Ducky Paredes

“When Obama gets on television, the national pulse goes down about 10 points. He has this incredibly calming effect.”

by Ducky Paredes

The leadership style in most of the world is changing for the better. We seem to have persons of greater intellect in charge in most of the planet. This is best exemplified by the sudden change in the leader of the one superpower left in the world.

From a George W. Bush to a Barack Obama is a giant intellectual leap for mankind – or , at least, that part which calls itself America. While Obama is on vacation in Hawaii, the New York Times took the occasion to delve into how calm he had been during the whole of his campaign for the presidency. According to Neil Abercrombie, a congressman from Hawaii: “When Obama gets on television, the national pulse goes down about 10 points. He has this incredibly calming effect. There’s no question in my mind it comes from Hawaii.

“He gives off a little oasis of calm. He is peaceful water in the maelstrom, which will serve him very well in these circumstances when there happens to be a crisis.”

Having lived in Hawaii myself during the years when Ferdinand Marcos was in exile on the islands, I agree with those who say that the Hawaii part of Obama is what gives him that inner calm and allows him to be pleasant even at moments of great stress. Hawaii has that effect on people.

They call it the Aloha Spirit. We used to have something like that in our country but we seem to have misplaced it. Somehow, when one thinks of this country, one hears a lot of noise and angry voices. We seem to have changed not for the better.

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It isn’t really good news but our imports fell for the first time in 17 months. What is not good about this is that among the imports that decreased were the raw material imports of firms that produce for the export market.

According to the the National Statistics Office (NSO) , imports dropped 11.1 percent in October but exports alaso dropped by 14.9 percent, the most in seven years. The World Bank says that it expects global trade to shrink in 2009. This will hurt the developing countries which are more dependent on world trade than most of the developed countries.

Thus, the global recession will have a great effect on us. Certainly, it will increase the number of unemployed and increase the crime rate as has happened in many parts of the United States.

 “The Philippine story is about a lack of diversification in its export basket, an overreliance on electronics, that’s why imports and reexports are hit simultaneously,” said Radhika Rao, an economist at Ideaglobal Ltd. in Singapore. “These products are discretionary and, in this scenario of recession, consumers tend to cut back.”

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Senator Loren Legarda is wishing for the moon when she looks to the local elitge to save the country by putting up investments. Says Loren :“Long-term investments [that] create more jobs improve the purchasing power of Filipinos, in which case more goods are procured, thereby spurring increased production.

 

Loren appeals “to the sense of patriotism of our [local] businessmen by investing more in times like this when dark clouds are hovering over the country’s economic horizon.”

Sayang! Things like lolng-term investments will not come from wishing them to happen! She is right, of course, that this is what we need. But, will there be any white knights who will save the Pinoy in these troubled times? What we need is a whole army of white knights even as the Pinoy elite keep their money in banks and other places safe from risks.

As for the government, its idea of helping the poor is toc dole out money and goods. This does not really help them. What is needed are investments – the longer-term the better. As it is, the government has even announced that its dole-out funds have been increased to P10 billion.

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Some of the Christmas spirit ought to sink in to make ourselves and our leaders realize that we can all be kinder to one another. Our politics has become so unkind. We think the worst of our leaders and are infinitely suspicious of everything and everyone. What will it take to change us back to the more halcyon days of the politics that our grandfathers practiced. Perhaps, a return to a two-party system may give that back to us. Among the things that have gone bad with our politics is that just about every politician can begin his own political party to use as his own vehicle for himself and for a few choice friends and underlings.

This is not what Democracy should be about. There ought to be a lot more to politics than the personal ambition of a few rich men.

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Cory Aquino obviously erred when, as she claims now, she joked about being sorry that she helped to bring down Joseph Estrada and install an infinitely worse one.

That was wrong. You do not publicly say you are sorry to anyone if you are not – not even as a joke. We expect more from persons like Cory Aquino.

Then, having erred by saying what she did, taking it back was even a worse thing to do. Why did she take back her “sorry”? Because a lot of persons who are in the same boat that she is lack the charity and the good sense to realize their error.

One does not take down a President and install a worse one without committing a grievous sin against our country.

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hvp (12.26.08)

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