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During the lead-up to the 2010 presidential elections, Noynoy Aquino tried to copy a lot of the things that Barack Obama did to secure the presidency. Aquino’s campaign was an engine that ran on the fuel of change and hope and he certainly capitalized on his background – being the only son of arguably the most beloved couple in the history of Philippine politics. People can argue that both men were pushed into the precipice of power not through their merit or achievements but because of reasons that no other rival could possibly top. For Obama, his eloquence and charisma was an easy sell for a nation that was so jaded with the Bush administration. Aquino’s pedigree as well as his commitment to clean governance (a cliche promise had it been said by somebody else) was the selling point. Continue Reading »

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I’m usually averse to political topics but I’ve been very keen on analyzing polls and surveys since I started blogging. I’m not exactly a math wiz but I enjoy the simple pleasures of arithmetic and number crunching. I wrote a piece on how April surveys tend to be not 100% failsafe when it comes to predicting the actual outcome of elections. I hope you could check it out at The Philippine Online Chronicles website.

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Running a campaign for a senatorial seat is not cheap. I’ve always wondered how people would willingly throw millions down the drain in the face of prospects that are almost nil. The only senatoriable who lost an election badly (out of the top 20) to ever make it to the winners’ circle in the past four elections is Jamby Madrigal. She definitely spent a lot more money during her 2004 campaign compared to her “who-the-hell-are-you” lukewarm attempt in 2001 as a member of the Puwersa ng Masa.

I will be comparing the October poll numbers for 2007 with the final COMELEC tally and see who among the 2010 hopefuls can still cross their fingers and hope for the best.

This was how the October 2007 survey results looked:

There were twelve slots up for grabs for 2007 and based on the October-November numbers for Pulse Asia, there were nineteen senatoriables who had a realistic chance of winning one of the seats. Of these nineteen, ten where projected to be sure winners had the elections been held six months earlier. These ten included Loren Legarda, Panfilo Lacson, Francis Pangilinan, Manuel Villar, Alan Peter Cayetano, Tito Sotto, Ralph Recto, Korina Sanchez, Koko Pimentel and Gringo Honasan. Interestingly, of these “sure bets”, four ultimately failed to win a seat – Sanchez didn’t run while former senators Sotto and Recto (Team UNITY – the administration slate) dropped off the list (Recto ended up at #14 while Sotto was over three million votes short of the twelfth spot at #19. Genuine Opposition candidate Koko Pimentel was controversially beaten by some twenty thousand votes and finished at #13. Continue Reading »

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I think it’s quite easy to find Chiz Escudero as one of the most grandstanding-prone politicians on television. While he may have a way with words, he does come across as someone who could easily smooth talk his way into spewing out ideas that are generally agreeable but not necessarily concrete or helpful – pretty much like Barack Obama. Of course that type of  charm works for a certain type of person and to be fair to Chiz, that type of person is the absolute majority once the greater scheme of things is considered.

Chiz Escudero in the flesh was not in any way pompous, arrogant or disagreeable. While it was not clear why he wanted to see bloggers for that day (other than to have small talk and probably feed a few undernourshed bloggers such as myself), it was nice to sit across him and have him answer off-the-cuff and unscripted questions from his obvious supporters, critics and skeptics.

The Good

- If everything where to be taken at face value – pretty much the same way that the good in me would like to see things — Francis “Chiz” Escudero seems to have his heart and head in the right place. He comes across as someone who can sleep soundly at night. I know that this is a very subjective comment that could further contradict the other things that I would write as this entry progresses, but at the basic visceral level, he seems like a guy who would be hard to hate. Either that or I’m just a naturally nice guy.

Continue Reading »

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For years now, Manuel Quezon III (more famously known as Manolo Quezon) has been dishing on point columns on various publications and putting the issues in a new perspective on his weekly talk-show-slash-lecture-program “The Explainer”. Manolo Quezon personifies what most Filipinos would like in a leader – level-headed, rational, responsive and passionate without the trappings of traditional politics.

Manolo’s popularity is definitely on an all time high and a run for the senate is a very feasible idea already. He has not voiced out his plans for 2010, but with enough of those who believe in his potential in abilities, we may just get him to run for us who think that we deserve leaders at his caliber.

Having Manolo in the Senate will not just be a good development for Philippine politics just because of what he brings to the table – it could also send a strong message that the political landscape in general is changing to a more progressive and critical-thinking atmosphere. It will heavily erode the strong biases against sectors of society.

Join us. Join the Manolo Quezon For Senator Facebook Group.

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The Social Weather Station (SWS) recently released a new poll regarding voter preferences of Filipino voters for Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s replacement come 2010. It comes without a surprise that Noynoy Aquino is far an away the leader with 60% of the respondents saying that he can be an acceptable successor to Arroyo. What’s worth noting is that he came out of nowhere to claim this spot – he wasn’t even part of past surveys!

The first thing we have to look at is what the numbers actually mean. It doesn’t mean that 60% of the respondents would vote for Noynoy Aquino if elections were held today – it only means that 60% consider him as a good replacement for the current president. Respondents can have multiple answers so the 60% is actually an upper limit for the number that he can get. It can be surmised that 40% will not consider voting for President had the elections been held during the day of the survey. That being said, the current support for any candidate on this list is considerably less than the number on the graph. Continue Reading »

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