What If . . .

Steve Jobs just gave half of his money to the U.S. Government, would it solve Uncle Sam's mounting debt woes?

It sounds logical and simple: key words used to describe the easiest and most effective solutions to the most complicated problems. Right? After all, Apple has more cash than the U.S. Treasury Department. Surely it can afford to let go of some of that whopping extra cash and do its patriotic duty to its fatherland?

And while an industry mogul bailing out a national government seems off-the-charts outlandish today, it has happened before. New York financier J.P. Morgan pledged a whopping $60 million in gold ($1.5 billion today) to help President Cleaveland get the U.S. economy back on track after financial panic of 1893. (See source here.)

It has happened before. Why not do it again?

Apparently, the situation is not the same banana. Or in this case, it's not the same apple (Pun intended). LA Times explains why dipping in Steve Jobs' cookie jar won't solve anything:

"...if Steve Jobs gave Apple’s $76 billion in cash to the U.S. government, it would just mean that the U.S. would have a few more weeks to solve their debt crisis, instead of a few days. We’re essentially comparing a high point for a U.S. corporation to a low point for the federal government. The U.S. spends billions of dollars a week. Apple makes billions of dollars a quarter. It’s not the same thing."

 Aw, too bad.

Why Blackberry over iPhone?

Blackberry 8520

Or why iPhone over Blackberry? Take note that the question is not which one is better because that is like asking whether a Mercedes Benz is better than a BMW, and vice versa. The debate will never end. Fans of each side will trumpet the perfection of their phones ad infinitum, thumping their chests like monkeys on Ecstasy. The fact of the matter is choosing a smartphone is governed by the same set of standards we use in picking our everyday outfits: It's a matter of personal preference and lifestyle.

So what do I like and what do I need?

• No to touch screens
• WiFi connectivity
• Camera (decent resolution)
• Bluetooth
• Compatibility with office apps (Adobe Acrobat, MS Office, etc.)

What I like about my Blackberry:

• Loud speakers
• Can talk while charging
• Easier to text
• Surfing and email! 
• Blackberry Messenger!

What I don't like about my new phone:

• Complicated interface
• Super-fast battery drain
• Unexpected charges (If you don't enroll in BIS, which can cost you between P300 to P1,000 a month, your BB is just like a normal high-end Nokia phone.)

So get a Blackberry if you:

• Don't like touch screens (like me)
• Are always on the go and need to access your work everywhere
• Want to tweet and IM 24/7!

Si Best Mehn

Taken here

Some people just relate better to the opposite sex than their own. I'm one of them. I have a few treasured female friends, sure, but therein lies the problem: They're few. Meanwhile I can recite a litany of guys I really get along with nicely, and by nicely I mean it in a strictly platonic way. While I believe that this uneven scheme of things owes much to my very tomboyish nature, I also think the credit goes to men.

Guys are simple and easier to understand. They're generally not pikon, clingy, or fragile. They're honest to a fault (to girls they don't want to $#@%! at least), and they listen! It's not that they don't space out when you ramble on and on about the same problem day in and day out, but they manage to see through the lies that you've convinced yourself are true, cut away at your fabrications and self-serving validations, and then get the gist of what you're hiding or unable to say. Then they tell you what you need to hear: "The truth is you're full of crap." 

But the thing I like most about guy friends is that they're loyal: Once you're deemed a friend, you're a friend through and through (unless you stab them in the back, which I think I'm smart enough never to do). That, and you can count on them to tell you that you're really getting fat .

Actually, I'm just talking about one guy. This post is two days late. Happy birthday, Marv! It chokes me up to know you're only 29, but the year is just as awesome anyway, right? Happy 2011!

 

What's in a Name?

. . . that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, or in this case, a sea by any other name would still smell as salty. And fishy. 

Recent incidents in the sea south of China, east of Vietnam, and west of the Philippines have stirred our government to flex whatever political muscle it can muster to [diplomatically but forcibly] tell China not to mess with Philippine territory, or with any other territory that we claim. Like it would ever make a difference. If this sea were a toddlers' playground, China would be the biggest, meanest, double-dealing bully harassing a host of teeny-weeny and [often] gullible Southeast Asian kids. The outcome of a potential fight is inevitable. But that's beside the point.

What kind of flexing can we do, anyway? Can we show our naval might in the patrol of our waters and intimidate Asia's [and the world's] growing giant into respecting international norms and laws? Can we make it heed common sense [Come on, claim an entire sea to be exclusively yours, even waters a thousand miles off your coast? Anak ng tokwa, naglolokohan ata tayo dito.]? With our naval assets and China's relentlessly aggressive posture, that is as unlikely as Lebron James winning an NBA championship or getting a warm welcome back in Cleveland.

Caught in such dire and limiting circumstances, the government has resorted to do what it does best: Speak. Express outrage. Condemn the intrusion. And call South China Sea the "West Philippine Sea," the Reed Bank  "Recto Bank." A bill has been passed to make the names official, arguing that it asserts our sovereignty and strengthens our claims over these areas. It makes sense. After all, the other camp banks on how everyone seems to call it "South China Sea" to further its own.

But what's behind the name? Does anybody know how big West Philippine Sea is, how far from the coasts it goes, or what shape it makes in the map? The country has yet to define the extent of its maritime zone. While there are bills pending in Congress that address this, the term "West Philippine Sea" is still absent in present versions. Maybe Rommel Banlaoi is right. As it stands right now, the name "is an empty label that cannot withstand the harsh reality of international politics."

But let's not trip all over ourselves yet. While naming something without fully defining what that something is may be just a bag of fluff, there is still some merit to it. Bestowing a name over something is an act of power, control, maybe even jurisdiction. And from a perspective that believes in the power of ideas, instilling in a nation's hearts and minds that something [no matter how hazy] is rightfully theirs -- and that they ought to protect it from those that seek to take it from them -- is the first step toward action. Never mind the lack of  definition and legalities for now. They can come in after. Very soon, I hope.  

So, what's in a name? It's the beginning of possession. But only just the beginning. Let's all hope that the government follows through.  

Back From Blogging Comatose

There was a time in my life when blogging used to be as easy as cake. No, that's not right. There was a time in my life when blogging was as necessary as breathing. Except for brief -- a month at the most -- hiatuses to attend to "important day-to-day matters," (Don't you just hate it when the real world gets in the way?) I had blogged without fail since 2004. Pretty impressive, huh?

Then it happened. Somehow I forgot to breathe the past eleven months.

I don't know when it started exactly, but I remember it was a slow, subtle progression to incapacity, much like how a serious illness sets in and leisurely spreads in your bloodstream: like HIV or cancer. At first I thought I just did not have time to write, which was true anyway.  Then when I did have the time, I was too tired to do anything else but sleep. And when I did have the time and the energy, I decided I had better things to do -- like have a life and nurture relationships -- than sit in front of the monitor, pour my soul onto the keyboard, and make love with a blank Word document. Finally when I wanted, needed, to blog, the words would no longer come. I lost the will to write. Then I lost the words. My seven-year-old blog lays hidden, neglected, and abandoned, perhaps forever.

I've lost count of the times I tried blogging the past year. Some had witty beginnings. Others had smooth endings. None of them had both a beginning and an end. Months later in a sudden fit of restless energy I stay wide awake at 5:30 in the morning to put up a new blog and write a post. I don't know where this new blogging mojo will take me, I might burn out eventually, but it's well worth trying.

Why do I write? How does it feel when I want to write something and I can't begin? No one comes closer to describing what it's like than Margaret Atwood: 

"There's the blank page, and the thing that obsesses you. There's the story that wants to take you over and there's your resistance to it. There's your longing to get out of this, this servitude, to play hooky, to do anything else: wash the laundry, see a movie. There are words and their inertias, their biases, their insufficiencies, their glories. There are the risks you take and your loss of nerve, and the help that comes when you're least expecting it. There's the laborious revision, the scrawled-over, crumpled-up pages that drift across the floor like spilled litter. There's the one sentence you know you will save.

Next day there's the blank page. You give yourself up to it like a sleepwalker. Something goes on that you can't remember afterwards. You look at what you've done. It's hopeless.

You begin again. It never gets any easier."

But nothing ever is easy. Nothing worth having or doing, at least.  It's probably hopeless, but let's begin anyway.

I'm back, blogging world. Not that anyone ever missed me.