POLITICAL CARTOON

Are Filipinos benefiting on the military exercises with the U.S?

My daughter Alex, 9, Grade 4, asked me how to pose questions in a mock press conference after she became a member of the editorial staff of her school newspaper.

Sabi ko ito ang pagtanung: "What is your take on your visit to Japan?" (If the interviewee is an imagined President Duterte).

Author (extreme right) sports with the helmet and vest used by the U.S Marines who manned theHighMobility Artillery Rocket System  (HIMARS) they used during a military exercise with
Philippine military.

Then I told her some of my “anecdotes” interviewing dignitaries;

ME: Senator Pacquiao what is your stand on K-12?

PACQUIAO: (who was sitting): I don't want to stand, I want to sit. I don't want K-12, I like K-9.

ME: How's the violence here in Maguindanao?

MAGUINDANAO GOVERNOR ANDAL AMPATUAN: (Who finished only Grade 3) Violin? I could not even play guitar. You asked me about violin goddammit!!! You want me to kill you?

***

I saw recently a column that reads the Philippines did not benefit to Balikatan or military exercise with the U.S.

I disagreed of course.

Here were the advantages of having military exercises with a super power based on my conversation with the U.S Marines at Clark Air Base in Pampanga early this year that manned the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS).
ME: How can the guided rockets of HIMARS hit with accuracy the Chinese warships if one of this is posted at one of the islets of the Philippines at the South China Sea?
US MARINE 1: They would be GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) guided.
ME: Oh, just like what the C.I.A backed Colombian government had done with the FARC (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia) guerillas when the Cessna propeller powered plane dropped a GPS guided 500- pound bomb at the guerrillas whose fire they used in cooking food betrayed them in nighttime.
ME: Is the price of this monster (Himars) $5.1 million apiece?
MARINE 2: Naah, its $6 million apiece now.

ME: Philippine government should buy some these so we can sink those ships of the Chinks.

***

Here’s what I read recently from Diplomat.com, the Bible of foreign policy makers:

"Vietnam’s defense expenditures were the fourth largest in Southeast Asia, behind only Singapore, Indonesia, and Thailand; all wealthier or significantly larger economies. It was the first year that Vietnam’s spending surpassed Malaysia’s. The defense budget is an estimated $5 billion in 2016, and it is expected to grow to $6 billion by 2020”.

Despite being allowed to fish, Ph fishermen's leader hopes Chinese Coast Guard leave

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Chinese Coast Guard ship in the Philippines' territorial water.
Photo Credit: Bangkok Post

"Nakaka pangisda na Kami sa Scarborough," declared by Jowe Legaspi, leader of the Filipino Fishermen who used to be driven out by the Chinese Coast Guard in the disputed Shoal.
"Sana umalis na sa"Karburo" mga barko nila ng lubusan Kasi insultong malaki Sa atin iyon dahil nasa pintuan Lang natin Sila. Hayaan na natin yung mga barko Nila sa Spratly, malayo iyon!" he said.
Legaspi, who lives in the coastal village of Infanta, Pangasinan led the 15 fishermen who petitioned the Chinese encroachment at the United Nations in 2015.

MY COMPLETE Q & A with Jowe Legaspi on the return of the Filipino fishermen at the rich fishing ground at Panatag Shoal can be accessed by copying and pasting at Face Book the following:

 https://www.facebook.com/mortz.ortigoza/videos/vb.569334707/10154780131354708/?type=3&theater

READ MY OTHER ARTICLE: China allows Filipinos to fish at Scarborough Shoal - Fisherman

My Unforgettable Visit at the Japanese Imperial Palace

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

During the official visit of the Philippines President to Japan, radio listeners and Face Book Live Feed’s viewers were treated about my narration with co-anchor Harold Barcelona on my nephew (father was Japanese) who was anointed by Japan Emperor Akihito to be the lead samurai or powerful military caste of the Imperial House or Koshitsu of the Nippon.

JAPAN VISIT. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and Japanese
 Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Photo Credit: GMANetwork.com

Here’s what I told Harold when I went with my nephew at the Koshitsu for the contest where my kin Maraki Akin-ari, 21, was pitted with contestants from Tokyo and Nagasaki about their slick, quickness, and deft in handling a samurai’s sword.

When Akihito threw a fly above, the Tokyo guy unleashed his sword and struck the fly by slicing it into two pieces. 
Spectators applauded.

When the Sun-God of Japan, threw a fly above, the Nagasaki guy rapidly hammered it twice with his sword and the fly was sliced into four pieces.

Spectators went wild.

When it was the turn of my nephew who grew up in Tondo and not Tokyo as previously described by the media, the Emperor threw the fly above and Maraki Akin-ari attempted to hit the fly 20 times but to no avail. The fly still flew and nagalit si Emperor Akihito.

“Wala kang kuwentang Samurai, 20 times mong tinaga ang bangaw, walang nangyari. Hindi ka puweding maging Lead Samurai dito sa Imperial Palace,” he chided my nephew.

 Maraki Akin-ari whom I trained, during our drinking spree with Kuatro Kantos, on the Art of Reasons, emphatically told the Emperor in Filipino that was immediately translated into Japanese:

“Mahal na Hari, hindi ibig sabihin na sa 20 times kong pag hampas ng espada ay pumalpak na ako. Kumuha kayo ng microscope o magnifying glass para makita ninyo kung paano ko tinuli ang langaw”.

Bad blood between Barbers, Pichay started in local politics – Toff

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

 "All politics is local, ” a famous phrase from my favorite humorous former U.S Speaker of the House of Representatives Tip O'Neill where his book “Man of the House: The life and Political Memoirs of Speaker Tip O’Neill” I kept bragging to five-time Philippines' House Speaker Joe de Venecia whenever I was in a huddle with him.

“Yah, I met Democratic Party’s Speaker O’Neill “All politics is local” when I met then President Ronald Reagan in the White House,” the rabble rousing Philippine Speaker kept telling me.

Here’s the neophyte congressman’s son of Speaker Joe when I interviewed him about the “circus” in the House of Congress perpetrated by two solons whose hatred with each other hailed from local politics that Speaker O'Neill kept blaming, son of a gun, whenever political and economic situations in the Land of the Free and the Brave went south. 

Congressman Ace Barbers points a finger at the face of
RepresentativeProspero Pichay in a near fisticuffs that ensued
 recently at the House of Representatives seen by millions of
 television viewers. Photo Credit: ABS-CBN 

 If House of Representatives’ Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez was ashamed by the near fisticuff of Congressmen Robert Barbers and Prospero Pichay Jr., a Pangasinan solon cited that there was bad blood between the duos that started in Surigao Province.

Barbers and Pichay are congressmen from the second and first Districts Of Surigao Province.

“That’s what I heard. Again, it was not firsthand information it was told to me. It also came out in the news,” declared by Congressman Christopher “Toff” de Venecia.

According to the Daily Inquirer, Pichay pitted candidates against the Barbers' clan following Robert's refusal to toe the line as member of the then ruling party Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats when he signed the failed impeachment complaint against then president Gloria Arroyo, Pichay’s ally, in the middle of 2000s..

In 2007, former Surigao del Norte governor Lyndon Barbers lost his congressional bid against Guillermo Romarate Jr., while Robert won his gubernatorial bid.

It was in 2010 that the Barbers political rule in Surigao del Norte officially ended after Robert lost his reelection bid to Sol Matugas, and Lyndon his mayoralty bid to Ernesto Matugas.

Let's continue the killings

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

I felt vindicated when the killer of an architecture student Nick Russel Oniot, 18, was extra judicially executed, er, killed by policemen when he grabbed the gun of one of the cops after they arrested him.

 My feeling of relief on the death of Marvin Bernardo, a recidivist and a parolee for murder, epitomized the feelings of the majority of the Filipinos who are tired already seeing on television habitual delinquents and other criminals preyed on defenseless victims.

Photo Credit: Philippine Star

Bernardo, and his effeminate companion Reynold Clave alias Sakura, attempted to rob Oniot when the Adamson University’s student was walking recently for home at dusk in Taguig.

Instead of yielding to the duo, Oniot fought back by hitting them with his knapsack.

Bernardo, to neutralize Oniot, stabbed him 18 times.

The graphic scene seen by millions of Filipinos on the TV evening news scandalized many of us. It was heart wrenching since after those volley of stabs and after the accused left, the teenager still stood and managed some paces while he hailed passing vehicles to bring him to the hospital.

With blood oozing from his wounds and bloodied his white polo uniform and some vital parts of his organ cut by the knife, he collapsed on the street without anybody from the kibitzers lifting a finger.

 Pathetic!

Since Bernardo and Clave who were identified by the security camera of the village casually walked from the crime scene, the police arrested the duo that followed the execution of one of them.

Dagupan’s “Little Tondo” straightens after two junkies' corpses displayed

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

DAGUPAN CITY – It took only two cadavers thrown by unknown  assailants near the entrance of the “Little Tondo” of this city  that scared the wit off of the residents there who immediately pledged their support to the police’s dangerous drug’s war.

I.D. Dagupan City’s Chief of Police Niel Miro shows the identification card he designed for 

the members of the Task Force Anti-Illegal Drugs as they watched 24 hours a day seven days 

a week Sitio Aling, known as lair of murderers and narcotic peddlers, in the City.

Upon Miro’s assumption of office in August 1, the residents of the slum nestled in the city 

proper gave their unconditional cooperation with him to fight criminalities.

 PHOTO: Mortz C. Ortigoza

Superintendent Neil Miro, the new chief of police here, said that after a certain Cayabyab, a notorious narcotics dealer, and a lady dope dealer Onging were murdered early of August, Sitio Aling, a part of Barangay Pantal here, known as lair of narcotics peddlers, snatchers, and killers became a peaceful place. "It was miraculously been likened to the nearby Church of Lady of Manaoag Shrine in Manaoag, Pangasinan, a radio broadcaster, who asked anonymity, quipped.

Aling had been an armpit of this generally peaceful city after previous chiefs of police could not solve the vileness of the place.

After Onging was murdered, residents there trooped by riding five public utility jeeps to the office of Miro that alerted his policemen.

He thought the 70 residents of Sitio Aling would retaliate after their two fellow residents were murdered.

“Sabi nila susuko na po kami (We are going to surrender),” Miro said.

Security precaution in mind, the chief of police asked his men to separate the men and women from the slum at the function room at the third floor of the police station where they were gathered.

 The 1997 member of the Philippine National Police Academy did it before he started the dialogue because many of the menacing looking men have tattoo all over their bodies.

Media men for a fee

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

With roughly 30 local legitimate and fly-by-night newspapers’ tabloid size in my almost three million populated province Pangasinan, we have roughly 250 authentic and pseudo –practitioners that include the village idiots who were whisked up by those two kinds of practitioners starting as errand boy and account executives that disseminate advertisement flyers until they (idiots) discovered the “bankability” of the trade.

This sorry picture of the media in my province epitomizes the larger picture of the Fourth Estate in the country.

One of the ugly facets was their bastardization of the English language that still sees print on newspapers and even on news blogs.

Just like their counterparts in radio, these print media practitioners are not paid if not paid well thus their news were all about the glorification of the “greatness”, holly molly, of a politician who could not even passed the average I.Q test.

These politicians, pockets fattened by corruption monies, flattered by the story give them three hundred pesos to two thousand pesos as their headline and photo as they depend on the prominence of the items on the eight pages weekly newspaper.

PH benefits $44,603B (P2.2 Trillion) from U.S yearly. Can China replace it?

By Mortz C. Ortigoza

Don’t you know that for this year the economic and military aids the United States will give to the Philippines will be U.S $180 million according to US state department’s spokesperson John Kirby?

The United States is our third biggest trading partner where in year 2015 we had a total trade of $16.491 billion. $9.023 billion was export composed mostly of electronic products while we imported $7.468 billion from the Yanks.

America, based on that year, was our third global trading partner after China and Japan where the land of samurais and ninjas was our biggest trade partner. Our total trade with China was $17.646 billion while our trade with Japan was $18.669 billion.

Hmm, the difference of the total trade with  the Chinks and the Yanks was more than a billion of dollars?

Singa-four, whose neighbors are Singa-five and Singa-three, ranked as the fourth largest trading partner of the country for 2015 with a total trade amounting only to $8.806 billion or a share of 6.8 percent of total trade we have with countries around the globe.

Minuscule, compared to China and Japan.

Although both of these countries have more total trade with us, the economic benefits from both were dwarfed if we quantify our economic relationship with the U.S through the Information Technology-Business Process Outsourcing (IT-BPO) where we are number one in this trade in the world, and remittances the Filipinos in the U.S sent yearly in our country.

Here are my questions in case we totally break diplomatic, economic, and military (like revocation of EDCA or Mutual Defense Treaty) ties with Uncle Sam:

Can our 1.2 million IT-BPO workers hold their jobs here when the U.S government ordered the primarily U.S companies in the IT-BPO to withdraw from the Philippines and look for other countries just like what she did to U.S corporations to countries that she broke diplomatic relations?

The IT-BPO would be providing $25 billion revenues for direct and indirect jobs for us this year. That would be at par with the remittances our overseas contract workers would be sending this year to our country.

Can China and Russia replaced the $10.4 billion sent last year and more of this amount this year  by our U.S Filipino expatriates in case America cut ties with us and put a stop of these monies being sent here?
Can the Sinos and Ivans substitute the jobs created here by the $9,023 export of goods we have with the U.S?