Inside Insight

Curious about the real score of the Iraq fiasco? Read the blogger of Salem Pax, a native of Iraq, and served as an interpreter for reporters when the war was 'ongoing'.

His insights are a real eye opener, and frightening to boot. The truth is seldom heard from the frontlines with all the oblique military-speak and PR talk; it's good to know that the internet can be a good font information. Salem Pax's banner reads from a quote:

"the West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do."

--Samuel P. Huntington

Apt, that.

Without further ado: Where is Raed?


Badabing badabum

Never disdain kid's cartoons, people they might just surprise you. One cartoon I'm certainly not disdaining? Hey, Arnold! Sure the football head is wacky and sometimes too righteous for his own good but I'm not watching for him, no, no... it's for Miss Helga G. Pataki.

She's a twisted, mean-spirited brat and we all just love her. As an episode says: "She sneers, she scowls and we love her!" After the 10 hour Helga nearly kisses Arnold marathon I am full of Helga-love.

She loves being unique, an individual with her trusty side-kick Phoebe she plots and plans to drive Arnold crazy, although she is secretly in love 'with the boy'.

She's like Nabiki, and Akane combined. How can people not love her deviousness and her complete obsession on Arnold... she even has a shrine for him. One day she'll land Arnold, then she'll rule the world! AhaHAHAHAHAHA *cough* *ack*

Laughing the evil laugh is hell on the throat!

Far and Away

Ma just left for Canada last night, she's attending the wedding of my tito Michael. Of all her brother's, tito Michael is my favorite, if only for the simple reason that I've seen him more. Or, I used to.

He's an engineer for Seimens and he was a trouble shooter, he was sent to various plants in different countries.

He's hilarious and wacky, and practices Kung-fu, and to my kid mind that equaled cool. I still think that actually.

I was actually supposed to go with mom to Canada but with circumstances beyond our control we ended up deciding it wasn't time yet, so, I am left Queen of the House. To me falls the responsibility of paying bills, herding my siblings and having no social life whatsoever, not even to Job hunt.

As expected waking my sibs is no easy task, but the hardest thing has got to be convincing my baby sister to go to school and explain to her that she doesn't have a sprain. Thankfully they're off to school.

So, I'm not going to mention the utter stupidity of the coup attempt, but instead I will go into something I've been reflecting about.

Immortality.

Not the immortality of long life, but the immortality of a person's works, and how they touch the generations to come. It would take an extraordinary person for a child a thousand years from now to know her/his name.

We take it for granted that we know Julius Ceasar's name, or Aristotle, or Sun Tzu, or Cleopatra; but how is it for the Philosophers before them, rules after them or artists who crafted sculpture's whose names will never be known to us.

Come to this: Will anyone a thousand years from now know who we are? Know our names?

It makes me shiver to realize I can be a part of those nameless figures who once lived in this period, no more. Not recognized as an individual, just a word:
"The Filipino people in the late 21st Century ..."

It's scary.

Ceasar has left his mark in history, and his legacy can be felt up to this point in time, but how about me? How will I be remembered... or will I be remembered at all? After the last goodbyes, and people I know and know me have passed how will they know that a girl named: Monique once lived?

The internet, the age of computer does not hold well to history because with a simple delete all files, all recordings of writings, of thoughts can vanish... It's probably why I still like writing on paper, sending letters through paper because at least it will record my own handwriting, a piece of my essence, maybe at least that piece will tell the world, long after I have gone that I lived.

Coup Ka la

The crisis is over, after a whole Sunday of nail biting wait, it's over. The Magdalo group are back in the military awaiting charges.

They claim they weren't staging a coup but a peaceful mutiny, *rolls eyes* whatever. Though their grievances were legitimate, the end result was only putting the Philippines in a very bad light and set us back in the economy.
Of course, they say that they couldn't care less for the econoomy. Good one, guys! *snort*

Why the hell won't they allow GMA to finish her term. I get it, she's female. Can't handle a female authority figure, and then throw in the charge she's weak.

Whatever the reasons guys, your cause maybe legitimate but your methods weren't. Didn't endear any supporters, dude.

Mad, mad world

First off, before I go off on a tangent--

Happy birthday, Marie!

You're 19! 19! 19! 19! 19! 19! 19! 19! 19! XDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD



People must be crazy, no, let me rephrase that, some military people must be crazy! Good grief, staging a coup, even spreading rumours of it never did anything good to any country's economy most of all here!

Can they be that stupid and selfish?

The only thing it could achieve is panic and discord, mostly in international eyes because, heck, everything is mostly fine here but to the perception of the global economy we might as well be a war torn country.

If the coup rumors are real the military officers who stage it can never prove it's legal, they have no basis for a coup! What major crime has Macapagal commited that would warrant this reaction? Let me guess, they weren't coddled enough?
Jeez, spoiled brats.

Is it just me or does the threat of coup just happen when women are in power? I don't mean those coup rumors that float around during FVR and Erap's run but a true honest to God coup alert. Though, I am not saying there is a coup, just that the rumors are rampant.

Do these men think that just because they have a woman for commander-in-chief that they can push her around because she is a woman and the general mentalitly is that she's weak? My God, no wonder we're still a third world country.

The Army has one purpose: Protect the citizens.

They're so drunk with power, with the toys they got, and maybe with a wallet full of bribe money that they can't seem to realize that this is never a beneficial move, then again I might just be giving them credit they don't deserve. They're pigs.