By Alex P. Vidal “The tyrant dies and his rule is over, the martyr dies and his rule begins.”—Soren Kierkegaard SIXTY senators, led by Gaius Cassius Longinus and Marcus Junius Brutus, took turns in stabbing to death Julius Caesar at the Theater of Pompey on March 15, 44 B.C. Seventy congressmen, led by
July 13, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “Fair peace becomes men; ferocious anger belongs to beasts.”—Ovid WITHOUT looking at her face, the name already evokes fear and terror: Dong Li (not a feminine-sounding name). But she is neither elderly Shaolin “Master Dong” nor menacing sumo wrestler “Ba Dong.” Dong Li is a 27-year-old Chinese woman who
July 11, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “As youngsters, my mother taught her children that while we might not be the smartest people around, we could be courteous, polite and considerate of others.”—Zig Ziglar UNTIL now the police in Iloilo City have not yet identified and traced the identities of the so-called “rich kids” who allegedly violated the
July 10, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “We have to remain vigilant and loud and stay consistently engaged with our representatives and the political process every single day, on both a macro and micro level.” – Billy Eichner SINCE January 2020, no major news has exploded in the media about graft and corruption, among other anomalies
July 9, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “When the public’s right to know is threatened, and when the rights of free speech and free press are at risk, all of the other liberties we hold dear are endangered.” —Christopher Dodd ONE of the most heart-piercing and scintillating declarations made by a media practitioner on the ABS-CBN issue was
July 8, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “Many people believe the whole catastrophe is the oil we spill, but that gets diluted and eventually disarmed over time. In fact, the oil we don’t spill, the oil we collect, refine and use, produces CO2 and other gases that don’t get diluted.” —Carl Safina WHILE Covid-19 causes respiratory
July 7, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “When trying to teach someone a boundary, they learn less from the enforcement of the boundary and more from the way the boundary was established.”—Bryant H. McGill A FILIPINO-American national from Lambunao, Iloilo has decried the order to restrict or close the Iloilo borders, saying “it will kill the
July 6, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “An academic dialect is perfected when its terms are hard to understand and refer only to one another.”—Mason Cooley THE dialect spoken in Antique is Kinaray-a, while in Iloilo is Hiligaynon. When she made an appeal to Iloilo Governor Arthur “Toto” Defensor Jr. recently to ease Iloilo’s border restrictions,
July 4, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “Well, I can fake my way around some things, but I don’t think I would be good at betting.”—Diane Lane A WEEK before I left the Philippines to cover the Mayweather Jr. vs Pacquiao 12-round title fight that took place in Las Vegas on May 2, 2015, one of
July 3, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “There’s so much interference, so much static and people’s voices talking about what you do and why you do it that I’ve learned to be like, ‘No, no.’ It’s actually simple. I just do this.” —Jenny Slate IF Iloilo Governor Arthur “Toto” Defensor Jr. isn’t happy with both the
July 2, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “Life is inherently risky. There is only one big risk you should avoid at all costs, and that is the risk of doing nothing.”—Denis Waitley WHEN the 44 members of the Special Action Force (SAF) were deployed to Mamasapano, Maguindanao together with other crack SAF soldiers to help arrest
July 1, 2020
By Alex P. Vidal “You get a reputation for stability if you are stable for years.”—Mark Zuckerberg LET us take into consideration the main interest and priority of power consumers in Iloilo City: a stable power supply. After they have been annoyed by several unscheduled blackouts, “a stable power supply” is the only
June 30, 2020