The meaning of a word is never fixed, philosophers tell us. Even dictionaries offer alternative meanings. We thus look for a word’s meaning in the context of its use. There we find that meanings constantly shift, expressing images, but also suppressing others. That is why texts are full of tension. In the past few days, … Read more
Some say that we should not take State of the Nation Addresses (Sonas) too seriously; they are just words. That we should look instead at the actual impact of government on the lives of the governed. Are the masses less hungry? Do they have jobs? Are they more hopeful about the future? That is a … Read more
I did not think it was serious until my own children began to talk about it as an idea whose time has come. Many years ago, at the peak of the Marcos years, we were presented with a chance to live abroad, but my family scoffed at the idea. The other day, one of my … Read more
The term has been used so loosely that it has become synonymous, at best, with what we used to call “cause-oriented groups,” and, at worst, with unelected meddlers and hecklers without any real political base. In fact, the term “civil society” has solid credentials, and it is useful to go back to its early usage … Read more
She clashed with her Foreign Secretary, Vice President Teofisto Guingona Jr. on the basic issue of American troops in Mindanao. Because of this, she said, she was accepting his resignation. Everyone knows she was really sacking him, and in a rather shabby way too. The other day, asserting her role as “chief architect” of the … Read more
The eroticism of risk is the essence of gambling. We all take risks – with our health, our money, our reputations, and sometimes even with our sanity. The question is whether, and to what extent, we want the State to protect us from our folly. That is one issue. The other issue has to do … Read more
What amazes us, modern city-dwellers, is why anyone in this day and age would want to join, and die for, anything like the Philippine Benevolent Missionaries Association, Inc. (PBMA). We take one look at its banefully unattractive leader, Ruben Ecleo, Jr., and our amazement grows even more. For we have learned to expect that such … Read more
Defenseless before death, but still armed with the logical and moral clarity of one who had studied the law all his life, my ailing father wrote his long dead father a letter. He was doing it, he said in the letter, not to disturb his soul, which deserved its peace, but to make a clean … Read more
Coming in the wake of a bungled hostage situation in Pasay City, the death of Martin Burnham and Ediborah Yap, two of the last three hostages held by the Abu Sayyaf, during a rescue operation will likely provoke mocking comparisons between Pasay policemen and Army Rangers. It is the worst time for such tragedies to … Read more
The year was 1986. A new government had come to power following the overthrow of the Marcos dictatorship through a peaceful revolution. So many lives had been lost or destroyed, and so much public wealth wasted and stolen, in the preceding dark years. The time for reckoning and settling scores had finally come. One of … Read more