OFFBEAT MAIL

American property developer Donald Trump has accused China of "ripping off the United States." His negative comment came at a time when China's President Hu Jintao visited Washington D.C. as an official guest of President Obama recently. His negative comment was considered timely. Or was it meant to drum up his political plans where Trump was reported to be planning to join the presidential race comes 2012? The issue that Trump was trying to play up was immediately snatched by the media considering his popularity in the international and domestic business communities. But many people, particularly the pundits, are asking as to his intention of poking his ire against China. And who wouldn't? China's trade surplus with United States is now estimated to have totaled $236 billion. Until now, the Obama administration is left with no choice but to use its diplomatic and economic initiatives to convince China to devalue its currency to no avail. In the CNN news poll, 61 ...

Many Fil-Am organizations in Southern California have expressed dismay over the recent failure of Congress to pass the Dream Act, whose primary intention was to legalize the stay of children brought into the United States by their undocumented parents. Leading the protest are the Alliance-Philippines and the National Alliance of Fililipino Concerns (NAFCON), which believed the negative impacts it will have on the more than 800,000 children whose only wish is to live a good life and a bright future in America. But their ambitions were quashed when Congress failed to give the proposed law a nod. With majority GOP members taking over the Lower House next year, there is a big doubt that any political agenda, especially pertaining to immigration reform that the Obama Administration keeps on pushing, will be killed. But President Obama can still wield his executive power by issuing an Executive Order that will legalize the stay of the undocumented Latinos and other foreigners across the Un...

It is so frustrating to read that a lot of people, especially women, are dying from terminal sickness like breast cancer. The case of the late Elizabeth Edwards had made a reawakening of how those millions of affected victims were reduced to expect miracles to heal them. For many decades, medical scientists had made serious efforts to discover a lasting cure for this malady. I'm not saying that nothing was done to cure this disease. Like the HIV, breast cancer is one of the killer diseases that hounds millions of women worldwide. It is public knowledge that medical scientists from advanced countries like the United States, Britain, Germany and so forth and so on have made attempts or are undertaking researches on how to cure breast cancer. But it seems nothing much was done to solve this problem. Despite the billions of dollars poured in to make the breast cancer research project successful, more work need to be done. Lately, I was wondering if the medical scientists are really...

Everytime, I come across news reports of allegations that put government controlled corporations in the limelight just made me so downtrodden not because I pity these executives running these GOCCs while many of the people are wallowing in poverty. I couldn't imagine how these executives could have a face to show the public by ignoring the realities of time. Of course, they are ignorant on the figures and official statistics that the Philippines' more than 70 percent population are poor. Yet they have the temerity to receive those excessive, if not, fat salaries which under normal circurmastances are deemed unimaginable of a person's ordinary mental faculty. Yet, everytime, the national government is left without a choice but to be helpless in enforcing policies that would correct these shenanigans in most of the these government corporations. Now, I learned that Malacanang had acted based on reports to at least tame the GOCCs' fat salaries and bonuses by issuing an...

It is a welcome relief to most Filipinos that elections were over. On the contrary, there were  election-related protests that had never ceased and are still bothering the conscience of most election officials. Among those protestors are the losers themselves who claimed that the PCOS machines used to automate election returns didn't seem convincing to most people. If there were complaints against the transmittal of election returns for the tallying of results, it would now be up to the Commission on Elections to investigate because, first and foremost, it is the Comelec responsbility to do that. Otherwise, it would take another couple of weeks before Congress is able to reconcile all those valid votes from the people. In a few weeks time, the newly elected President Noynoy Aquino, son of the late Sen. Benigno Aquino and Corazon C. Aquino, would be steering the rein of government. Many peole have expressed hope that it will a departure from the recent administration that was mi...

If indeed it is proven that Hubert Webb , the convicted son of the former Philippine Senator Freddie Webb, along with his co-accused, is innocent of the criminal charges levelled against him in the killing of Estrellita Vizconde, 47; her daughters--Carmela, 18, who was raped, and Jennifer, 7--in their home at BF Homes, Paranaque on June 30, 1991, the Philippine government would have to be answerable for whatever exemplary damages that the accused would seek for destroying their future and the shame that befell themselves and their respective families. It is public knowledge that there are hundreds, if not thousands of Webbs, who are languishing in different jails in the Philippines for crimes that they may have not committed. Their only mistakes were that they were at the wrong place, at the wrong time. And the Philippine government has been spending hefty sums of money to feed and keep them in jail for a long time, while the real culprits are running scot-free and may have ...

"All of these articles blasting Toyota. Someone mentioned that American automakers are behind this continuing front page crusade against Toyota to try and help their sales. I am beginning to think this is true," wrote a certain GaPeech in his comments concerning on the latest article posted on Yahoo! on April 11 titled  "AP IMPACT: In Toyota cases, evasion becomes tactic". There seems to be a collective corporate publicity stunts to destroy the soaring image of Toyota as the number one carmaker in the world. And the only way to damage its reputation is to hurl all the blames on accidents and deaths of people who operated Toyota cars on a daily basis. In the publicity world, there are only two acceptable spheres to wit: To build or to destroy. Toyota happens to be pitted on the latter option, which makes it vulnerable to all sorts of negative publicities if only to bring it down. I happen to pass by the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) in Torrance and saw Toyota car ...