winnie monsod & BNPP

got an email with attachment 4 days ago from dr. floro quibuyen, anthropologist and political scientist, greatly concerned about dr. solita “winnie” monsod’s inquirer column where she supports in no uncertain terms mark cojuangco’s push to activate the bataan nuclear processing plant, post-fukushima, published march 18.

quibuyen wrote a 5-page researched reply, and sent the inquirer a 2-page version that has not been published to date.

Despite my repeated attemps at contacting the Inquirer (and submitting a shorter 2-paged version), the PDI refuses to respond, let alone publish my paper. I’d appreciate it if you can pass it on to your readers and interested individuals and groups. Critical comments are of course welcome.

WHEN WILL THEY EVER LEARN?
A REPLY TO DR. SOLITA MONSOD

Floro Quibuyen, PhD
Croydon, Greater Sydney, Australia
25 March 2011

It is stunning how Dr. Solita Monsod, UP economics professor, in her March 18, 2011 Philippine Daily Inquirer column, could wholeheartedly endorse Mark Cojuangco’s recent claim that what happened to the Fukushima Dai’ichi Nuclear Processing Plant would not have happened to the Bataan Nuclear Processing Plant had the same magnitude of earthquake and tsunami occurred at Subic Bay. The notion that BNPP can be safe has been debunked two years ago by Dr. Kelvin Rodolfo (Professor Emeritus, Dept. of Earth & Environmental Sciences, Univ. of Illinois at Chicago) in a well documented and widely distributed paper—Geological Hazards of the Bataan Nuclear Plant: Propaganda and Scientific Fact (2009)—as well as in well-attended public fora.

Yet, Monsod persists in trumpeting Cojuangco’s call for a revived BNPP, unmindful of the fact that this call has been based on wrong presuppositions. This is evident even in Cojuangco’s new claims, as reported approvingly by Monsod:

Claim 1. Well, says Cojuangco, for one thing, the BNPP is built on a hilltop, 18 meters above sea level, so no tsunami could have touched it. Is this a big deal? Yes, because the FNPP problems were caused by the tsunami that followed the earthquake

One wonders why Monsod blindly believes all that Mark Cojuangco says. While it is true that the BNPP is 18 meters above sea level, it does not follow that “no tsunami could have touched it.” I’ve emailed Dr. Kelvin Rodolfo regarding Cojuangco’s claim. He replied, Im a marine geologist who has studied Subic Bay and its tectonics. But even I cannot predict a tsunami height there. But bear in mind that the 2004 tsunami was 33 meters high, and that the record tsunami height (Lituya Bay, Alaska, 1958) was 524 m [or 1720 feet]!

Aside from the real possibility that a tsunami could swamp the BNPP, so many other things can happen that could damage or disable the reactor’s cooling system—precisely what triggered the overheating, fires and explosions at the Fukushima Dai’ichi nuclear power plant (FDNPP). As Dr. Kelvin Rodolfo notes,

A disruption would not be very difficult: Failure of a pump or valve, rupture of a pipe, an inattentive or sleepy technician, an electrical brownout or power surge… Not much of a task for an even moderate earthquake, let alone an eruption.

Claim 2. Because the BNPP was designed to withstand a seismic load (definition: the force on a structure caused by acceleration induced on its mass by an earthquake) of 0.4g, while the FNPP was designed to a seismic load of only 0.18g. Cojuangco also points out that the FNPP did not crumble despite the fact that the earthquake was stronger than its design basis, because apparently nuclear plants are built conservatively with “overkill „safety factors‟.

The integrity of the structure of the reactor is not the only issue. Indeed, as what happened to the FDNPP shows, the Achilles heel of a nuclear reactor is its cooling system. Failure to keep the fuel rods, as well as the spent fuel rods from overheating would lead to a meltdown. Rodolfo explains,

The spent fuel rods must be kept immersed in a pool of water, typically 40 by 40 feet in area and 40 feet deep. Millions of gallons of water must flow through the plant every day not only to cool the reactor core, but also to absorb the radiation in the spent-fuel pool. There, the radiation energy is removed and transformed into heat. But the heated water must be continually replenished with cool ocean water. Interruption of that water supply could be catastrophic.

The spent fuel rods are armored with a zirconium alloy. If the pool water were lost, the armor of the newest spent-fuel assembly would ignite, and in turn could ignite adjacent fuel assemblies. Once started, the fire would be virtually impossible to put out. Spraying it with water would only make it worse, because even more heat is generated when zirconium reacts with steam. A fire and explosion in the spent fuel storage pool could release huge volumes of radioactive gases to the atmosphere, including much radioactive cesium-137, which is water-soluble and extremely toxic in minute amounts.

Claim 3. Cojuangco mentions that while the FNPP is a BWR (Boiling Water Reactor) with only one cooling circuit, the BNPP is a PWR [Pressurized Water Reactor] with two separate and distinct cooling circuits. The additional isolation apparently makes for “more forgiving of extreme situations” although the tradeoff is a reduction in efficiency (4 percent).

Having two separate and distinct cooling circuits is not a guarantee that the cooling system will never be disrupted—whether by an earthquake, a tsunami, or a volcanic eruption.

And why does Monsod keep repeating the already refuted idea that the BNPP is in an isolated site? In his paper, Rodolfo has already exposed and corrected Cojuangco’s misunderstandings, if not sheer ignorance of the geological context pertaining to the site of the BNPP.

To mention a few: BNPP is not just ten kilometers from Mt. Natib, which constitutes more than the entire northern half of the Bataan Peninsula. Its base is below sea level. The BNPP site is on the flank of the volcano, at Napot Point; the last eruption of Mt.Natib is not between 11,000 and 18,000 years ago—In the years since Marcos decided to go nuclear, many more earthquakes have occurred in the vicinity of the BNPP. From 1973 to 2008, the U.S. Geological Survey has located many earthquakes of moderate magnitude in the vicinity of the BNPP, one of them directly under Napot Point, like the one mentioned by Hernandez and Santos in 1977; the fact that the BNPP does not sit directly over a fault does not mean that it will never be threatened by an earthquake—Manileňos need to know that a major earthquake on the West Marikina Valley fault would probably be most damaging not along the fault zone itself, but in places built on natural and artificial bay fill kilometers away, like Tondo and the Asia Mall. The earthquake damage directly along the trace of a fault is usually minor compared to the total damage in the affected area.We must remember that the great 1990 earthquake in Nueva Ecija greatly damaged Baguio and Dagupan, cities 100 kilometers away from the epicenter; the idea that the farthest a volcanic mass can travel is six times the elevation of the volcano is true only with respect to landslides—During an eruption, pyroclastic flows — dense mixtures of explosion debris and very hot gases — can surge great distances down the volcano flanks at hurricane speeds, searing and obliterating everything in their paths. These are not landslides! to bruit about the notion that the BNPP is safe because it withstood the 1990 Luzon quake and the 1991 Pinatubo eruption is absurd; the plant was not running! Think of the spent fuel pool and high-tension cables of an operating plant; etc.

One has to actually read Rodolfo’s paper, backed by peer reviewed scientific studies, to realize the full extent of Cojuangco’s numerous egregious inaccuracies and misunderstandings of geology, if not outright distortions of the scientific data.

It takes one’s breath away how Monsod can concoct, without any qualms, this spin:

Cojuangco’s views are a welcome relief from the rush to judgment that has apparently gripped any number of people, led and fed of course by the so-called “anti-nukes.” But that does not excuse the inaccuracies being bruited about to bolster the anti-nuke position. Thankfully, Science and Technology Secretary Mario Montejo and Sen. Miriam Santiago refuse to be stampeded.

On top of this, Monsod gushes over Cojuangco’s credibility and intentions:

Cojuangco is credible, because he has no financial interest in any activity related to the issue, his main concern being how to make the country more competitive by lowering its energy costs, not to mention reduce its pollution. Moreover, he has done a lot of homework on the subject.

Of course only God in his infinite wisdom and mercy can tell whether Cojuangco indeed has no financial interest relating to the revival of the BNPP, but we mortals can at least ascertain if it is indeed true that the BNPP would lower the Philippines’ energy cost and reduce its pollution.

Today, it costs US$12B just to build a nuclear plant. But let us assume that the Philippines needs only one plant, and that all that is needed is to make the BNPP operational. It is said that refurbishing the BNPP will cost only $2B (or 86 Billion Php), but this does not include the cost of its maintenance and operation, let alone the uranium that is needed to make it operational. As Rodolfo has pointed out, the Philippines does not have uranium, and so it will be importing, most likely, from Australia. Moreover, we should also consider how much it will cost to decommission a nuclear plant, once it has reached its expiry date—the costs are huge, according to environmentalist and consumer advocate Ralph Nader. How much will be the total cost of rebuilding, operating and maintaining the BNPP?

Not only does it cost too much, nuclear power is just too risky. That is why, in the USA, observes Nader, “nuclear power is uninsurable in the private insurance market” and “Wall Street will not finance new nuclear plants without a 100% taxpayer loan guarantee. (Nader, 2011)

Is the BNPP pollution free? The fact that the BNPP (like the Fukushima Dai’ichi Power Plant) was built on the coast, next to the sea, had a reason—massive amounts of water has to be pumped into the reactor to cool it. But ignored by Congressman Cojuangco and economist Monsod is something environmentally crucial— “the impact,” notes Rodolfo, “of millions of gallons of seawater heated and released every day on Subic Bay and adjacent coastal environments and ecosystems should BNPP be operated.” Rodolfo asks, “Does an Environmental Impact Statement for BNPP include an evaluation of such questions?”

Finally, is the BNPP the best option in making the Philippines competitive? Even the more prudent among advocates for a revived BNPP—notably Mark Cojuangco’s wife and replacement in Congress, Kimi Cojuangco, who, unlike Monsod, realizes that the disaster at Japan’s FDNPP has dealt a death blow to her husband’s pet project—have not given up on their conviction that a revived Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) “is one way out of poverty,” and that there is “no other alternative that could offer cheap and stable source of power” [Bill seeking BNPP revival shelved By Lira Dalangin-Fernandez inquirer.net]

In fact there is a better alternative—solar power!

Author, inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil—who became famous for predicting that the internet would emerge by the 1990s, that a computer would beat the best human chess player by 1998 (Deep Blue beat Kasparov in 1997), and that the IT would facilitate the spread of information that would accelerate the collapse of the Soviet Union—is now predicting that solar energy will soon be able to compete economically with fossil fuels.

Kurzweil is not looking at the crystal ball, he is deriving his predictions from his law of accelerating returns:

One of my primary theses is that information technologies grow exponentially in capability and power and bandwidth and so on. If you buy an iPhone today, it‟s twice as good as two years ago for half that cost. That is happening with solar energy — it is doubling every two years. And it didn‟t start two years ago, it started 20 years ago. Every two years we have twice as much solar energy in the world.

Today, solar is still more expensive than fossil fuels, and in most situations it still needs subsidies or special circumstances, but the costs are coming down rapidly — we are only a few years away from parity. And then it‟s going to keep coming down, and people will be gravitating towards solar, even if they don‟t care at all about the environment, because of the economics. … People say we‟re running out of energy. That‟s only true if we stick with these old 19th century technologies. We are awash in energy from the sunlight.

Ralph Nader observes that concerned scientists are saying much the same thing:

Nuclear power is both uneconomical and unnecessary. It can‟t compete against energy conservation, including cogeneration, wind power and ever more efficient, quicker, safer, renewable forms of providing electricity. Amory Lovins argues this point convincingly (see RMI.org). Physicist Lovins asserts that nuclear power “will reduce and retard climate protection.” His reasoning: shifting the tens of billions invested in nuclear power to efficiency and renewables reduce far more carbon per dollar. Peter Bradford, a former Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) commissioner has also made a compelling case against nuclear power on economic and safety grounds. [http://www.nirs.org/factsheet/whynewnukesareriskyfcts.pdf] [Nuclear Nightmare by Ralph Nader]

Indeed, as Kurzweil has pointed out, the nuclear reactor is fundamentally a 19th century technology—the steam engine. It uses nuclear fission—which was originally developed to create, at the height of World War II, what was then the most powerful weapon of mass destruction—to produce the steam that would turn the turbines of an electric generator. Given the lessons of the tragedy of the Fukushima Dai’ichi Nuclear Power Plant, it is time to discard this 19th century model, and turn to solar power and other renewables.

Postscript

When a reputed professor of economics argues, without shame or embarrassment, that it is the anti-nukes who bruit about “inaccuracies” and “rush to judgment”, when otherwise intelligent people like DOST secretary Mario Montejo and Sen. Miriam Santiago “refuse to be stampeded” into the anti-nuke position, one wonders what is driving their dogged push for the revival of the BNPP? We can be sure it’s not scientific reasoning and knowledge, much less the lessons of history. Perhaps something else is at stake—something so compelling that not even the scientific findings of distinguished scientists and the currently unfolding horror at Fukushima can make them think more sensibly and responsibly.

Could this unstated agenda, whatever it is, be the reason why the DOST abruptly, without explanation, ended the balik scientist program? Was it to discourage the likes of Dr. Kelvin Rodolfo from coming to the Philippines and providing scientific support to the anti-nuke activists loathed by Monsod (which, by the way, includes several progressive lawmakers, environmental groups and the Church led by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines)? There’s the rub!

END

Contact info: Floro Quibuyen
quibuyen01@yahoo.com
Australia mobile number: 0410031093
Phil Globe roaming: 09273986728

persecuting willie

so i’ve just been called a pedophile on facebook because i protested against a poster of a goodlooking teenage boy in the briefest of white briefs in macho-dance pose.   says the poster:

WILLIE’S SUMMER DANCE STUDIO PRESENTS
MACHO DANCING FOR BOYS!

Learn to shake hips
& pick up customers
Parents can make up
to $1K a week
And it’s free!

A Corporate Social Responsibility Project of:
PROCTOR @ GAMBLE, JOLLIBEE, UNILEVER, PEPSODENT, VASELINE, OISHI, CDO, SURF DETERGENT, TECHNOMARINE, CAMELLA’S HOMES, LHUILLER AND OTHER OUTSTANDING COMPANIES WHO SPONSOR WILLIE’S DANCING CONTESTS FOR BOYS!

HURRY! CLASSES LIMITED! CALL MANNY PANGILINAN AT CHANNEL 5 TODAY. GUARANTEED CUSTOMERS FOR YOUR BOY AFTER CLASSES!

quite offended i commented that the poster was too too much!   totally unfair to willie and his sponsors!   that the 6 year old was the one who wanted to go on tv to show off his dance routine.   he had done it many times before elsewhere, even in school, and was rewarded and lauded for it.   that willie was just as surprised as everyone.   and that we’re imposing our sensibilities on the masa, sensibilities that they don’t share.   whats indecent to us may not be indecent to them.   that there’s clearly a class divide here.

and that’s when one of the commenters said i must be a pedophile, or a media executive, which at the moment daw are the same thing.   i’d cut and paste that comment except that it was deleted by the commenter soon after i replied: oh wow, this is not an intelligent conversation. signing off…   the downside of social media: having to deal with the whole spectrum, from the stupid, sometimes irrational, many times unthinking, to the intelligent and creative and occasionally sublime comments that any blog, tweet, or fb status is open to, especially when one is in a major major disagreement with a lynch mob, such as the kick-out-willie movement.

of course because it’s been sensationalized to the max, mainstream media are taking up what social media started.   the inquirer has it on the front page: Willie treatment of dancing boy ‘criminal’ says the broadsheet. Revillame treatment of dancing boy in tears criminal–CHR says the online version.

MANILA, Philippines—What the show “Willing Willie” did to Jan-Jan Suan, the 6-year-old boy who was told to simulate a striptease while in tears in exchange for cash in front of a cheering studio audience, was criminal, the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) said Tuesday.

The CHR said it would investigate the episode as it appeared to have violated a law protecting children.

“The commission will investigate this incident in order to identify the person/s liable and to recommend proper legal actions against them,” it said in a statement.

what’s scandalizing to me is the CHR’s, or is it the inquirer‘s? summary of the situation:  “the 6-year-old boy who was told to simulate a striptease while in tears in exchange for cash in front of a cheering studio audience…”

this makes it seem like willie told the boy, o sumayaw ka ng “striptease”, bibigyan kita ng pera.   when in fact it’s not the way it happened at all.   anyone who watches willing willie would know that the kid would have been given money, kahit ano pang isinayaw niya, lalo na with tears effect, which was not because he was feeling “humiliated.”   anyone who has taken the time to check out the story and really watch the youtube video en toto, and then watched the interviews of the boy and his parents in the following days, would know that it was the production staff’s responsibility, and that they had toned it down na nga, pinalitan nila yung music na dala ng bata, which was hayden kho’s “careless whisper”.

also, it was nothing close to a striptease.   there was no shedding of clothing or suggestion thereof.   does the CHR, or the inquirer, even know what macho dancing is like?   it’s no different from what little girls dancing like sex bomb dancers do.

karen cardenas reflects: …on The Dance and what we impose on it. He was fully dressed, he was making movements, he wasn’t provocative. What is the difference from ocho-ocho or for heaven’s sake, the grind or tahitian or dirty dancing or lambada? Kasi pang “macho dancer”? Bakit niyo minamaliit ang macho dancer? —facebook 29 march

of course the next question posed is: why didn’t willie stop it right away, after he had seen the macho-dancer routine.   why did he let it go on and on?   it was so inappropriate, so offensive, and what about the little boy, kawawa naman, umiiyak na nga, yada yada yada

willie tried to explain, everyone was having a good time, the father, the aunt, even the boy, who gamely danced everytime he heard his music instead of running away when he had 10k na in his pocket — i mean you know, if he was aware enough to feel oppressed by what he was doing, he would have been smart enough to get off that stage the moment he got the money, okay na, panalo na, but he didn’t.

everyone was having a good time.   the first time i saw it, natawa rin ako.   natawa ako sa bata, natawa ako kay willie, natawa ako sa audience.   of course i knew by then that there was an uproar over it in social media, so i was also thinking omg yes it’s the sort of thing na pagdidiskitahan ng opus deis and couples for christ and their ilk.   still i could relate to the laughter, what fun to break out of the norm, do something different, even, defy a sexual taboo, mwahaha!   and susmayorsep alam kaya ng batang ito kung sinong sumasayaw ng ganyan?   mwahahaha!   sana hindi!    mwahahaha!

read karen’s Willie, Humiliation

… when Willie makes jokes, is it to humiliate the contestants, to make them feel lowly, inferior, or is there a collective humility in all of them, an unspoken awareness that it’s open season. Laugh at me, make fun of me, because it’s just one big hilarious joke, everything we are doing here. It’s one big show, and it isn’t real.

Willie, from what i have heard, came from the same situation as his contestants. He was, as far as the stories go, also struggling in life before he became rich and famous. My guess is he, like his guests, understands self-deprecation, he knows what it is like to laugh at himself, at his situation.

Feeling humiliated may not be something they concern themselves with because their lives are hard enough, and if they can have a little fun in an arena meant for them, why not? Don’t Pinoys love to laugh, even at themselves?

and if we go even deeper, and attribute more intelligence to the masa, the poor, the lower class, i daresay the exploitation wasn’t one-way.   sure, the capitalists exploit the masa with this sort of show, but it is just as possible that the boy’s family had read into the system of the gameshow and thought:  this is the way to go, we do something different, we do something a little naughty, we make more money.   depende sa perspective.   which is only to say that there are no absolutes here, and willie does not deserve the wholesale villification and opprobrium.

it is so clear now how hated willie, hero of the masses, is by the know-it-all self-righteous self-proclaimed pundits of social media, led it would seem by fellow celebrities in the showbiz industry who just can’t stand being upstaged by a willie revillame na hindi naman guapo, walang ka-class-class, pero tumatabo on primetime tv and in opm CDs, laban kayo?

because hey, the masses love him, he’s one of them, just a little smarter and luckier, and i’m sure they love that he is medyo bastos, which is, wittingly or un-, an up-yours to the moralist establishment that is at the root of their poverty.

and speaking of bastos, sino ba talagang bastos.   di ba mas bastos yung nag-upload ng video of the little boy sa youtube?   di ba mas bastos ang nag-upload ng poster sa facebook, na natanggap ko rin sa email, for the sake of the little boy daw?   what kind of caring is that?

like katrina says of the offensive poster:

sinong bastos ngayon?
no really, lalabanan ninyo si Willie Revillame by doing this?
how crass. how un-intelligent. how irresponsible can you get.

post EDSA: what happened to gen. tadiar

last feb 28, after reading doronila’s and de quiros’s inquirer columns of the day, i wrote a letter to the editor saying that they were only partly right, attributing EDSA to the courage of the people on the streets; the same with former president fvr who attributed it to the split military.   i pointed out that they neglected to give credit to the loyalist marines general artemio tadiar and colonel braulio balbas who were given the kill-order but defied their superiors.   i said they were the unsung heroes of EDSA and they were more heroic than the soldiers who defected and then hid behind the skirts of nuns and other civilians.

inquirer published it eight days later with the title Edsa I’s unsung heroes more heroic than defectors.   three days later i got an email from glenn tadiar, son of gen. tadiar, thanking me for the kind words and relating what happened to his father post-EDSA.   i asked if i could post his response in my blog and he said yes, but on second thought i suggested he send it first to the inquirer, they just might publish it, and i would post it then.   it’s been 16 days, and inquirer might never publish it – medyo di na uli uso ang EDSA stories — so here it is.   thanks again, glenn.

Dear Ms. Stuart-Santiago,

I would like to thank you for your kind words regarding my father”s actions in your letter that appeared in the Philippine Daily Inquirer on March 09, 2011. Twenty five years ago on this date, my father was at our assigned quarters in Fort Bonifacio on the tenth or eleventh day of his house arrest, ordered by then General Ramos. His decision to not follow the orders given to him on the second day of the Edsa Revolution, the decision to not throw in his lot with the rebels, the decision to continue serving President Marcos in a defensive manner, the decision to order Col. Balbas back to Fort Bonifacio on the third day all must have sat heavily in his mind as he contemplated what appeared to be the end of his professional military career.

For me, it was heartbreaking to see him so but what solace or comfort could a 17 year old son offer him during those dark times? What followed was eight months of house arrest punctuated by investigations by the PCGG hatchet men due to my father’s perceived close ties with President Marcos. Did they find anything out of the ordinary? Apparently not for he was later on given a new posting as the Deputy Commander, Subic Naval Base Command in October. He knew deep down that his career was essentially over since this posting was a dead end in the AFP. One thing I love about him was, despite being given a basket of lemons, instead of being sour or bitter about it, he went on to make lemonade and enjoyed his six years at this post interacting with his counterparts in the US Armed Forces, playing regular golf games many times a week at the world class golf course in Binictican and looking out for the welfare of all those assigned to his command.

When he was promoted to Brigadier General in 1984, he was one of the youngest Generals in the AFP. By the time of his retirement in December 1992, he was one of the oldest Brigadier Generals having served the longest time “in grade”. If he had any bitterness or disappointment that many officers junior to him went on to higher positions and rank than himself, he did not show it but what man would not have a little something in his heart? One thing he could be proud of was that he was the only officer of flag rank promoted by Marcos to have survived the purges of the Aquino administration. They could find nothing.

Thank you again for pointing out something that most have already forgotten. My dad was a hero.

God bless you and yours.

Respectfully yours,

Glenn Tadiar

merci & the senate

from newsbreak‘s glenda gloria: ‘Lp now a force to reckon with’

The overwhelming House vote for the impeachment of Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez proves two things: that the ruling Liberal Party is now a real force to reckon with and that President Aquino has been able to exercise political command without trying too hard.

“The impeachment project was a consolidating project for the LP, and they succeeded,” said Earl Parreño, a veteran House watcher and former journalist who’s now with the Institute for Political and Electoral Reform (Iper). “After this consolidation phase, they could push for their reform agenda and if they do it well, it could only be good for the country.”

The victory becomes sweeter because the Iglesia ni Cristo pushed hard—but failed—to support the Ombudsman, according to a political ally of the President.

At total of 212 members of the House of Representatives voted to impeach Gutierrez for betrayal of public trust (see how they voted). This is 30 votes less than the total members of the ruling coalition—250. President Aquino earlier made it clear to his partymates that he wanted the Ombudsman out since he considered her an obstacle to honest governance.

The INC reportedly managed to persuade some solons to vote no, abstain or not register their votes. Among the 4 who abstained are relatives of senator-judges: Cavite Rep. Lani Mercado, wife of Sen. Bong Revilla, and Las Pinas Rep. Mark Villar, son of Sen. Manuel Villar.

… A senior government official close to the President told Newsbreak that they had about 4 estimates of how the voting would go—anywhere from 140 to 160 to close to 200, but never 200 or more. In the early headcount phase, the President even said he’d be content with just the 94 votes, according to this source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

i was surprised when gma showed up, looking rather woebegone.   was her one vote perceived to be so important as to make a difference, be a tipping point maybe?   when in fact wala pala silang kalaban-laban?   i bet she regretted coming.    manny pacquiao who stayed away but voted via twitter was way smarter.   even if he got heckled online for his no vote, and of course his weird, and graceless, retort to why he was absent, serves him right.

so now, all eyes on the senate.   manila standard‘s emil jurado predicts that merci will be acquitted.

Will the Senate convict Gutierrez? There are serious doubts. Senator Francis Escudero, an Aquino ally, says that no less than 16 senators are needed to convict Gutierrez, and at least seven to acquit her.

Out of the 24 senators, two are not present. Senator Panfilo Lacson is still a fugitive from justice. Former Senator Noynoy Aquino has risen to the presidency. But it is clear that the Senate needs a two-thirds vote in order to convict an official.

Who might be the seven senators to decide in Gutierrez’s favor. They are Senators Lito Lapid and Bong Revilla, known to be former President Arroyo’s allies; the minority in the opposition composed of Nacionalista Party senators, like Manny Villar, Alan Peter Cayetano, Pia Cayetano, Bongbong Marcos, and Loren Legarda. That’s already seven. Others who will also likely join them are Senators Joker Arroyo, Miguel Zubiri and Miriam Santiago. That brings the total to 10 senators in favor of Gutierrez.

Thus, my gulay, it’s unlikely that Gutierrez will be convicted. Her acquittal will be a slap on President Aquino, he who does not hide his obsession to run after his predecessor and prosecute her with a “friendlier” Ombudsman.

hmm.   read raul pangalangan‘s Gutierrez impeachment prospects in the Senate and tony la vina‘s Impeachment as a lesson in civics.   the senate would be wise to give the prosecutors of the lower house, and not the impeached ombudsman, the benefit of the doubt.   senators who acquit do so at their own peril.