Aging is a natural process that we cannot control, like so many things in this world that we do not have a way of controlling. It is a natural process that whether we like it or not will come, will arrive, will inevitably happen. The question “Do you like getting old?” for me is not the correct question. Because when we answer ‘yes’, of course we are kidding ourselves. To answer ‘no’ is probably more truthful.

I don’t like getting old, if getting old means (having) a bulging belly, wrinkly arms and legs, sagging face and neck, being forgetful,….., wetting when you laugh and cough, hypertension, weak heart, weak knees, no sex …. all the signs of dying. (more…)

1. Follow traffic rules. Follow the law.
2. Whenever you buy or pay for anything, always ask for an official receipt.
3. Don’t buy smuggled goods. Buy local. Buy Filipino.
4. When you talk to others, especially foreigners speak positively about us
and our country.
5. Respect your traffic officer, policeman and soldier.
6. Do not litter. Dispose your garbage properly. Segregate. Recycle
Conserve.
7. Support your church.
8. During elections, do your solemn duty.
9. Pay your employees well.
10. Pay your taxes.
11. Adopt a scholar or a poor child.
12. Be a good parent. Teach your kids to follow the law and love
our country.

These are 12 things every Filipino can do to help our country. The author, Alexander L. Lacson, is a graduate of the University of the Philippines College of Law, 1996. He took up graduate studies at the Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His wife, Pia Peña is also a lawyer from U.P.1993, a legal counsel for Citibank. They established a foundation together to help underprivileged children through school, and are now subsidizing 27 young scholars in different public schools in Alex’s native Negros Occidental.

This year’s Press Freedom Dinner at Darling Harbour in Sydney focused heavily on assisting the families of Filipino journalists who died in a massacre in Maguindanao, in the Philippines’ south.

Speakers spoke about Australia’s genuine concern for the victims’ families, including those who had been killed over the last decade elsewhere in the Philippines.

The Australian journalists’ union under the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA) and through the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has been actively campaigning for justice and better government protection of journalists in the Philippines, according to Australian union leader and journalist Mike Dobbie. (more…)

I put down my thoughts today with much regret for the time I had let pass. Time I have lost. Perhaps, if I’d made up my mind sooner, I could have done more. But here we are, five days to go before we, the Filipino people, are given an opportunity to steer our nation. In five days, we will let our voices be heard and brace ourselves for a change in leadership that we all hope will bring this troubled country some relief. By this time, most of us will have decided on whom to support. I write in the faint hope that my verbosity might help at least one person decide.

This note is borne partly in response to an article written by the young and brilliant Patricia Evangelista which is certain to sway many minds. In her piece entitled ‘People call me Dick.’ (you might have read it or will find it with relative ease), she delineates her dislike for Richard Gordon and questions his character. She gives as an example Gordon’s dismissal of UNO editor Erwin Romulo as a “nobody” during his interview on NU 107’s RockEd Radio. (more…)

Former police officers Cesar Mancao and Glenn Dumlao have linked Senator Panfilo Lacson as the mastermind behind the killing of Salvador Bubby” Dacer and his driver Emmanuel Corbito some 10 years ago. But does the buck really stop there? Both Mancao and Dumlao were former members of the now defunct Presidential Anti-Organised Crime Task Force (PAOCTF). The heinous killing happened during the term of former president Joseph Estrada. (more…)