if you were in their shoes?
Faithful reader Abbygail asks a provocative question:
… if you will be tapped by the govt. to serve in teves’ shoes, what will you do to change the rut we’re in? help the people w/ your ideas. we cannot be blaming each other forever and just sit still. what will you do if given that chance to serve?
I personally do not think that an interactive forum like ours requires its participants to offer specific alternatives (in contrast, for example, to a newspaper editorial). It’s more than enough to express ourselves and discuss issues with others. But I do share Abbygail’s concern about moving forward (note, please, that I did not use that old plea to “move on” — euphemism for forgiving and forgetting).
If we were in a high official’s place, what, specifically, would we do? No need to limit ourselves to Finance Secretary Gary Teves; how about we choose one department (say, DND) or agency (say, Pagcor), and then offer our proposed (specific) solutions?
Should be interesting. But, please, keep it specific. As they say, God (or the devil) is in the details.
December 20th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
To Padang,
How does science come into the equation?
Or are you inferring that I need to come up with some surveys and random sampling to prove my point?
Have we lost faith on our own judgement that we need statistics to agree / disagree on something?
Who said we should use my point of view as a standard to measure society? I never claimed such thing, I was simply airing out my opinion.
You ask about the low wages of the filipinos, well my answer there, maybe they are working in wrong industry. Who says they can only work in one place?
You ask about the landless farmers, well
speaking from experience two generations of my family were landless but that didn’t stop them to strive hard. My grand parents had their lands taken from them forcibly but that did not deter them to succeed.
My parents went to school bare foot and penniless but they along with their siblings became success stories.
I don’t know about you but that’s’ my historical and objective basis.
And I refuse to accept that other people can’t do the same as two generations of my family and a whole lot of other folks have done so and succeeded.
December 20th, 2007 at 4:47 pm
If i will be given a chance, I will do what is right wether it is popular or not, besides there are laws to follow in every desicions i will make. We cannot please everybody ika nga,eventhough your doing good things for them laging may nakakabit na komento o pagdududa, lalo na sa mga Pinoy.
Marami kasi sa mga Filipino ang naniniwala sa mga sabi-sabi kahit walng exact knowledge sa mga issue at walang evidence to castigate the lonely target.
We make our own destiny, we choose what kind of life we wanted to be, and it’s up to us, kung di tayo mismo ang gagawa ng paraan para gumanda ang sarili nating buhay walang magagawa ang Gobyerno o kahit sinong pang magaling na Presidente ang ilagay mo dyan. “We cannot please everybody”…Dito pa nga lang salisalikwat na.
December 20th, 2007 at 4:21 pm
Marius Lardizabal’s understanding of class society is devoid of any historical and objective basis. My advice to Marius is that he should never raise a point unless he can prove it scientifically.
For instance Marius, is it every Filipino worker’s decision that their wages be kept low? Is it every worker’s decision that they would rather remain contractual workers every five months?
Is it every farmer’s decision Marius to remain at the mercy of traders and usurers? What about being landless or being an ethnic minority?
Marius, never assume that your standpoint is the standard by which we judge history or measure society.
December 20th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
pls. don’t take this like a grain of salt for a bad remedy to a bleeding wounds.
with only a high school education that kept me for not finding a decent permanent job in the motherland, it seems that my future is not going anywhere and looks bleak at all fronts. but then a great opportunity came along that have change my whole life. the great opportunity that my own beloved patria adorada could not provide me in my lifetime now is the making.
before i left the island for good during the early 70s, i did and been employed on and off in every known backbreaking job that i can get when there is one. i also manage to spent hot summer nites and long hours of pulling “talahib” grass on hot summer days inside the fort bonifacio during the martial law years. i was detained for breaking curfew hours while i was performing the 8 pesos a day job during the late hours of the night. on those days the metrocom does not accepts any reasoning and logical explanation.
so when the great opportunity knocks on my door, i did my very best not to get it away from my grips. i made myself ready, physically and mentally. i told myself this is where it all begins and it also ends, i can not let this opportunity to get out of my hands.
after arriving here in the land of milk and honey my whole perspective in life change. my future and viability to become a productive citizen making contribution to the great scheme of things now is a reality. my new adopted country provided me the training and schooling for a high skilled trade jobs,(from marine engineering,instructors duties,to law enforcement and police academy -to name the few-in the last 25 yrs)- sent me to college on tuition aid programs and at the same time afforded me to travel all over the world to perform my job and then to retire after 20 plus yrs. for the first time. but full retirement is not on my list yet. another great chance of a new adventure in life came by that made me jump in it with two feet. instructor duty at secondary education level in a school district where we used to live gave me an adrenalin rush for almost 8 years until we decided to moved and tried my luck in allied and civil engineering world. now i am employed by the state dept of transportation that survey,design,build and manage multi-billions of dollars of infrastuctures, interchange and hi-speed inter-state high ways engineering and construction. again training and education are still the carrot sticks that kept me very enthused and inspired every day in doing my job.
now we are living a very comfortable life that i can never achieved or even dreamed off in my own motherland. all of my offsprings attended university and has very successful career of their own.
the point that i am making with this life story of mine are as follows;
1. since the last 40 yrs that have gone by, our national and local govt have made no effort to show a great improvement that can provide or help in the betterment of life condition of our less fortunate youths. it is still in the same predicament and getting worst.
2. jobs, adequate and affordable staple food supply,education, affordable housing, health system,sanitary living condition, acceptable level of crime free community,the lacks of elected govt and public officials with good work ethics and without moral turpitudes are still an endemic problem in cancerous form.
3. political dynasty and oligarch marriage of convinience are still an accepted practice to make the nepotism, cronyism and institutionalized corruption a legalized covert ways in controlling the socio-economic and political reforms.
4. juan dela cruz is still clueless all these years and does not have a idea what is becoming of him.
so back to the question of what would i do if i am on teves shoes -nothing, nada, zilch and awanen- it will take not just teves to get the motherland’s grave situation on even keel.
juan dela cruz must change first before teves can do his job.(hopefully without malice and false pretense behind the color of authority).
our patria adorada and its whole socio-economic and political system is almost non-functioning and close to disastrous level of anarchy.
like in all reality show, the good furtune that i have will never happen even at present day situation in our motherland just like 40 yrs ago. good fortune and upward mobility is only for the connected.merit system is not in the filipino vocabulary.
quo vadis juan dela cruz.
i hope my diatribe does bored and offended someone.
salamat po…
kayana2
lasvegasnv.
December 20th, 2007 at 12:34 pm
Tarsier,
Without much ado, i would like to say that review your economics before concluding that the economy is performing well. The reduction in budget deficit is the direct result of reduction in government investments in critical infrastructure, social services, and economic programs. Reduction in the value of foreign debt is the result of the appreciation of the peso which in turn is the result of steady and increasing OFW remittances as well as the problems facing the US dollar.
The economy is improving? huh? Simply because macro-economic indicators present a rosy picture? Consider the other indicators and fundamentals: purchasing power of the population, availability and affordability of basic social services, wages and jobs… etc. etc.
And what about the quality of investments that come into the country?
In contrast to Bert’s proposal, i don’t think the bottomline is behavior. I still think that at the end of the day, the economic structure determines the obtaining political and socio-cultural dynamics.