WASTE LAND

Students shooting each other

THE spate of school shootings involving high school students attacking fellow students has shifted attention momentarily away from the impeachment proceedings in the Senate and the alleged thievery of our politicians…

My disappointment with Justice Adolfo Azcuna

I USED to greatly admire retired Supreme Court Associate Justice Adolfo Azcuna. I regarded him as a thoughtful constitutionalist whose public service deserved respect. This is why listening to the positions he took as…

Can Lazarus rise in a Congress of dynasties?

AFTER the 1986 People Power Revolution, the Senate was restored under the 1987 Constitution. I had the privilege of being one of the 24 senators elected nationally to the reborn chamber. I was also elected majority…

PH signs up for US colonialism

ONE of the most frustrating things about the months-long exercise in sialorrheic self-congratulations that the Marcos administration has engaged in about the Philippines having joined the MAGA regime’s “Pax Silica”…

Xi Jinping under the microscope

WHAT’s happening inside China under Xi Jinping deserves close attention, not because war’s inevitable but because Beijing is increasingly organizing its political, economic, technological and military systems around the…

Emilio Jacinto after Balintawak

THE Philippine Revolution has started! After the first cry of the revolution, the establishment of the national revolutionary government and the first skirmish with the Spaniards under Lt. Ros in Pasong Tamo, which the…

Filling the gap in our zoning regulations: Adopting the gross plot ratio

OUR cities and towns suffer from the lack of proper urban planning and design. This leads to congestion, lack of access to potable water and proper sanitation, lack of access to mobility and transportation, safety…

School shootings a problem that won’t go away

I HAVE observed that most governments react to problems rather than carefully diagnosing their root causes. To understand social problems, experts frequently use the Iceberg model, which is a framework that divides a…

Finished or not finished? The Matugases and the P80M road project

THE controversy over the Mahayhay-Tuburan Road project in Del Carmen, Surigao del Norte sounds simple when reduced to a headline. A government road project was supposedly completed. The contractor was paid. However, a…