Analysis and Opinion By Lance Corporal X The Meeting in Naga Former VP Leni Robredo and current VP Duterte met in Naga a few days ago. Their meeting is a sign of mutual respect. Not desperation , not gullibility. Sonny Trillanes is wrong. He’s trying to gatekeep. He’ll not win the presidency in 2028. But there’s  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America First we need to define the term “Left”. The Left is that part of the political spectrum that seeks more aggressive federal government intervention in the caretaking of citizens. The right is that part of the political spectrum that believes local governments, or private interests, should be empowered to  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America I don’t think pinks are a personality cult. But it’s not up to me to decide. It’s up to pinks to decide and they can go either direction, personality or principle. Or they can dissolve and waste the tremendous amount of effort put into the “brand” by Leni and  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America Power is like water, it flows downhill. The dynasties exercise it within their realms. The Dutertes run the Davao realm. The Espiñas run my Biliran realm. The Marcos clan is joined with the Romualdez clan. Even the Aquinos are dynastic. Barangay captains know where their bread is buttered. And  ..read more

By Giancarlo Angulo Note: wrote this Aug 5 so I wasnt able to incorporate what is written in this piece: https://www.philstar.com/opinion/2024/08/12/2377262/awash-unused-funds Here’s your text with grammar and clarity improvements: Policy Making is Hard (PhilHealth Edition) The goal of society is to move things forward—understand, explain, and communicate for a better Philippines. One way to achieve  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America The Leni Robredo Pink campaign in 2020 was awesome. It did everything but win. It was a volunteer effort. Honorable, bright, loud, inspiring. Was it just a flash in the pan? Is it still here? Is it for Leni Robredo alone or does it have lasting power if she  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America It’s a human condition, not a trait that only applies to Filipinos. Good people must be perfect or they are bad. Bad people don’t have to live up to that standard because people accept the flaws as a part of their character. So they are “good”. For millions, the  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America It strikes me that the Philippine Left, which embraces everything from the communist warmongering extremes to the moderate efforts of Senator Hontiveros, is a huge waste of energy. So many street protests, so little traction. So many outdated slogans tearing down, so few ideas building up. So fickle during  ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America The decent candidates took a bath during last two Philippine elections. By decent, I mean honest, intelligent, patriotic, competent, and compassionate. Yellows and pinks and lefties. There are four huge barriers to success for decent people. They are weak at fund-raising, mistakenly thinking that being good is good enough. Voters sell their votes but good people by definition can’t buy them. Dynasties are in cahoots, strong at the local level, and favor the corrupt. Good people must be perfect or they are bad while bad people are good because everyone kno ..read more

Analysis and Opinion By Joe America This blog has always been for the Philippines. The basic distinction between here and elsewhere is a choice between building or whining. We choose to build. To build ideas. To build understandings. To build solutions to problems. As the principal writer here, I’m starting to focus on the 2028 election because the choice of Philippine president establishes the nation’s primary direction for six years. It’s a big deal. That said, the strength of this blog is not my articles. It is the discussion section. The robust discussion is truly unique within the Filip ..read more