Will the Speaker and the Majority Floor be spooked or would they rise up to the challenge and limit the debate on economic provisions? Truly a defining hour for Belmonte and Gonzales.  Let us see if they can wrestle with the spooks!

2016 should be a search for a leader who must be willing and able to “define reality with great clarity; engender trust by demonstrating a disciplined commitment to the selected strategies to make things better and provide more opportunity.” A lot of this can get lost in the fog of winnability.

If you defend a department during plenary debates, you get to get some extra projects within the department. If you stall plenary debates on departments or make it hard to get a department budget approved on plenary, then the legislator is asked what she or he wants and that is often given to her or him to get budget approved, a straight quid pro quo.

Why did I went through the various Budget Messages?  Because I wanted to give context in reviewing the PDAF cases and DAP.  After all, PDAF was a pillbox thrown to few and selected legislators while DAP was the reverse.  The Supreme Court caught the Executive  juggling funds.

If DAP was in good faith, it should have been in any of the 2011, 2012 and 2013 Budget Messages. There was no DAP but you can see some components of it in 2012 and 2013. What is clear is that there was no policy or program.

The only thing they missed out was DAP is all about trust. When trust is gone it would be hard to govern and manage. When trust is eroded, every act is suspect.

Three generations of political names with two heavily supported by classes D and E and the third having served the nation for fifty years and of last act chairing the impeachment court with such brilliance, consistency and discipline that this Administration would not have pulled the Corona impeachment without him.

Rice crispies or ampaos are very prevalent in the country. There are round and square ones; plain or with peanuts. Sweet and brownish outside, the round ones are hollow inside. It was a growing up food for those who grew up in the province and a most anticipated pasalubong for kids who grew up in the metropolis.

Several weeks back in February, The Manila Times’ columnists had lunch with the Vice President. While we were waiting, a tour of the infamous Coconut Palace was made.

I was in in Duterte country over the weekend and again, I was treated to what can be. The Davao International Airport was a lot better than NAIA I, cleaner and more user-friendly than NAIA II, with functioning escalators compared to NAIA III. There was order in the taxi queue. There were no individual transactions on how much the fare would be. Before the taxi can go out the complex, the security by the gate logs the number of the taxi and the name of the rider.

Skyway Stage 3 began yesterday. It also ushered in the rehabilitation of EDSA, north and south, which is said to end by 2016. The 14.8-kilometer Skyway Stage 3 project aims to connect SLEX to NLEX from Buendia to Balintawak and aims to decongest EDSA, C-5 and other major thoroughfares in Metro Manila. It also aims to reduce travel time from Buendia to Balintawak from two hours to 20 minutes or less.  Its estimated cost: P26.5 billion.

How long would it take before government acts to prevent breakdown on basic services?  How long will it take for people to seek redress of their collective grievances? How long would the People Surge that began in Samar-Tacloban last week hit the metropolis? It appears that in the last two minutes we just might be in an official meltdown. Why? Allow me to count the ways.