Tagged with Risa Hontiveros …

May 13 2010
1 Comment
2010 elections, LGBT, LGBT rights, politics

The homophobes lost, but…

Rep. Abante during the Anti-Discrimination Bill hearing

Here’s some good news: three candidates from the conservative bloc lost in the senatorial and congressional elections. Bienvenido Abante, an incumbent representative in District 6, Manila City, lost to his rival Sandy Ocampo, a former congresswoman and currently Manila’s deputy mayor. Atty. Jo Imbong, legal counsel of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, ran for senator under the Catholic church-backed Ang Kapatiran Party, is among the bottom-dwellers in the senatorial race. Another pro-life bet, ex-senator Kit Tatad, has been unable to surpass the Top 20 benchmark.

Rep. Abante, as Chair of the House Committee on Human Rights, blocked the passage of a bill penalizing discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgenders. Last year, Rep. Abante filed a bill criminalizing same-sex marriage and prohibiting co-habitation among between partners of the same sex.

He also opposed the enactment of the RH Bill, a controversial measure that provides access to reproductive health information and contraceptives.

Atty. Imbong, on the other hand, is the CBCP lobbyist that has rabidly campaigned against the RH Bill and Anti-Discrimination Bill in most congressional hearings. A “pro-life” advocate, Atty. Imbong has labeled the above bills as part of the Church-opposed DEATH bills, a cluster of measures promoting divorce, euthanasia, abortion, total reproductive health, and homosexuality (same-sex marriage). Continue reading →

Tagged , , , , , , , ,
Apr 25 2010
Leave a comment
2010 elections, politics

Greasy campaign trail – ‘L’ is for Lechon, ‘V’ is for Vetsin

Elections is fiesta season in the Philippines. And if we truly are what we eat, then Filipino politicians are aptly symbolized by pork and grease.

The culinary theme is not green, yellow or orange, it’s cholesterol. Everything is deep-fried, served with fat and layered with oil. When politicians speak of the vote-rich L to L corridor, they actually mean liempo to lechon.

Grease is a main-stay in Philippine politics. Political affiliations shift – expect the entire Lakas machinery to go to Villar (ok, some are LP-bound) – but what  isn’t going to change is grease. Once, in a sortie in Tarlac, the whole LP entourage went to the ancestral home of the Aquinos for lunch, which consisted of tocino, homemade corned beef swimming in oil, and fried hito. My face is the epicenter of oiliness, but these dishes make my face seem fresh and healthy.

If it isn’t homemade grease, it’s fastfood oil – with MSG. If the L sign means ‘Lechon’, then V is vetsin (or Vitter Villitants, but that’s another story). When meals are not hosted by local politicians, we get our regular dose of fat and MSG from Jollibee or McDonalds. Breakfast at McDonalds in SLEX, late-night post-sortie dinner in KFC NLEX. Gone were the days when you carry bags of local pasalubongs at the airport; I actually found myself carrying in Davao City’s airport McDo take-outs that we bought from a drive-thru in Gen San – and it didn’t feel absurd.

In a solo sortie in HK, what started as a silly wish – eating dimsum filled with broth – ended up becoming an obsession as the day began transforming into a classic monster. There was the usual high-energy activities, the small crises that required troubleshooting, coordinating with Manila for other events – everything was Multitasking 2.0. Eating dimsum became a rallying point, my own liberation day, and maybe a cry for help. But the chance to go to a dimsum house didn’t come. I remember having breakfast, lunch didn’t take place (there was some time for snacks, but that was it), and soon after, Risa and I were at the airport, tired, each nursing a cup of warm drink from Starbucks, sitting quietly while waiting for our flights. Dinner was out of the question, and dimsum was, well, a figment of my own chismis.

I was tired and hungry when I finally reached home a few hours later. But the moment I stepped inside my apartment, next day’s sortie was already there, waiting. I opened my laptop, googled McDonald’s, and, by opening a new document, started a new day.

(Epic fail for the that one-entry a day challenge. No excuses, but hey, it’s 15 days till election day. Next blog should be about preparing for debates. I’m blogging from Legaspi City, and we’re waiting for Ms. Kris for a sortie in Legaspi and Tabaco.)

Tagged , , , ,
Apr 25 2010
Leave a comment
2010 elections, politics

Greasy campaign trail – 'L' is for Lechon, 'V' is for Vetsin

Elections is fiesta season in the Philippines. And if we truly are what we eat, then Filipino politicians are aptly symbolized by pork and grease.

The culinary theme is not green, yellow or orange, it’s cholesterol. Everything is deep-fried, served with fat and layered with oil. When politicians speak of the vote-rich L to L corridor, they actually mean liempo to lechon.

Grease is a main-stay in Philippine politics. Political affiliations shift – expect the entire Lakas machinery to go to Villar (ok, some are LP-bound) – but what  isn’t going to change is grease. Once, in a sortie in Tarlac, the whole LP entourage went to the ancestral home of the Aquinos for lunch, which consisted of tocino, homemade corned beef swimming in oil, and fried hito. My face is the epicenter of oiliness, but these dishes make my face seem fresh and healthy.

If it isn’t homemade grease, it’s fastfood oil – with MSG. If the L sign means ‘Lechon’, then V is vetsin (or Vitter Villitants, but that’s another story). When meals are not hosted by local politicians, we get our regular dose of fat and MSG from Jollibee or McDonalds. Breakfast at McDonalds in SLEX, late-night post-sortie dinner in KFC NLEX. Gone were the days when you carry bags of local pasalubongs at the airport; I actually found myself carrying in Davao City’s airport McDo take-outs that we bought from a drive-thru in Gen San – and it didn’t feel absurd.

In a solo sortie in HK, what started as a silly wish – eating dimsum filled with broth – ended up becoming an obsession as the day began transforming into a classic monster. There was the usual high-energy activities, the small crises that required troubleshooting, coordinating with Manila for other events – everything was Multitasking 2.0. Eating dimsum became a rallying point, my own liberation day, and maybe a cry for help. But the chance to go to a dimsum house didn’t come. I remember having breakfast, lunch didn’t take place (there was some time for snacks, but that was it), and soon after, Risa and I were at the airport, tired, each nursing a cup of warm drink from Starbucks, sitting quietly while waiting for our flights. Dinner was out of the question, and dimsum was, well, a figment of my own chismis.

I was tired and hungry when I finally reached home a few hours later. But the moment I stepped inside my apartment, next day’s sortie was already there, waiting. I opened my laptop, googled McDonald’s, and, by opening a new document, started a new day.

(Epic fail for the that one-entry a day challenge. No excuses, but hey, it’s 15 days till election day. Next blog should be about preparing for debates. I’m blogging from Legaspi City, and we’re waiting for Ms. Kris for a sortie in Legaspi and Tabaco.)

Tagged , , , ,
Apr 17 2010
1 Comment
2010 elections, politics

The Daily Grind

24 days before D-day. If I don’t do this now, I won’t be able to do this at all.

The challenge is to blog about the campaign trail, an entry a day. I’ve told someone before that I’ve been remiss with my blogging duties because of the campaign – the hectic schedule, and the rare lulls that are oftentimes spent to catch up with errands that are left behind.

Why not blog about the campaign trail, he suggested.

He’s right. A senatorial campaign is a strange monster . You jump in, you get swallowed. I suppose writing about it would make it easier to digest.

There is more familiarity in a party-list campaign: you deal with constituents you’ve worked with, the niches are clear, and the scale follows boundaries that you have traversed in the past. You know your hooks, you’ve been there, you’ve done that, and you know the limits of the system itself. It is a known playground.

But now, the campaign trail doesn’t end. The next day and its own mob of tasks, statements, and meetings have a way of creeping from behind, without warning, an intruder that has the gall to welcome you to your own home. A week becomes a continuous, seamless loop of days. Before you sleep, no matter if its at 2 or 4 am, you need to meet your deadlines, and then wake up early so you could do some finishing touches, make the sound bite sharper, or the point more resonant.  You are completely aware that it could be for naught, especially in country where politics is a narrative of personal dramas, not of platforms or issues. So you just go ahead, praying that what you’re doing can make a dent.

I admit that there are moments when we ask ourselves why we are doing this. The party-list race is our comfort zone, and had we opted to limit ourselves in that arena, the campaign trail would unfurl with a certain predictability – the kind of messages you can and cannot deploy, the numbers you need to crunch. A party-list campaign would still be hard, but definitely not as hard as a senatorial bid.

But in the middle of the daily grind, we constantly get reminders why we are here – an old woman who handed Risa some money as contribution to her campaign; a student who professed his support, unabashedly, and delivered what is perhaps the most compelling speech about change that I’ve heard since this campaign started; the father who introduced Risa to his young girl, and started conversing with her as people went in and out of the LRT. All of these happened when we weren’t preaching to the choir, while eating in Jollibee or while in transit. It is when we are with them that I realize that we haven’t lost our moorings.

Tagged , ,
← Older posts