grassroots level (rural banks), is being unquestioningly placed under the control of those whom financial critic Max Keiser calls the global financial "banksters."

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m. on "Mon-Satan, the GMO evil"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

Aliens over our rural banks

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/10/2013

Daily Tribune

While countless half-conscious thinking Filipinos (most of whom are not even thinking anymore) were being distracted by the antics of self-serving senators dramatizing their "sacrifices" for principles and country, countless more foreign exploiters continued to extract their pound of flesh from the Malacañang occupant whom they conspired to boost to power in 2010 through the Smartmatic Hocus-PCOS (precinct count optical scan) machines.

So, as expected, BS Aquino delivered fast on many items on these foreign interests' wish list. The earliest was the implementation of the value-added tax (VAT) on toll fees, put off by PeNoy's predecessor Gloria Arroyo for five years after the forced passage in 2005 of the so-called rVAT (deformed, not reformed).
Lately, we again picked up one little known concession to these aliens that managed to creep surreptitiously through Congress but has now suddenly turned into law, reportedly allowing foreigners 60-percent ownership of Philippine rural banks.

That law was signed by BS Aquino on May 24. When I called my rural banker-friends about this, their reactions confirmed my worst fears. A former head of a rural bank association in the country has sounded off the alarm that foreign interests with ominous intentions will now gain not only a foothold but control of the grassroots credit network of rural banks, allowing them to push programs that may be totally unhealthy for the Philippine economy and the Filipino people.
One example he cited has to do with control of rural financing and its access to farmers. Under the new law, foreign companies such as Monsanto can now fast track their insertion of genetically modified organism seeds and ancillary products such as pesticides and fertilizers into our food chain that will ultimately prove immensely harmful to the nation, especially for future generations that may be irreversibly damaged by these perilous products, which countless other countries are already rejecting today.

I picked up the information about BS Aquino's signing of RA 10574 from one of the dozen or so foreign newspaper columnists spread throughout print media. This one I read from Ben Kritz of The Manila Times, who described the law BS Aquino signed allowing majority foreign control of Philippine rural banks as "Only a gesture, but a welcome one." Kritz is a very good business writer and I have quoted him once before when his view of the Fitch's and other ratings upgrades supported the correct view (which I have been impressing on the Filipino public's mind) that these are just come-ons to get the Philippines to borrow more without really being investment-drivers. This new item from him, though, reflects the core mission of all foreign columnists in our mainstream and second line print media — advancing foreign access into and control of the Philippine economy.

Kritz describes the Philippine rural banking sector as "troubled." Yet those troubles would not be there if not for the unhelpful policies of the Western—controlled international banking community and institutions. The most recent imposition on the Philippine rural banking system comes all the way from Basel, Switzerland via the Basel III Accord around supposedly "global, voluntary regulatory standard on bank capital adequacy, stress testing and market liquidity risk… agreed upon by the members of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision in 2010 to 2011… scheduled to be introduced from 2013 until 2015…"

Basel III supposedly strengthens bank capital requirements by increasing bank liquidity and leverage. But as a consequence, the vast majority of Philippine rural banks (no matter how well and professional these are run) are finding themselves undercapitalized.
Basel is the base for the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). What emanates from it has come to be known at Basel I, II, and now III. It's also known as the central bank of central banks. While few even know of this body, it rules with the power of life and death over hundreds of millions of people.
In the great, voluminous book by historian and theorist on the evolution of civilization, Dr. Carroll Quigley "Tragedy and Hope: A History of Our Time," he writes of the international bankers behind the BIS:

"I know of the operations of this network because I … was permitted … to examine its papers and secret records. I have no aversion to it or to most of its aims and have, for much of my life, been close to it and to many of its instruments… The powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations." (Continued on Wednesday.)

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m. on "Mon-Satan, the GMO evil"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 0923-4095739)

Our smiling coast guard

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/5/2013

Daily Tribune

Our May 20 column, "Strike three: Noy's out," dwelt on the incidents involving the Philippines that have roiled the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. The latest of these was, of course, the Balintang mishap where a Taiwanese fisherman was killed by the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG).

In the ensuing tit-for-tat of charges, the PCG claimed it had a video that would vindicate it. That video, I wrote, should have been released to the public posthaste so as to spare all the great acrimony in the quest to find a quick resolution to the conflict. To this day, the public is still kept in the dark even as the said video has been turned over to Taiwanese authorities for examination.

Not surprisingly, leaks of what the Taiwanese saw later surfaced, with reports saying that the PCG gunmen were gleefully laughing while firing at the Taiwanese fishing boat. The PCG, as expected, defended itself a day later. Strangely, though, it did so only by saying that "smiling" is not laughing--as if that would mitigate the appalling implications of its alleged trigger-happiness.

Taiwan and RP's "parallel investigations" may be holding off the video showing for now; but the longer it is kept from the public, the more damage it does. In defending what certain people believe is our coastal protection force's action, answering an eye-for-an-eye Taiwanese vituperations, such as when the flag burning in Taiwan was answered by retired police super-patriot Abner Afuang's Taiwanese flag burning in Manila, flag-waving has now deteriorated into xenophobia.

On Philippine TV discussions, even the brightest Filipino analysts fall into chauvinism in describing Taiwan as a "puny island" while claiming that the PCG only grazed the fishing boat, despite pictures clearly showing dozens of puncture holes (and despite the fact that one fisherman was indeed killed).

The morning of the report of the PCG commander's hair-splitting between "smiling" and "laughing," my youngest son, the journalist, chuckled, "As if 'smiling' would make a difference." I lamented the embarrassment Filipinos will face once the video that portrays the PCG treating the deadly business of strafing a fishing boat with frivolity is finally shown to one and all.

I fault many of our countrymen for using simplistic patriotism to deliberately blind themselves to the facts of the case--that a Taiwanese fisherman was killed; that there were more than enough bullets fired and holes left as evidence; and that there is incoherence in the PCG's story, enough to question its version of events. For many, it is a case of "My country right or wrong."

"But shouldn't that be the case?" my son retorted. His mother almost chimed in to agree but held her tongue probably after a quick second thought. I certainly made myself very clear: That never should the concept of "country" be above what is morally correct--for nations have a greater duty. That greater duty is to human civilization built stone by stone on truth and justice. How else does civilization improve itself?

The reason the US of A is today in irredeemable socio-economic-political crisis is because it has lost its moral moorings after getting intoxicated with unlimited power upon achieving victory in the Cold War. Thus, to maintain its power, the US persecutes men of conscience, such as Iraq whistleblower Sgt. Bradley Manning and info freedom champions like Julian Assange; tortures prisoners without being held by any charge in Gitmo; and kills innocents all over with its drones.

While the US is going to the dogs, the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) nation-states are setting the moral standard of multipolarism, non-aggression, and peaceful coexistence. They are also setting up the multibillion financial BRICS bank to aid developing nations while leading the struggle to neutralize US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) aggression.

BRICS countries are vastly improving the lives of their citizens while US and Western societies crumble, with their people impoverished as their ruling classes prosper like never before in history.

The Philippines as a US appendage will only suffer worse social crises and collapse, as its elite amasses fortunes at the expense of the nation's future. Taiwan, for all its faults, takes care of its people. Thus, the life of a single, aging fisherman is still valuable to its leaders.

In the Philippines today, children abandoned by their mothers (and their government) graze the streets with empty stomachs--this, in a nation of 20 million hungry people where police kill police, students commit suicide for lack of tuition, and the ruling elite constantly lie to the people. You'll find hardly any of these in Taiwan.

And as Taiwanese fishermen work hard fishing in overlapping RP-Taiwan economic zones, Filipino fishermen don't fish there as their country's capitalists and government do nothing to provide financing.

Many things are terribly wrong in Philippine society---the reason the country relies on Taiwan for jobs for 89,000 Filipinos.

So let's stop blaming others. Let's seriously look at the truths about our country. For starters, here's one truth we should face squarely: Some PCG bosses are paid P200,000 per Taiwanese fishing boat for the right to fish on the Balintang Channel. Such deals are made in a small hotel along Roxas Blvd. convenient for the PCG's top brass. Clearly, it may no longer be easy to smile after this.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN Destiny Cable Channel 8, Saturday, 8:00 p.m. and replay Sunday, 8 a.m. on "Mon-Satan, the GMO evil"; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com; and text reactions to 09234095739)

The election economy

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

6/3/2013

Daily Tribune

The NSCB (National Statistical Coordination Board) report on the "fantastic" 2013, 1st quarter. Gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 7.8 percent attributes the growth to "manufacturing, construction and consumer spending." But what is the fountainhead contributing to all these three sectors? Was there a great surge in production of some goods, commodities exported or a great surge in employment generation that formerly jobless Filipinos started earning income to splurge in three months? Some enthused about "the good news," columnist BSA (not Aquino) who wrote, "Best of all, we just beat China's 7.7 percent growth and Indonesia's 6 percent and Thailand's 5.3 percent growth. This was quite unexpected because the National Economic Development Authority (Neda) expected only a six or seven percent growth." How shallow, I thought.

Like the "fantastic" 7.9 percent growth rate in 2010 Gloria Arroyo apologists, like former Greece ambassador, wrote about and cited in pooh-poohing BSA III's earlier 2012 boast of 6.6 percent GDP: "… on track to restoring the growth of 7.9 percent she attained…" Both Arroyo and Aquino share one thing — pambobola, both think all Filipinos are fools like that columnist comparing the growth rates of China, Thailand and Indonesia to this latest Philippine growth data. Gloria and PeNoy's "fantastic" growth rates are both based on "election campaign spending" which does not produce anything except inflation and neither does it produce jobs needed by the hordes of Filipino unemployed. Around 45,000 candidates for senator to local councilman spent untold billions that boosted consumption by 33 percent.

This year's public works election period ban started on May 29, hence the first quarter government public works splurge figured heavily in the boost. Much of these naturally went into the income stream of temporary construction workers which also boosted the consumer spending. Thus, the 33 percent rise in consumer spending claimed by the NSCB is not surprising, but hardly any of these are "real" growth that can be considered productive, sustainable and jobs generating. Now, how can one compare these with the rise in genuine production of goods for China (the world's factory), Thailand (which still produces MPV such as vans and pick-ups, while RP doesn't even produce its own paper clip) and Indonesia exports oil. One real statistics that should worry RP is this: Just two days before the GDP hype the business headlines blared — 7.4 percent drop in imports.

For the Philippines' import dependent export industry sector the drop in imports is an indicator of slowing exports such as microchips and other electronic goods. Then, a day after the GDP hype the PSEi (Philippine Stock Exchange index) dropped by 4 percent or the second largest one day drop in PSEi's history. What do the two BSAs say about these? If I am very hard on these two BSAs and their deliberate or simply ignorantly innocent misleading of the reading the GDP figures it is because their shallow and distorting interpretation of the performance causes the Filipino public's mind to be befuddled with wrong notions about what constitutes real economic growth. Even more demeaning is their shallow braggadocio about beating the other countries, a bragging right that has never been earned.

My GNN TV show last Saturday night serendipitously featured the topic "BSP losses, Jobless GDP" and my guests Dr. Rene Ofreneo, business forensics Hiro Vaswani and Solidarity Economic's advocate Ben Quinones, had a field day discussing the GDP claims and the real situation of the economy. What stood out in the discussion was Ofreneo's reference to the "enabling environment" of industrialization that simply isn't present, citing the exorbitant power costs in the country. There was unanimity in this. All recalled the Golden Age of incipient R.P. industrialization during Central Bank Mike Cuaderno's time of "currency and capital controls" and the monetary finance of Tetangco today generating losses.

Final conclusion: no real GDP growth without industrialization, but Neda is still keeping RP OFW, BPO and failing exports dependency. Some "Filipino" businessmen of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry are pushing for economic legislation "… to relax some restrictions in the entry of foreign capital and in the practice of certain professions ….to attract more investments…. also ….to raise the cap on foreign ownership of industries from 40 percent." RP economic managers have depended on "foreign investments" for decades and all they can show for it is still the "sick man of Asia." If foreign investors, especially Western, were so good then their own countries wouldn't be in such crises. What is absent in our national economic discourse is "re-nationalization" of basic utilities and industries to enable the revival of manufacturing for "import substitution" and jobs generation. Election economics we need like a hole in the head.

(Tune to 1098AM, 5 to 6 p.m., Tuesday to Friday; Destiny Cable, Channel 8, Saturday 8 p.m. and Sunday 8 a.m.: this week "Mon-satan, the GMO evil"; visit: http//www.newkatipunero.blogspot.com; reactions can be texted to: 09234095739)

Law of Large Numbskulls

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

5/29/2013

Daily Tribune

I don't look into the details of the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) election shenanigans anymore, but I'm glad others like the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) Watch, US based Filipino journalist Ado Paglinawan, the Philippine Computer Society and many others are still scrutinizing the minute details of Comelec and Brillantes' transgressions.

I had long concluded that Philippine elections are circuses when they used the Smartmatic-Comelec PCOS or any other electronic or automated system at the precinct level designed to manipulate votes, and when the Philippine Supreme Court continues to protect the Comelec-PCOS shenanigans such as violating the rule of prompt court action by sitting for three years on the petition lawyer Bono Adaza, myself and Ado Paglinawan filed in June of 2010 calling for the nullification of the 2010 Elections on the basis of the Comelec and the election exercise's proven violations of the Automated Election Law.

An ongoing debate rages between a small minority who are still defending the PCOS and a much larger number of the knowledgeable IT experts in the country from the major academic institution, i.e. the UP and the Ateneo, and journalist Ado Paglinawan, who have exposed the statistically unbelievable 60-30-10 apparent template in the "batched" canvassing of the votes from the different provinces. This "batching" of the national canvassing is the first time ever in Philippine election history. In the past the canvassing from the provinces were done and announced as they came in from the field. Why this "batching" was done may be explained in the discussion I will cite below. Suffice it to say that the pattern from the first to the sixteenth batched canvass showed the controversial 60-30-10 pattern and then the canvass flow stopped at around 75 percent of all the canvasses.

No rational explanation was given by the Comelec or Smartmatic for the 60-30-10 anomaly, until a Filipino expat in teaching in the US, Dr. Michael Purugganan of the New York University, dean of science, argued from the point of the Law of Large Numbers (LLN…one of several theorems expressing the idea that as the number of trials of a random process increases, the percentage difference between the expected and actual values goes to zero. Wolfram Mathworld), i.e. that the pattern does not necessarily indicate fraud as large numbers tend to (in my layman's terms) round off and in the case of the 2013 elections the "batched" canvassing rounded off the 60-30-10. Another was on the social media, Mike Beduya of AIM. Even AES Watch stalwarts Dr. Pablo Manalastas made the caveat that the LLN could come into play.

I interviewed Ado Paglinawan who was among the first to note and write about the 60-30-10 "template" as he calls it and I find his rejoinder to be the most logical. It's an important point to clarify as one reporter of GMA News writes of the issue, "Conspiracy or Just Math?" In such matters as election counting and process the political analysts trump the mathematician:

"…I would rather follow the logic of Hermenegildo Estrella (electrical engineer, member of Tandem), both a geek and a political animal… 'The LLN's applies only for trials from the same population, which should mean that these trials (group of votes that are counted) are, or should have come from areas, really representative of the country as a whole.'"… He compared this (batching) with what SWS and Pulse Asia do in the use of 1200 respondents as samples to predict the entire country's preferences in areas where they have initially identified as leaning to their desired outcome… Beduya analyzed the increments between each canvass and charted the peaks and valleys of shares relative to each of the canvass as it progressed from the first to the sixteenth… obviously to dispel aired suspicions that the votes followed a fixed linear pattern.

"But what Purugganan and Beduya were not aware of is that the Comelec, for the first time in the history of Philippine elections, 'batched' provinces and cities into respective canvass clusters… that batching or clustering the provincial inputs is by itself already a humongous anomaly. It presupposes … that a filtering mechanism to, the very least to group the incoming tally into clusters, existed … In layman's tongue using baseball lingo, after the ball was released by the pitcher, it did not go straight to the catcher but passed through a short-stop. This 'short stop' did not only expose the data to possible manipulation... The 60-30-10 is … a premeditated goal preprogrammed to be delivered by strategically inserted default mechanisms against opposition bailiwicks using the combined numbers of administration bailiwicks and strategically designated electronic dagdag-bawas centers…"

And what I would add is this suspicion, that the 25 percent remaining canvass that remains unreported after two weeks if where the final "doctoring" can be done just in case…

(Tune to 1098AM, 5 to 6 p.m., Tues. to Fri.; Destiny Cable, Channel 8, Sat. 8 p.m. and Sun 8 a.m.: this week "Liberal E-'con'-nomics"; visit: http//www.newkatipunan.blogspot.com; reactions can be texted to: 0923-4095739)

IPP oversupply redux

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

5/27/2013

Daily Tribune

The country is embroiled in several major distractions, from the Hocus PCOS 60-30-10 magic to the super-extended display of BS Aquino government incompetence in the investigation of the Balintang Incident that has threatened to break Philippine-Taiwan relations, another old affliction is growing to be another major economic debacle. The disease is the power piracy cancer that visited the Philippines' Luzon and Visayas power sector is now reemerging in Mindanao. Last week the Aboitiz Power Corp. through its CEO Erramon Aboitiz, expressed fears that a potential oversupply in Mindanao in the next three to four years and reiterating the forecast by the San Miguel Corp. The worse part of the dire prognosis is that it will also be an oversupply of the wrong type of energy and at the highest cost in Asia.

The impending oversupply of electricity in Mindanao is not because the government and the private power sector have been responsive to Mindanao's power crisis but that they have both been intent in preying on the power crisis that they themselves have created for Mindanao. The government delays in rehabilitating the Agus-Pulangui hydro-electric system is the root of the Mindanao power crisis, and allowed BS Aquino to chastise Mindanaoans for complaining and telling them to accept high energy rates. This whetted the appetite of profit hungry private companies to apply and put up power projects there, but with the insistence of imposing their desired mode of energy, i.e. fossil fuel fired generations from coal to diesel fuel, over the desire of Mindanaoans for rehab of the Agus-Pulangui posthaste, development of more hydro-electric and geothermal; hence power rates will be exorbitant.

Government capture by the privatization pirates and corporate greed is the crux of the problem for Mindanaons today suffering as much as six to nine hours brownouts and now pay as high as Luzon and the Visayas when they used to pay only half that. In the midst of these issues the Aboitiz CEO's announcement of imminent oversupply of Mindanao power, Aboitiz Power Corp. just announced also last week that it closed 2012 with P 24.4-billion net income, up by 13 percent year-on-year from the P 21.6 billion in 2011. Much of these additional profits come from the misery of Mindanao power consumers whose plight could not be helped by government due to restriction on public generation of electricity as Epira restricted the entire sector, including power distribution to private corporations. A prime example of this case is Iligan City.

Iligan City has more than sufficient power plants transferred from IPPs such as those of the Alacantaras to the National Power Corp. which was in turn sequestered by the city government for non-payment of taxes. The two power plants from the Alcantaras are in pristine condition and hardly used by the Alcantara IPP (remember, the oversupply contracted by Fidel Ramos). Due to the excuse Epira ban on government engaging in power sector operations the corrupt public officials of Iligan City found the excuse to resell the IPP turned over by the Alcantaras back to the Alcantaras for a centavo to the peso. The Alcantaras will then generate electricity from their old plant, making a huge killing several times over: from the horrendous overprice during Ramos time to the buyback 20 years later and the new Iligan city power rates that will be three times over 20 years ago.

The Epira law and power privatization have been around for the past 20 years and there has not been anything good to show for it. The promise was cheaper, more reliable and more efficient service, but as the "highest power rate in Asia" one can hardly miss the fact that everything about that promise was false, at the same time the continuing blackouts and brownout, shortage and oversupply situations and the pre-election power crises we just witnessed prior to the recent May 13 elections, testify to the fact that neither reliability nor efficiency has been delivered by the privatization program and the Epira. I will also wager that the newly "elected" top six senators proclaimed without complete canvass returns, will never touch on these all important power rate issues. They wouldn't dare touch the powers that rule over the entire political and financial system, many of who contributed funds to their campaigns.

Faraway, in Eastern Europe, in Bulgaria the power price gouging by privatized power companies brought about by Western liberalization and globalization of the country has caused a major popular rebellion. Six Bulgarians have immolated themselves over the past few months, protesting the out-of-control spiral of cost of living starting with their electricity bills. I have been contemplating not self-immolation but an indefinite hunger strike to force the public to wake up to the power injustice our people are facing, if I can find a dozen to join in the effort I'll take that step. We've struggled over a decade and nothing has worked, maybe it's time for this step. Any joiners?

(Tune to 109 8 a.m., 5 to 6 p.m., Tues. to Fri.; Destiny Cable, Channel 8, Sat. 8 p.m and Sun 8 a.m.: "BSP P95-B losses"; visit: http//ww.newkatipunan.blogspot.com; text comments to 0923-4095739)