so what was so big about the picture ricky carandang painted when he and his fellow media practitioners vergel santos, john nery, and juliet javellana talked about nothing but their small elitist corner of media where confidentiality between journalist and his/her sources is higher even than the national interest. newsstand.blogs.com even has the nerve to recap: “The journalistic privilege is indispensable to the free flow of information.”

oh please! free flow? you call that free? more like restricted, selective, problematic than free. in my book, the lowest kind of information.

i think jarius did the right thing. but it wasn’t the pros and cons of what he did that merited a whole show. it was what he said, the info he offered, added to info that emerged in the senatehearings, that media should be looking into. isip-isip naman, mga bata.

the question is no longer whether gma and/or the first gentleman were part of the fix — that’s already obvious, di ba, as obvious as her voice on the garci tapes. the question that media, and the senate, should be gnawing to the bone, instead of avoiding, if they are truly in the service of all filipinos, and not just of their publishers/networks and advertisers/sponsors and campaign contributors, is: do we really need a national broadband network?

because the answer is yes, never mind muna about the last mile chuchu. not only the government bureaucracy but we the people who already use cellphones and the internet but who find pldt and globe rather expensive as service providers would have a cheaper alternative in a national broadband network that’s run not for profit but for public service, lalo na kung di naman tayo pasosyal o tight ang ating budget at mababaw naman ang kaligayahan natin.

this is why pldt and globe are so against nbn in any kind of reincarnation, and ito na rin ang “razon” kung bakit pilit na sumasawsaw ang tycoons sa isang public service project. and so naghalo na ang balat sa tinalupan, kumbaga.

read manila times’ a backbone-breaking straw by benjamin g. defensor.

i disagree with senators like miriam and joker who say that senate hearings on the garci tapes and the zte-fg deal (no deal) are a waste of timeand resources. not at all. like the erap impeachment trial, i find them quite informative and educational, not only re the facts of each case, no matter how kulang-kulang, but also re congressional rituals and level of discourse, or quality of thought.

i also disagree with pundits who think that there is no outrage, no edsa cuatro, because people don’t care anymore, because people are done with edsas, thanks to that edsa kuno that gave us gma. on the contrary. i think there is outrage and disgust, but that’s not all that’s needed to get people moving.

in 1986 we at least knew enough about the excesses of the conjugal dictatorship and the cheating in the snap election, thanks to the mosquito press, and mababaw ang kaligayahan natin, mapatalsik lang si macoy okay na, bahala na. in 2001 we at least knew enough about the jueteng pay-offs and the bank accounts, thanks to the live broadcasts and replays of the impeachment trial.and mababaw pa rin ang kaligayahan natin, mapatalsik lang si erap okay na, bahala na.

this time people are thinking muna before moving. hindi na mababaw ang kaligayan nila. next time they want real change. and they don’t know enough, they need to know more, to make informed decisions. so anc’s live broadcasts of the senate hearings are invaluable. people can see, hear, for themselves about the cheating and stealing that’s going on, and sometimes, sometimes, the senators ask good questions that expand the mind and raise understanding a notch.

every little helps.