Waking up sleeping dogs and Grace Poe’s surge
I FIRST heard the expression from David Tanner, country manager of Beecham Products at the time that our ad agency was helping the British corporate giant establish a foothold in…
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Asian Americans could provide swing vote in future elections
With the 2014 midterm elections behind us, one demographic has both Republicans and Democrats buzzing. Based on exit polling of the 2014 midterm elections, 50 percent of Asian American support…
Holiday spirit
A THIRD of Filipinos are expecting a more prosperous Christmas celebration. According to a recent Pulse Asia survey conducted from Nov. 14 to 20, 34 percent of the 1,200 respondents…
Countdown: The Twelve Days of Christmas
READY or not, Christmas will be here in a week. Gifts. Christmas decorations. Holiday parties. Christmas carols. They all set the stage for another festive holiday celebration. One of the…
Pasko, more fun in the Philippines
“SINGKO lang po, singko lang po, (Just five centavos, just five centavos) Singko lang po ang ibigay niyo. (Just give us five centavos). Ayos na ang buto-buto.” (Everything will be…
The wake-up storms before Christmas
FOR several years now, Filipinos’ joyful anticipation of the Christmas season has been challenges by the wrath of Mother Nature that seemed to have been unleashed just before the holiday…
Wonder city
IT is official. Vigan City in Ilocos Sur has been named one of the New 7 Wonders Cities of the World. Also dubbed as urban wonders, these cities are put…
Ruby reveals how Filipinos learned from Yolanda
RELIEF. Gratitude. Hope. These are what Filipinos in America feel in the aftermath of yet another super typhoon, just a year after the Philippines was devastated by Super Typhoon Yolanda,…
The revenge of the bobo-tante and tanga-suporta
I HAVE learned two new terms from reading the postings of self-anointed social media vigilantes and reformists: bobo-tante and tanga-suporta. These are a play on words, meaning stupid voter (bobo…
Better safe than sorry
JUST when everyone thought that the worst has passed, another super typhoon is doomed to devastate parts of the Philippines once more. A year after the dreadful Yolanda (international name:…
Do you feel safe or threatened when you see a police officer?
THIS is the question The Filipino Channel’s daily newscast Balitang America asked its viewers, amid nationwide protests denouncing two separate grand jury decisions in Ferguson, Mo. and another in Staten Island, NY,…
Initiative
THE Philippine government is more driven to institutionalize good governance and continue walking the “tuwid na daan” (straight path). To achieve this, Presdent Benigno Aquino III vowed to strengthen and…
White House warns: Beware of immigrations scams
MORE than five million undocumented immigrants, including Filipinos who are in the United States without legal status, are expected to benefit from a series of executive actions announced by President…
NAIE – The Ninoy Aquino International Embarrassment
THE Ninoy Aquino International Airport, Terminal One is not simply a gateway to the Philippines. It is hallowed ground. Like Fort Santiago. And Bagumbayan. This is the where Ninoy Aquino…
Sustaining growth
DESPITE efforts from the current administration to maintain the Philippine economic growth, this year’s 3rd quarter Gross Domestic product (GDP) have decelerated from the previous quarter’s 6.4 percent gain and…
President’s immigration executive order tramples the Constitution
One of the pillars of our constitutional form of government is a separation of powers, vesting in Congress the power to legislate and in the Presidency the duty to faithfully…
Obama’s Executive Order: A Thanksgiving gift for many kababayans
THEY have been waiting for this for so long—perhaps for twenty years. Many kababayans living in the United States without legal status, those who entered the country unlawfully, or those…
Scraping the bottom of the barrel
WHEN Alan Peter Cayetano spins a tale of a threat to his life and Antonio Trillanes begins to predict his incarceration or liquidation if Jojo Binay ever becomes president, you…
Counterterrorism
THE Philippines is among the top 10 countries with the highest level of terrorist activity in 2013, according to the study released recently by the Institute for Economics (IEP). “Terrorism has increased…
Kababayans’ reaction to Obama’s executive action on immigration
PRESIDENT Barack Obama finally delivered on his promise to fix America’s broken immigration system by using his executive authority to start the process. In a televised speech last Thursday, Obama…
Kababayans’ comments on the challenges of raising and disciplining kids in America
A WHILE back, I wrote about the dilemma many Filipinos face as they raise their young children in America. Many of us who grew up in the Philippines shared the…
Aquino has failed the test of leadership
WHEN Noynoy Aquino blunted a Tacloban businessman’s complaint that he had been threatened by looters at the height of the Yolanda disaster, by declaring, “You are still alive, aren’t you?”…
Cutting back
GLOBALIZATION is slowly taking its toll on countries such as China and the United States, considered two of the largest consumers of fossil fuels that pollute the atmosphere and cause…
Could Obama use executive action on immigration this coming week?
SOONER than previously reported, President Barack Obama’s much anticipated unilateral measure to fix America’s broken immigration system will reportedly be announced this coming week, instead of mid-December. This is according…
Should Obama use executive power on immigration despite Republicans’ threat?
WHEN will President Barack Obama fulfill his promise as a presidential candidate that he would reform America’s broken immigration system? This is the question many kababayans ask, along with the…
Establishing the American Dream of homeownership for all Asian Americans
Every study has demonstrated that our nation’s twenty million Asian Americans seek the American Dream of homeownership. Among many Asian American groups, including Filipino Americans and Vietnamese Americans, the percentage…