malu-bigfoot-in-her-mouth-fernandez strikes again, this time dissing bloggers (slacker’s job daw, unless you get paid for it, how mercenary) who crucified her once for dissing ofws, and all in a sophomoric kind of bad writing that’s full of herself and her perfumed hot-air existence. to top it all, she has the gall to call herself a journalist. omg, i swear, professional pinoy journalists should raise a stink. there ought to be a law barring the likes of this woman from thinking herself in the pro league, and naming herself to the pro league. she gives philippine journalism a bad name.

and of course, being the aunt of the gma cohort (supposedly senator) migs zubiri (whose mom is her sister), the tacky bitch just had to weigh in on a bloggers’ campaign to unseat the lucky bitch:

It’s just like all this hullabaloo about ousting GMA. You deposed ERAP in Edsa Dos. Now you’re unhappy with his replacement. Make up your minds. (For the record I’m not pro anybody I’m pro whatever lesser evil is out there). You can’t overthrow one president then decide you made a mistake with your second choice. I’s not like buying a green Hermes bag and suddenly deciding, oops I should have gotten the black one instead. Unfortunately that’s the kind of nation we have become, a bunch of wishy-washy whiners who whine about everything under the sun and found the blog sphere to be the new medium for whining. Yes we do what we have to do as a nation to get things done and stop corruption and evil (I’m all for that) but we never seem to be happy with what we have, hence the complaining and whining. It just never stops.”

grabe. if i were the supposed senator zubiri, i would cringe in shame at being associated with such drivel.

priceless this reply of manolo quezon to a comment on his blog that the lopezes of abs-cbn, which network put out the news that “noli is set to assume presidency,” seem to have a score to settle with the macapagals.

i actually think the lopezes are being extra prudent, because gma has them by the balls over meralco. ever wonder why christian monsod is so ardently pushing the keep her until 2010 movement?”

it’s like asking, ever wonder why solita a.k.a. mareng winnie monsod is so ardently saying no to gma’s ouster?

googled “christian monsod and meralco” and, yes, he’s been board director since december 1998. and i found this tribune column by herman tiu laurel “National calamity: GMA & Meralco” dated august 2007, posted in magdalo sa pagbabago.

…Meralco rates should be reduced by up to 50% to bring it in line with the average in Asian power rates. One issue is the “incremental cost of capital” Meralco uses to massively cheat 4.2-M captive consumers – constantly escalating equipment costs to inflate its capital investment that never increased at all.

“To perpetualize this fraud Meralco induces top legislators, regulators and court judges to justify its system and jack up allowable profit from 5% decades ago to the present 15.4% … A previous Meralco sequestration was due to Meralco’s accounting practice that swindles government and the public. The Lopezescontaminate everything, even religion: “donating” land to the Jesuits’ Ateneo (brainwash its students) paid for by Meralco consumers – the Ateneo, Rockwell law school and new Ateneo medical school land beside Medical City on Ortigas Ave.

“The media too: ask Meralco director Christian Monsod’s wife at the Inquirer who’s so pro-Edsa Dos, that event that brought the IPP-PPA bonanza to the Lopezes. Ask 90% of radio and print commentarists who defend or keeping silent about Meralco abuses. On the courts, see the Philippine First Holdings Corporation website: “Former SC Chief Justice Panganiban as new director Mr. Angel Ong has resigned.” Readers may ask what’s wrong with this? I suggest – go to the December 2006 newspaper items about a certain “midnight decision” at the Supreme Court.

“Every discussion on electricity rates threatens to drown the layman in a sea of confusing figures, rule and regulation. The public must ask Gloria, her legislators, regulators and business cohorts the simplest question: “Why is the Philippines’ power rates the highest in Asia since afer Edsa Dos until today, and getting worse. What are you doing to bring the Philippines’ power rates to the reasonable and average rate prevalent in Asia – to keep our industries and our standard of living competitive and comparable to the rest?”

“It is not the Filipino people’s obligation, nor electricity consumers, to suffer for the benefit of Gloria and the power companies. Gloria’s SONA obviously recognizes the electric power rates problem as a major one, thus she spoke of “amending” the EPIRA’s on “open access”- but treating it as a legislative issue is intended to exhaust the last two minutes with a long dribble. It will just allow continuation of Meralco and its stockholders 4,000% earnings in fifteen years using only its consumers’ monthly payments – blood, sweat and tears – for exorbitant power rates.

“In 2001 the Lopezes, with other oligarchs, launched Gloria’s coup against an elected president. Seven years of socio-economic-political calamity followed as privatization concentrated political power in the profit-seeking elite. Gloria, the Lopezes and Meralco are emblematic of the sources of our nation’s seven years of calamity since Edsa Dos: systematic abuse of our people for unappeasable, insatiable, ravenous, criminal profit at the people’s expense. Our solution? Emergency “people power” through a consumers’ cooperative, returning control of Meralco to the people.”

so really gma and the lopezes are oligarchs-in-cahoots. gma owes the lopezes bigtime for anc’s part in edsa dos. the lopezes owe gma bigtime for privatizing and deregulating the energy industry. but manolo’s “gma has them by the balls over meralco” tells us that gma has the upper hand, she has the power to compel meralco, for the good of the whole, to bring down electricity rates or else.

but now that gma’s in trouble over nbn-zte-fg, the lopezes must be in a tizzy. what to do? in case she manages to hold on till 2010, it would be wise of the lopezes to hold off on joining the oust-gma bandwagon. but in case she doesn’t manage to hold on, it would be wise of them to be lobbying for noli de castro behind the scenes (as maybe they are), di ba, since he, too, owes abs-cbn bigtime.

no wonder anc is so clearly neither here nor there. or should i say, no wonder anc is so clearly here, and there.

it was not unexpected that the philippine national police would find for a gas explosion, not for an explosive device. matagal na nilang sinasabi that evidence was pointing to a critical build-up of gases that could have been prevented if the guys in charge were doing their job.

but it was unexpected that the police would recommend charges only against the engineers, operators, and fire prevention officers who were immediately responsible for safety measures, and not against the mall owner nor city hall. unexpected because matagal na silang naghi-hint that the the pnp was not beyond charging even ayala land and mayor binay for command responsibility if warranted. kaya na nga panay ang press release ng ayala land before this, contesting findings of a gas explosion and negligence.

puno‘s excuse:

“. .. it was just that repairing the malfunctioning sewage system was not the job of the owners while those who had been charged had immediate responsibility for the repairs of the sewage system.”

pero kaya nga tinawag na “command” responsibility, di ba. kahit hindi ka directly responsible for repairs, pero kung mga tao mo ang pumalpak – june july august pa lang daw me problema na ang sewage system – ibig sabihin may pagkukulang ka rin. kasi kung on-top-of-the-situation ka, kung maayos ang palakad mo, wala sanang pumalpak, wala sanang namatay at nasugatan.

i smell a rat. maybe a backroom ex-deal (puno style) between ayala and malacanang. hmm. maybe re charter change? or maybe that is still to come, and nagpapapogi lang ang palasyo sa mga ayala.

not that i’m completely sold on the negligence charge.

i was expecting that anc, as is usual with important developments, would have some resource persons, maybe an engineer or two, to share their expert opinions, but no, not this time. later in the evening ricky carandang devoted the whole hour of the big picture to the same story, but again we had to listen to the same pnp guys rehashing what we had already heard, with ricky just clarifying the double blast, the ayala investigations, and the rdx angle.

the biggest let-down of all, not just from anc but from all media is that no one has yet asked the BIG question posed by some bloggers and, i hear, science e-groups, soon after the blast: conceding, for the sake of argument, that it was indeed not a bomb but a gas explosion. WHAT IF it was not a matter of criminal negligence but, rather, a matter of creative criminal engineering? surely it is humanly possible to orchestrate such a blast? what would it take? why is it not being considered by the police as a distinct possibility?

nakakadismaya our media. no time to read, no time to research, no time for critical thinking. paano kasi, ang he-hectic ng buhay. bread trip. one show after another, one deadline after another, no time to read read read and google and surf the internet, much less to turn on to pinoy blogs, where some of the discourse is remarkably (happily) higher than in broadsheet and broadcast media.