I mean, I can’t “heckle with my own kind”, since they’d be too smart for it. Better to bug someone whose arguments I can easily dismantle.

About Dato Arroyo, I’m from the district of Camarines Sur that he will be representing and I’m glad he won.
I don’t see any problem with his joining Mikey in Congress, a much, much larger body than the senate. Iggy is an uncle and not a direct relative of PGMA.

Bencard,

I couldn’t agree for more!

If you recall cvj, this is what I said in my previous comment: “it is easy for people like us to respect the ‘less fortunate’. [...] The real question though is this: do the Pinoy masa respect themselves?”

Kung baga we in the elite constantly wax rhetoric about “equality”, “justice”, and “freedom” for “all”. But do *da masa* really comprehend (or even care to comprehend) these things?

Same with “respect”. We find it easy to draw on our robust ethical frameworks (honed by good upbringing, breeding, and education) to respect the least of our citizens. But put yourself in their shoes for a minute. Do you think the average kanto boy really respects other people the way we presume to?

In my experience, really rich people tend to treat their servants with far more respect that middle-to-lower-income employers of domestic help.

Go figure.

“the track record of the people i listed, which list, again, you deliberately omitted obviously to slant the point i was trying to make, was public knowledge…” – Bencard May 19th, 2007 at 2:27 am

It is not the public knowledge aspect that i’m questioning but your contention that individual morality can be aggregated into a collective morality and that this can be derived from the choices the voters make. That would require the assumptions that i listed above, all of which do not hold.

(I ommitted your illustrative list of names you gave since i won’t be party to your crude attempt to associate oppositionists with Jalosjos.)

“Even a “direct democracy” exercised by a majority of “intellectually-vacuous” or morally-challenged people would’nt work. – Bencard May 19th, 2007 at 2:27 am

You are right to point out that direct democracy is not meant to substitute for whatever intellectual or moral deficiencies of the voters. It is there to compensate for the weaknesses of representative democracy i.e. the failure of the representatives to truly represent the public interest. When this happens, the people have to step in. That is the rationale for people power and the public sphere.

I’ve read your work on the “Presidency project”. (Sorry if I got the title wrong since I’m doing this from memory)

I know that Estrada got about 39% of the vote to get elected. But is there analyses already on the distribution of votes according to class? How much of the votes for Estrada came from the masses and how much of the total votes for the Presidency came from the masses too?

“Let GMA get away scot-free?” – ay naku.

If you get accused of murder and you are acquitted, would you like to be prosecuted for the same alleged felony again and again until your accuser, somehow find a way to convict you?

Ay naku. Paano maa-acquit si GMA when she hasn’t even been “tried” yet? She has thwarted all attempts to get the judicial ball rolling through means fair and foul — mostly foul. She has ruthlessly used the vast powers of the presidency — and powers that she doesn’t even legally own — to evade accountability. Ilang rebuffs na ba ang natatanggap nya from the SC? Or would you say na si GMA pa din ang tama at SC ang mali?

You call that being acquitted? Ay naku. Anyway, you are obviously partisan in favor of GMA, no matter how you try to project yourself otherwise. Kahit ano pang ebidensya ang ipakita sayo about her crimes, eh patuloy kang magbubulag-bulagan.

By the way, have you spoken out against the political dynasty of the Arroyos, with Mikey, Dato, and Iggy? I hope so, para naman di ka masyado obvious na sobrang partisan in favor of GMA. Or would you find a way to rationalize that as well? Onga pala, nabasa ko yung comment na na ok lang yung kaso ni Iggy kasi di naman sya malapit na kamag-anak ni GMA.

Well, we are all mostly partisan here anyway. Sana lang huwag na tayong magkunwari. Pro-GMA kung pro-GMA, anti kung anti. Ay naku.