“Congenital liar” ATBP #MartyrNOTMurderer

Sorry natagalan itong pangako kong next post na WHO’S “THE CONGENITAL LIAR”?  I had actually decided to wait until the film is released. Baka naman kako yan mismo ang pinapa-cut out ng Viva Films, yung sinabi ni Marcos nang face-to-face kay Ninoy na “congenital liar” siya, na isinalin into “Napakasinungaling mong tao!”

Ang knee-jerk response ko was, wow! nagsalita ang hindi sinungaling, sabay flash back, running through things Marcos had lied about over some 50 years, of which parang there are too many to mention so I decided ‘wag na lang, too much work tracking down documented sources that I don’t have time for right now. Besides it might be taken to mean I’m agreeing that Ninoy was a liar, too, which I’m not, not at all.

Right now, all I have time for is to note down, for the record, two specific items that Viva is reportedly wanting to cut out, and “congenital liar” is not one of them.

Adobo Chronicles’ star correspondent Jake D. caught up with the controversial director while he was dining at Mang Inasal. It turns out that the scene Viva Films wanted to cut was that of Ferdinand E. Marcos singing “Pamulinawen” to a tickled Imelda Marcos.

Yap told AC that he will not agree to censoring history and reality in any of his films. https://adobochronicles.com/2023/02/10/why-director-darryl-yap-almost-quit-martyr-or-murderer/

Natawa ako because, of course, we boomers are reminded of Dovie Beams and the audio tape that had a man who sounded very much like Marcos singing the same song to her at bedtime. Pero puwede naman na in happier days Marcos did also sing “Pamulinawen” to Imelda, as it is an Ilocano ditty of courtship and love. Puwede naman.

But this other one, Viva has a point. And here’s the director refusing to remove it:

I am about to give up.
If Viva insists on removing this sequence I’ve been fighting for 2 hours;
let them remove me as well.
don’t show it if it’s not included.
Tired. Motherfucker.
I just want to tell a story, there’s evidence,
may source, may basis!
I DON’T WANT A DIRECTOR’S CUT.
MARCH 1 must contain the ONLY CUT.
GOD!
#MoMNOCUTS
https://www.facebook.com/YouthAndPower2016/

And here he is saying why he is fighting the cut:

When I said, MARCOS did not kill AQUINO—
I meant it with certainty, I know it 100%
and if you symphatize with the former Senator, you will realize we are all entitled to know the whole truth; for his supporters’ peace, for the justice we all deserve to feel.
So who really did it?
#MARTYRorMURDERER HOLDS THE ANSWER.
https://www.facebook.com/YouthAndPower2016/

Grabe. He is 100 % sure that Marcos did not kill Ninoy. Ang sarap sana patulan. But for now the better part of valor is to wait, and see kung anong context. Kasi puwede naman talagang sabihin with 100 % certainty na Marcos did not kill Ninoy. I’m sure marami sa atin ang 100 % sure na hindi si Marcos mismo ang bumaril kay Ninoy on the 21st of August 1983. Pero malinaw ang 1984 Agrava Reports, Majority and Minority, that Ninoy was shot on the stairs by one of his military escorts, not on the tarmac by Galman, and that it was a military conspiracy on top of which was Ver who we all know was a Marcos stooge.  Certainly, 100 %, kay Marcos at kay Ver ang command responsibility.

What we might be seeing is a whole new genre, first with Maid in Malacañang, now with Martyr or Murderer:  creative-fiction-based-on-facts-taken-out-of-context, if that’s what it turns out to be.

Mga Kuwentong Marites  #NinoyImelda #NinoyFerdinand

Umiikot ngayon sa tiktok ang isang video na pinost ng isang empanadaeditx tungkol sa “one of the most controversial chismis of the history” (sic) that the upcoming Darryl Yap film, Martyr or Murderer, “might tackle” daw.

Might pa lang? Kung sabagay, medyo sablay ang tsismis:

i  That back in the 1950s Ninoy was courting Imelda who “wasn’t wealthy or powerful” and Ninoy’s family disapproved of the relationship “in favor of Cory Aquino” and so he turned his eye to Cory, whose father was “a wealthy politician and businessman of Tarlac”.

ii  That “As Ferdinand and Ninoy became friends before, as they went (sic) in the same fraternity, Ferdinand actually helped Ninoy get heart surgery, with Imelda’s help.”

ANG TOTOO

NINOY & IMELDA were dating for a while but not exclusively. They were both playing the field.  That Ninoy later started dating Cory exclusively was not because his family disapproved of Imelda but because he fell in love with Cory who was, among other things, a math major, minor in French. As for Imelda the beauty queen, the story is that she was actually in love with a certain Nakpil when Ferdinand swept her off her feet in that whirlwind courtship of 11 days. (Read Nick Joaquin’s book on the Aquinos, and Betsy Romualdez Francia’s on Imelda.)

ANG TOTOO

NINOY & MARCOS were never friends in the true sense of the word. They were both Upsilonians but Marcos was batch 1937 and Ninoy batch 1950; hindi sila nag-abot sa U.P.  Sabi ni Kiko Pangilinan sa Twitter: “Pareho naming silang brods kahit na magkasalungat ang kanilang pulitika.” Marcos considered Ninoy his political nemesis, a threat to his dream of dynasty and reigning forever and ever. Kaya niya ito ikinulong. And when Ninoy urgently needed heart surgery, he didn’t agree to let Ninoy fly to Texas out of friendship or generosity but out of political expediency.

SANDRA BURTON. Although Marcos was reluctant to let Aquino leave the country, Imelda was quick to see the advantage of the proposal. “If he is operated on here and he dies, everyone will think there was monkey business,” she remarked. On the other hand, if he were flown to the U.S., the Marcoses could wash their hands of the troublesome prisoner. She won the argument, as she often did. [Impossible Dream page 107]

LUMANG TUGTUGIN. Dati nang ipinipilit ng Marcos propagandists na, dahil magkaibigan ang dalawa, imposibleng may kinalaman si Marcos sa pagpatay kay Ninoy. Sinabi pa nga daw ni Marcos sa kanyang generals na “my best successor is Ninoy.” But it was only a statement of fact (meant to agitate the generals into a conspiracy, I imagine), and not a statement of intent. Ang totoo, matagal na niyang naipangako ang puwesto kay Imelda.

RAYMOND BONNER. On June 7, 1975, in his own tiny scrawl, Marcos wrote out Presidential Decree Number 731. “By virtue of the powers vested in me . . . , I, Ferdinand E. Marcos, hereby decree” that “in the event of my death or permanent incapacity,” a commission shall exercise power. And the chairman of the commission, he also decreed, shall be “Mrs. Imelda R. Marcos.” [Waltzing with a Dictator, 156. See also Imelda Marcos: The Rise and Fall of One of the World’s Most Powerful Women by Carmen Navarro Pedrosa]

NEXT: WHO’S THE “CONGENITAL LIAR”?

‘Ubuntu’ and the Ateneo debaters’ historic win

Here’s hoping that Ateneo shares video and transcripts of the debate.  Let the conversation continue.  #darksideofUbuntu

RANDY DAVID

… The victory of Ateneo de Manila University’s debaters in the World Universities Debating Championship 2023 on Jan. 3 in Madrid, Spain, may be regarded as the present-day equivalent of the achievements that Rizal lavishly praised among his contemporaries. He would have been the first to recognize the significance of this feat.

Like anyone who marvels at the force of a good argument and tries to understand how it works, I, too, wanted to know how the team of Ateneo students David Africa and Tobi Leung formulated their argument. Here I quote from an online report: “The Ateneo team debated against the proposition that it is preferable to have a ‘world where all persons have a strong belief in the philosophy of Ubuntu.’”

“Ubuntu”—I had heard that word before. Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa first popularized it in his explanation of the objectives of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which he headed in post-apartheid South Africa. Ubuntu must inspire the commission, he said, as it pursues its difficult and complex work. A person with Ubuntu, he wrote in his book “No Future Without Forgiveness,” is “open and available to others, affirming of others.” Ubuntu makes him/her aware they are part of a greater whole.

Yet when I googled the word, the first entry that appeared referred to the open-source Linux operating system, which allows and promotes the free exchange of software. Ubuntu was indeed the name given to the free Linux operating system found in computers that refuse to bow to the commercialization of software exemplified by Microsoft and Apple. It was a subtle dig at the privileging of private profits over the larger needs of the community.

Clearly, the meanings associated with “Ubuntu” were all positive. Therefore, to argue against Ubuntu philosophy would be like arguing against the primacy of community or humanity, or God Himself. Coming from a school that prides itself in the formation of “men for others,” the Ateneo debaters could not have picked a side more opposed to the core Christian values in which they were bred.

But like the eloquent debaters they obviously are, Africa and Leung took up the challenge, and prevailed, by highlighting the dark and dangerous side of Ubuntu. This dark side is seen in the widespread tendency to justify tyranny in the name of some abstract community good.

Here is the news report of how the Ateneo team argued its position: “‘These obligations manifest badly … They always will,’ Africa said in his argument. He cited the difficulty of speaking up against the status quo, of people having less time to explore their own identity, and possible escalation of conflict.”

Leung chimed in with a more emphatic depiction of Ubuntu’s dark twin: “Community is a shackle that alienates you from your very sense of self, discourages you from discovering your own preference, and emboldens the worst forms of tyranny.” He was named the second-best speaker in the tournament.

Ubuntu is not exclusively an African value; it is also at the heart of the communitarian ideology behind the so-called “Asian values.” It is what Singapore’s leaders, for example, assert when, in the name of strategic national goals, they must counter their citizens’ growing clamor for greater individual liberties, for individualism can be equally pernicious.

Indeed, in the modern world, it has often become a warrant to allow the untrammeled rapaciousness of the market. Perhaps, the French philosopher Michel Foucault said it best. In his preface to the anti-fascist manifesto “Anti-Oedipus,” he wrote: “Do not demand of politics that it restore the ‘rights’ of the individual, as philosophy has defined them. The individual is the product of power. What is needed is to ‘de-individualize’ by means of multiplication and displacement, diverse combinations.”

Instead of the sheer quest for individual liberties, what is most needed in today’s world is the kind of freedom that encourages openness to the diverse affiliations that our common humanity offers.

 

Curb your nuclear enthusiasm some more

By BEN KRITZ

SINCE the recent “breakthrough” in nuclear fusion technology on closer examination turns out to be one small step on a path that will still take decades to travel, it is natural to wonder if there are perhaps other forms of nuclear energy that offer the prospect of being useful within the next couple of years. Energy policymakers and industry players here and elsewhere throughout the region are certainly hoping so. The Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia and Myanmar have all recently announced ambitions to pursue nuclear energy, and Japan has just lately reversed its nuclear decommissioning policy adopted in the aftermath of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami disaster.

Of those countries, Japan has the best chance of making practical use of nuclear energy before the end of the decade, because it already has an extensive conventional nuclear infrastructure and the knowhow to operate it. The downside of that is that the Japanese public may not be particularly supportive — experiencing the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl tends to temper people’s excitement — and even before the tsunami-induced Fukushima catastrophe, Japan for all its talent had a rather spotty record when it comes to nuclear safety. Japan’s nuclear plants (excluding Fukushima) are not really the problem, but the rest of the infrastructure — fuel processing and waste disposal — has experienced a number of serious, and in several cases fatal accidents.

It is that “rest of the infrastructure,” the extensive systems and processes necessary for the construction and operation of any kind of nuclear plant, that nuclear energy advocates here in the Philippines, even the fools still holding out hope for the operation of the Bronze Age-vintage Bataan Nuclear Power Plant, stubbornly ignore. In every country with legitimate experience in nuclear energy, whether it’s Japan, or the US, or France, or Korea, it is in those parts of the bigger system where things go wrong, often and with significant cost.

Since 1952, when the partial meltdown of Canada’s experimental NRX reactor became what is considered the first civilian nuclear accident, there have been 122 known accidents rated 1 or higher on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES), an average of about one every seven weeks; 38 of those have been rated 4 or higher, which is considered “serious” or worse. These are just the accidents related to nuclear power; radiation accidents involving medical or other industrial systems are not included, but number in the hundreds.

The broad safety risks are something the Philippines is going to have to come to terms with, sooner or later; if the government and energy sector doesn’t do it sooner, which would obviously be preferable, some mistake will inevitably compel them to do so later. Fortunately, it seems the country will have the time to do things right — that is, develop an actual regulatory structure and enforceable safety standards before deploying nuclear power — simply because that other magical MacGuffin of nuclear technology everyone believes they will just be able to buy and plug in, the so-called small modular reactor (SMR) systems, has hit a number of development obstacles that will delay its practical application for years.

Another dud?

Recent agreements that the Philippines has sought have all been based on the assumption that SMRs are the most sensible direction for the country’s hoped-for foray into nuclear energy. Last month, the US announced it would begin discussions with the Philippines on a “123 agreement,” a prerequisite (from Section 123 of the US Atomic Energy Act) for the transfer of civilian nuclear technology. In addition, the US also announced that it would supply both the Philippines and Thailand with SMR technology, although no additional details were disclosed. It was also reported earlier this month that Meralco, the nation’s largest distribution utility, has announced it is applying for a grant from the US government to conduct a feasibility study for the use of SMRs.

SMRs, which are derived from small power plants used in ships and submarines, are touted as being more versatile, cheaper, more reliable, and producing less dangerous waste than conventional plants. On paper, they make some sense for the Philippines; their typical design size of around 100 megawatts (MW) capacity make them a good alternative to truly stupid generation sources such as oil or diesel for small islands and other isolated areas.

The problem is, all those benefits proven in naval applications — at least in the US; other countries, particular Russia, have had some issues — have not yet exactly translated well to the commercial concept everyone is so excited about.

The biggest hang-up, as is always the case with any version of nuclear power, is cost, and the issue is serious enough that it might completely kill development of SMRs in the US. On December 14, the trade journal Energy Wire reported that the most advanced (in terms of progress toward actual certification and deployment) project in the US, one being built by NuScale Power Corp. and Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS), is facing a vote by UAMPS members and utilities in six other Western states as early as next month as to whether the project should continue.

The project, which hopes to have the first of six 77-MW reactors operational by 2029, has seen its levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) soar to near $58 per megawatt-hour. The vote of the utility backers will be automatically triggered when $58 is reached, and if enough of them pull out — the effect of a “no” vote would be a utility’s opting out of purchasing electricity from the project when it is completed — its funding would effectively disappear.

The second big problem with SMRs, surprisingly, turns out to be waste management. As SMRs are, well, small, it has always been assumed that the amount of radioactive waste they would produce would be much smaller than a conventional nuclear plant, and therefore easier to safely store or dispose.

That, however, does not seem to be the case. Two fairly recent studies of unimpeachable credibility — one published this past May by Stanford University and another released last month by the US Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory — reached the similar conclusion that SMRs are not particularly “clean” with regard to waste generation, especially the type — the design used by the already cost-challenged NuScale project — that is considered the closest to being commercially viable.

“Our results show that most small modular reactor designs will actually increase the volume of nuclear waste in need of management and disposal, by factors of 2 to 30 for the reactors in our case study,” Stanford’s lead researcher said. In its press release, Argonne’s senior lead nuclear engineer said, “All told, when it comes to nuclear waste, SMRs are roughly comparable with conventional pressurized water reactors.”

The difference between the two studies’ conclusions is the point of view their respective authors take toward the findings, which can probably be overlooked since the results are what they are. Stanford’s opinion is that “overall, small modular designs are inferior to conventional reactors with respect to radioactive waste generation, management requirements, and disposal options.” Argonne’s lead expert, on the other hand, suggested that “there appear to be no additional major challenges to the management of SMR nuclear wastes compared to the commercial-scale large LWR (light water reactor) wastes.”

ben.kritz@manilatimes.net