My Manila Times columns for the week of February 24, 2025

THE most significant thing about this week -- apart from getting some important background stuff organized -- was that I was able to determine the direction of my counterattack against the neo-Nazi cabal that has seized power in the US. Student of history that I am, the realization that unless those of us who are not okay with Nazism -- which should be everyone, but some people are too stupid or evil to do the right thing -- strike back fast and with more force than the fascist thugs are applying, we are all going to sleepwalk right into a Fourth Reich and World War III. Thursday's column below (I will break the paywall and publish it in full, after a suitable interval), is my first shot; a ranging shot, so to speak, with the full salvo to follow. 

The illustration seen here, which adorned that column on Thursday, is once again from the talented Steve Pabs. 

Tuesday, February 25, 2025: Incentives should go both ways in new auto program -- This is Part 2 of the column I started on Sunday the 23rd.  

Thursday, February 27, 2025: Comelec supports fascism with Starlink plan -- The Commission on Elections here has made the regrettable decision to contract with Starlink for connectivity in some remote areas of the country ahead of the May 8 midterm polls. They will rue the day, and so will that Nazi piece of shit. 

Sunday, March 2, 2025: Good vibes from the new DOTr chief, but will it last? -- DOTr is the Department of Transportation, and a new secretary was just recently appointed. I hope he can accomplish something, but remain skeptical.

The Manila Times Editorials for the week of February 24, 2025

AS always, a bit of a mixed bag of topics this week, but unlike some papers who twist themselves into knots to promote a stupid agenda (looking at you, Washington Post), we simply focus on trying to sort the right from wrong where we find it.

Monday, February 24, 2025: No straightforward solution to ending Ukraine war – I have a big issue with this issue, because there is absolutely a straightforward solution to ending the war. Russia needs to get the fuck out of Ukraine, pay reparations, and forevermore respect the pre-2014 borders without other conditions. But, our world editor thinks in more complicated terms.

Tuesday, February 25, 2025: Unseasonal dengue comes back to town – We are having a bit of an outbreak of dengue fever here in the Philippines; yet another manifestation of climate change, if you ask me.

Wednesday, February 26, 2025: Big shoes to fill at ADB – An appreciation of the Asian Development Bank’s recently retired president.

Thursday, February 27, 2025: PH is right to be cautious about maritime carbon tax – This commentary is a bit wonky, but it’s an important topic. The proposed carbon tax on shipping is not a bad idea generally, but it needs a lot of work.

Friday, February 28, 2025: Ending the cycle of election-related violence. Honestly, I think this commentary is obligatory at least once during any election campaign season.

Saturday, March 1, 2025: Can the dim prospects for Medicare portability be improved? – The government and Fil-Am advocates would like Filipino retirees who received Medicare to be able to keep it if they return to the Philippines to resettle. With what is happening in Washington, this seems unfortunately very unlikely.

Sunday, March 2, 2025: Let’s all follow the rules – This discusses the epidemic of drivers in Metro Manila getting caught using the exclusive bus rapid transit lane along Edsa. In the latest incident, it was the Chief of the Philippine National Police’s convoy that was caught (although he has yet to admit it was actually him), using the excuse that there was an “emergency meeting” they needed to get to.

 

My Manila Times columns for the week of February 17, 2025

THIS week was a bit of a mixed bag, which is mostly a function of having more topics to discuss than I have space to discuss them in. On a personal note, Monday the 17th would have been my late father's 82nd birthday, and Wednesday the 19th was my son David's, my youngest, 18th birthday. So I was in a bit of a wistful mood for most of the week. 

Tuesday, February 18, 2025: A dubious outcome from latest RE auction -- The Department of Energy recently held its third Green Energy Auction, and it was with obvious pride that it announced that the 4,000-odd megawatts up for grabs had been oversubscribed by bidders by nearly twice that amount. However, all but a few hundred MW of that capacity were in the form of bids to build pumped hydro energy storage systems -- the most expensive and least likely to ever be completed of any form of RE. I received a number of messages from business people both in and outside the energy industry, complimenting me on my sensible point of view; none of those, however, were from the DOE. 

Thursday, February 20, 2025: The unfriendly skies -- An attempt to inject some sense into the hysteria surrounding the unfortunate string of air accidents in the US. For the record, I do think flying will become a great deal less safe in the US due to the vindictive idiocy being carried out by Kleinfuehrer Musk and his puppet president Donnorhea, and I've suggested to several people that they change their travel plans in the months ahead. But I don't think the recent string of accidents can be attributed to them, really. The ones that may happen in the near future, however, are a different matter.

Sunday, February 23, 2025: Incentives should go both ways in new auto program -- Part one of a two-part discussion on the efforts of the Philippine auto parts manufacturing industry to gain some government support, particularly in view of an incentive package being prepared for automobile assemblers. If you're an automotive manufacturing geek -- as I was for quite a number of years in a past life -- you would probably find this interesting. Otherwise, it will likely come across as quite nerdy. But it is nevertheless an important economic issue here. 

The Manila Times Editorials for the week of February 10, 2025

THE Philippines is ramping up toward the midterm elections (which will take place on May 8), so our day-to-day news is dominated by campaign-related stories; much to the detriment of every living soul in these islands, in my opinion, because these politicians here are a bunch of clowns. What is interesting, however, is that among the Editorial Board, particularly the four of us who do the actual writing for the daily editorials, we avoid local political and especially campaign-related discussions like the plague. There are a few exceptions of a more public service nature, of course -- for example, policies adopted by the Commission on Elections (COMELEC), or broad issues such as combating fake news, are sufficiently ecumenical to sound off about. But in terms of actual political stuff, which dipshit candidate said what dipshit thing, no; without ever having discussed it amongst ourselves, we have apparently agreed that way lies madness. 

To be honest, I don't know that it's necessarily a good thing. There are times when we should perhaps take a more activist stance than we do, although I would be hard-pressed to make an argument that it is a necessity now, given the candidates and the shape of the campaign so far. We are fortunately not dealing with anyone like Trump who is a clear and present danger; perhaps the fringe represented by former president Duterte, but despite his one-time popularity it is already clear that the Filipino public is over him and his violent, foul-mouthed brand of crazy -- all the candidates in his bloc are polling extremely poorly, and his own public approval rating, outside his hometown of Davao, is somewhere south of 20 percent. 

So for now, I think we're all going to continue to enjoy thinking about other, more substantive things, and our collection of editorial thoughts reflects that. Here are the ones for the week of February 10: 

Monday, February 10, 2025: PH needs to reinforce cyber defenses 

Tuesday, February 11, 2025: Prices of food items: Up, up and away! -- This is clearly the current Marcos administration's Achilles' heel, and I'm not sure why. The economy in general is doing reasonably well, at least according to the scale that applies here, but the government has struggled to come to grips with food inflation. 

Wednesday, February 12, 2025: An opportunity and risk for Filipino teachers -- Concerning the efforts of school districts in Alaska to recruit teachers here to work in rural and remote communities.

Thursday, February 13, 2025: From a potential to actual economic threat -- The government here has been reassuring the public that the country is safe from Dicksprain Donald and his tariffs, but that is probably unhelpfully optimistic. 

Friday, February 14, 2025: Land swap deal offers hope of ending Ukraine war --  Well, it may have for a moment, but I don't think that's the case any more. 

Saturday, February 15, 2025: A tool to build the domestic economy -- A pitch to use the two-year-old Maharlika Investment Fund of the government to replace lost funding for key projects caused by the demolition of USAID. 

Sunday, February 16, 2025: A destabilizing presence -- China and its nonsense in the South China Sea, again. 

 

 

My columns for the week of February 10, 2025

UNRELATED to anything here, I'm having a bit of an age moment -- my youngest, David, is celebrating his 18th birthday today, which means that all of my children are now adults. I wish that we had left a better world for them, and I'm sorry we didn't, but hopefully they will be better than us. 

Here are my Manila Times columns for the week of February 10, 2025:

Tuesday, February 11, 2025: MMDA subjected to a well-deserved spanking, but now what? -- The Metro Manila Development Authority is a cross-jurisdictional agency in the capital, and is responsible for things such as traffic and solid waste management, as well as, somewhat inexplicably, the annual Metro Manila Film Festival. Rather than being run by urban planners or traffic engineers as would befit its stated purpose, it is instead a political patronage post usually filled by lawyers and accountants. While its most recent harebrained recommendation was savagely and properly shot down, something still needs to be done about the makeup of the agency.

Thursday, February 13, 2025: Are the climate scientists wrong? -- The above illustration, another of Steve Pabilinas' gems, accompanied this commentary. I wrote the headline to troll our in-house climate denier; my point in this is that the scientists may be "wrong" only in the sense that they have been entirely too optimistic about how quickly the climate is changing for the worse. 

Sunday, February 16, 2025: A change at the DOTr -- Somewhat unexpectedly, the Secretary of the Department of Transportation announced his resignation; this column offers some insights into the possible reasons why, and prospects under the new Secretary.  

NEWSMAKERS is now on the air

 

AFTER some delays, which are not worth nitpicking about now, my new show, called NEWSMAKERS, on The Manila Times' streaming channel has now started to air. The first two episodes have been posted, there are two more already in the can, and I am working quickly to tape some more -- I have about six guests in line at the moment. 

You can find the web version of the channel at https://streaming.manilatimes.net/, and do check out our variety of programming. There is also a mobile app available in both the App Store and Google Play, just search for "Manila Times streaming." 

My first episode features an interview with Scott Morris, who is the Vice-President for East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific at the Asian Development Bank (ADB). Scott is also a fellow Pennsylvanian -- he's from Williamsport, and attended Franklin & Marshall College in my hometown of Lancaster. The interview is a bit dated, since it was done a couple of months ago, but is quite relevant and interesting. 

Stay tuned for more episodes soon!

 

 

My Columns for the Week of February 3, 2025

 

Things are getting rowdy; between the midterm election campaign that is heating up here -- Philippine elections are always chaotic -- and the ongoing neo-Nazi takeover in the US, there is too much to talk about it, almost none of it good. 

Tuesday, February 4, 2025: Congressional flatulence -- Oh my god, will these people ever stop with their endless search for miracle treasures. This column is about a 40-year-old fable started by a conman who convinced a shocking number of people that there is a huge supply of deuterium at the bottom of the Philippine Trench (spoiler alert: there is not). A Congressman recently introduced a bill to create an R&D center for deuterium development. This Congressman (his name is Ace Barbers) is an idiot. 

Thursday, February 6, 2025: Fascist Musk destroys P19.5B of PH development projects -- A rundown of the damage caused by the shutdown of USAID. This was my biggest column of the year so far, probably the second or third most-read column for the entire paper for the week, and it generated a shocking amount of hate mail. There are obviously a lot of members of the Musk cult here, and all I can say is, sorry you were born with vaginas and tiny brains, fellas. The image at the top of this page is by our fantastic cartoonist Steve Pabs, who regularly adds to my columns. 

Sunday, February 9, 2025: The end is nigh for failing electric co-op -- A commentary on the impending dissolution of a dysfunctional electric cooperative near Davao in Mindanao. When co-ops are functioning well as public utility businesses, and about half of those in the Philippines are, they should be supported. This is one of the ones that needs to go.