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I see. Well that's crap. I did read that the justification for that reduction was because they were mainly used for business purposes, which is obviously laughable. Oh well.
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# ? Dec 24, 2017 08:15 |
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# ? May 28, 2024 16:04 |
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Hello, Philippines thread - it has been a while: SEC orders Rappler shut down quote:The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has ordered the revocation of online news site Rappler’s license to operate. It's kind of an open secret that Rappler is largely funded by billionaire philanthropist Pierre Omidyar, so while this move is absolutely politically motivated*, there's also enough of an imprimatur of the legitimacy of the complaint to probably make it stick. Rappler themselves may have known that this was coming down the pipe, which is why they've been running a "Kickstarter"-esque fund donation drive since late 2017, ostensibly to raise enough money to allow themselves to run without Omidyar's funding anymore. _____ * The Solicitor General as of Dec of 2016 that would have sent the letter to the SEC was Jose Calida, who's a staunch Dutertist. The whole Omidyar angle and accusations that it's therefore some kind of anti-Duterte hatchet operation has been peddled for a while now by pro-Duterte propagandists: http://www.manilatimes.net/rappler-funder-omidyar-helped-topple-ukrainian-president-2014/357123/ http://www.manilatimes.net/govt-must-indeed-rap-rappler-for-its-foreign-ownership/340682/ http://www.thinkingpinoy.net/2017/07/dutertes-sona-marks-start-of-rapplers.html
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# ? Jan 15, 2018 09:03 |
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lol "Thinking Pinoy" I have hated that guy since before Duterte was a thing, together with "Get Real Philippines". In related news, they're proposing an amendment changing free speech to "responsible exercise" of free speech. Hoo boy. http://cnnphilippines.com/news/2018/01/16/House-body-wants-amendment-to-free-speech.html quote:Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, January 16) — Free speech is no longer absolute under a constitutional amendment proposed by a group of lawmakers.
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# ? Jan 16, 2018 07:22 |
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Argue posted:Hoo boy. I feel like we're in that phase where: * the President and his cabinet is lucid and conscious and isn't self-sabotaging (unlike, say, Trump) * they have so much of Congress on-board with their agenda that they can pass whatever they like * the administration has figured out that there isn't anything actually stopping them and we're only going to see this kind of thing be inflicted upon the country at an accelerating rate. It's like if Mitch McConnell had a Senate Supermajority and Mike Pence was President: sure, the Muslim ban might have been blocked by the courts the first time they tried it, but Obamacare would have been repealed within six months, and then the tax bill wouldn't have taken so long to pass. The best case right now is that Duterte at least seems to be faintly interested in governance rather than pure pillaging, though turning into Thailand rather than Russia is little comfort.
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# ? Jan 16, 2018 08:15 |
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Speaking of accelerating decline: https://twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/953209376508059648 Congress just adopted a resolution to convene themselves as a Constituent Assembly for the purposes of amending the Constitution. Amendments to the Constitution under a "Con-rear end" will pass with a vote of 3/4ths of Congress. It is not clear whether the House and the Senate will vote separately or together, though it is extremely likely that the House will get their way and Congress votes as a single body. This will completely nullify any opposition, since the Duterte loyalists in the House can still form a 3/4ths bloc even with House and Senate opposition voting against. (the alternative was a Constitutional Convention, in which a separate body of delegates would be elected for the sole purpose of amending the Constitution. Congress's official take on this is that it would take too long and cost too much, but the real reason they don't want this is that current members of the House cannot be "Con-Con" delegates, which means they couldn't guarantee a body full of conservatives and reactionaries) Here's an executive summary of the changes proposed, if you're interested. The bullet points: * they want to turn the Philippines into a Federal Republic, with something like five different autonomous states with their own state-level government * they want a Semi-Presidential system, with the President acting as Head-of-State and setting foreign policy and handling national defense, while the Prime Minister shall be Head-of-Government and handling domestic and ecnomic policy. The PM would be one of the Representatives in the majority party of the national-level legislature, as appointed by the President * they want a devolvement of powers to the state level * they want to lift foreign ownership restrictions in the Constitution * they want to limit public land selling restrictions in the Constitution * they want to lift term limits for legislators There's a number of ostensibly "good" measures in the plans, such as proportional representation, a concretized anti-dynasty measure, and measures to enforce party structures and loyalty, but I'm viewing them all with a huge dose of skepticism given the administration's (and the country in general's) predilection for corruption and neoliberalism.[url][/url] gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 12:17 on Jan 16, 2018 |
# ? Jan 16, 2018 12:06 |
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At least he didn't send the military after the press, you ingratesquote:MANILA, Philippines – In an apparent bid to downplay the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ruling against Rappler, Presidential Spokesman Harry Roque said that things could have been worse.
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# ? Jan 16, 2018 13:27 |
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Guy running from Iglesia Ni Cristo granted refugee status in Canada: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/refugee-philippines-church-lowell-menorca-1.4502614 I always thought they were kind of creepy.
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# ? Jan 26, 2018 23:33 |
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The level of indoctrination they have that allows their leaders to dictate who they will vote for en masse is creepier in my book.
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# ? Jan 26, 2018 23:49 |
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One thing I'll throw out is that the INC has a religious belief against unionization, which makes them rather preferred workers by corporations like Henry Sy's SM that go big on contractualization.anakha posted:The level of indoctrination they have that allows their leaders to dictate who they will vote for en masse is creepier in my book. The control exhibited by the church over their adherents is not good, to be sure, but I think the actual political effect of the "bloc voting" done by the INC is a little overstated. They always endorse the most popular/highest polling candidate, who oftentimes would have won regardless. You'd have to go back to maybe Ramos or GMA's second term to find a race that could potentially have been flipped, but every race ever would also have been flipped if we stopped using First Past The Post.
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# ? Jan 27, 2018 02:29 |
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Back in November, the French pharmaceutical manufacturer Sanofi made a press release, stating that their dengue fever vaccine, Dengvaxia, has a significant chance of causing "severe dengue" in cases where a person who has never caught dengue fever before is vaccinated with it, and then gets a real affliction of the virus afterwards This presented a problem, since the Philippine government launched a vaccination program with this drug in 2015, and by that time had already vaccinated in excess of 500,000 children The Duterte administration picked up on this immediately, and immediately launched an investigation into the "scandal" of his predecessor enacting a vaccination program with an "untested drug" Soon there were accusations of health officials being bribed by big pharma, and rhetoric to the effect of "the Aquino administration made guinea pigs out of Filipino children" and "the Aquino administration attempted to commit genocide upon children" (there probably really was bribery and undue haste involved, but that's a problem of for-profit medicine, something that's not being discussed nor being addressed) The Department of Justice started exhumations of children who reportedly died after having received the vaccine, and they're conducting autopsies with their own "experts", rejecting offers by non-partisan groups and the Department of Health to assist, and coming out with conclusions that, ah ha, these children were "killed" by Dengvaxia The whirlwind that is being reaped from the politicizing of this issue is https://twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/959367633614209025 https://twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/959279728002662400 https://twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/955452998183981056
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# ? Feb 2, 2018 13:04 |
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Duterte admits he is a Dictator.
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# ? Feb 9, 2018 09:04 |
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It's incredible that this is news at all considering being a dictator was literally one of his campaign promises and that one time he compared himself to Hitler. Edit: 🤔🤔🤔 Argue fucked around with this message at 17:00 on Feb 9, 2018 |
# ? Feb 9, 2018 10:53 |
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Duterte has beaten "grab them by the pussy": http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-duterte-female-rebels-20180212-story.html
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# ? Feb 12, 2018 22:14 |
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Oh that Rody, what a joker he is! Have you heard his latest jest? https://twitter.com/gmanews/status/965559389326159872
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# ? Feb 19, 2018 13:30 |
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Argue posted:Oh that Rody, what a joker he is! Have you heard his latest jest? Chinese Ambassador:
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# ? Mar 21, 2018 21:59 |
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Hello thread, it's been a while: IS DUTERTE PUTTING THOUSANDS OUT OF WORK IN BORACAY TO CLEAN IT UP FOR CHINESE GAMBLERS? quote:[R]epresentatives of the Macau-based Galaxy Entertainment Group, including its founder Lui Che-woo, met Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte last December to wow him with their vision of a US$500 million integrated casino resort there [in the island of Boracay].
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# ? Apr 7, 2018 07:15 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:Hello thread, it's been a while: Of course he'd be genuflecting at their feet. Launder your filthy money here, I'll even let you funnel drugs through for an extra fee.
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# ? Apr 7, 2018 07:37 |
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What would take out Duterte at this point?
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# ? Apr 7, 2018 17:43 |
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Duterte:Trump:Russia It really is uncanny.
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# ? Apr 7, 2018 22:36 |
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Grouchio posted:What would take out Duterte at this point? An assassination. Another PPR maybe. His term limit
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# ? Apr 8, 2018 21:40 |
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The Boracay thing, isn't it actually, really hosed up there absent of any conspiracy theories? Like it was really bad when I was there 10 years ago and I can't imagine it's gotten any better
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# ? Apr 8, 2018 22:33 |
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Scaramouche posted:The Boracay thing, isn't it actually, really hosed up there absent of any conspiracy theories? Like it was really bad when I was there 10 years ago and I can't imagine it's gotten any better yes. Boracay's been dirty and steadily getting dirtier for a while now, and the reason why it's so easy to believe that the island actually really does need a temporary shutdown for rehabilitation efforts is that it could honestly use the help.
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# ? Apr 9, 2018 00:27 |
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Ma. Lourdes Sereno was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Philippines. An impeachment case was filed against her earlier this year on the premise of missing SALNs (Statement of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth), but largely because she was appointed by President Aquino and has been mildly critical and resistant of Duterte's attempts to exert control over the judiciary. Solicitor General Jose Calida filed a "quo warranto" petition to have her removed. "Quo warranto" is basically a kind of memorandum challenging a person's fitness to occupy a position. The underlying rationale is that, if successful, this is a faster means of removing Sereno rather than impeachment, and especially since the votes for impeachment might not pass in Congress. The Supreme Court decision reached today (May 11 2018) was over whether or not this quo warranto was sufficient to remove a Supreme Court justice, because otherwise the Constitution says that only impeachment can remove a justice. The court, voting largely along partisan lines, voted to consider the quo warranto position as valid, thus leading to Sereno's ouster.
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# ? May 11, 2018 09:29 |
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https://twitter.com/MickeyInglesLaw/status/994796305733046272?s=19
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# ? May 11, 2018 11:24 |
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So much for constitutional law.
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# ? May 11, 2018 11:46 |
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33+ dead in election violence. http://news.abs-cbn.com/news/05/14/18/election-death-toll-hits-33-pnp
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# ? May 15, 2018 00:42 |
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AARO posted:33+ dead in election violence. What is the violence stemming from or how? Is this just general people beating the poo poo out of each other for no reason or what?
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# ? May 15, 2018 04:07 |
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TBF, the Philippines has always had election violence, even before Duterte. It's mostly born out of local-level candidates and their supporters getting assassinated.
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# ? May 15, 2018 04:34 |
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How has the economy been doing under Duterte? In my limited observations, the peso has steadily died and basic goods are all much more expensive. Before he took over, the Philippines had one of the fastest growing economies in Asia.
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# ? May 21, 2018 08:51 |
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The peso-dollar exchange rate has basically been the worst it's ever been since Marcos, and the "tax reform" law that was passed in December 2017 has driven up the price of basic goods from both increased inflation and direct changes to value-added tax. Gas prices (at least in my neck of the woods) was 46.30 PHP/liter on the last day of 2017, and it jumped about 4 pesos to the 50s practically overnight. The most expensive it's gotten so far this year was 53.50 PHP/liter about three weeks ago, and tends to hover between 50 and 52. The administration is still planning to pass another round of "tax reforms", this time to lower corporate taxes. It's like if the OMB Director was Larry Laffer instead of Mick Mulvaney. _____ In other news, just today, we have a new Senate President - Tito Sotto, whose last big achievement was plagiarizing this section of a speech made by Robert F Kennedy: quote:Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation. ... in defense of his opposition to a comprehensive Reproductive Health bill back in 2012. gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 09:59 on May 21, 2018 |
# ? May 21, 2018 09:12 |
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Is the old LF content still available because IIRC I made an effortthread about the RH bill there back when it was the biggest thing we had to worry about and Sotto featured prominently at one point.
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# ? May 21, 2018 11:06 |
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This is what I mean when I talk about how neoliberal our economic policy is right now: http://bworldonline.com/tax-perks-reform-may-still-change-dof-exec/ Also, bonus tinfoil hattery courtesy of our new Senate President: https://twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/998906492978741249
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# ? May 23, 2018 06:39 |
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# ? May 24, 2018 10:50 |
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It used to be that Duterte would say something misogynist, then his PR would offer an apology, only for Duterte to go against them by doubling down on his statement. Now he's not even waiting for his PR team to offer an apology before doubling down on it! Last week: https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2018/05/17/1816067/next-ombudsman-wont-be-woman-duterte-says quote:MANILA, Philippines — The next ombudsman will not be a woman, according to President Rodrigo Duterte. Today: https://news.mb.com.ph/2018/05/24/duterte-some-jobs-are-not-for-women/ quote:The President, in a speech in Davao City Thursday evening, said that unlike men, women do not have a mindset that is prone to violence. He also said that women can’t stand threat and intimidation.
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# ? May 24, 2018 16:51 |
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https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000317993715302401 #BabaeAko translates to #IAmAWoman Forthcoming translations are my own. Some of these sentences come out funny, and I want to make it clear nothing is being lost in the translation; he's just a very poor communicator and I have as much difficulty trying to figure out what he is trying to say in Tagalog as you probably are in some of the translated quotes below. https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000318903979933697 "What sort of journey are the two of us going to make in life together? I'll pick you up at a boarding house, let's go into a motel. It's just going to be for a short time." "If anyone hot is waiting outside [of the palace], open the door to my room." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000319309560737792 "Look at her face, she looks like a drat movie star. I'm mad she was raped. But she was so beautiful, the mayor [Duterte himself, at the time of these remarks] should have been first. What a waste." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000320321625341952 https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000322397264691201 "She was wearing a skirt, and her knees had no calluses. I said, 'this one doesn't go to church.'" https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000322659845005312 "It's a good thing that every time I see a beautiful woman I become young again." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000323990232027136 "Berna, I'm getting distracted. You close your legs. This is national TV." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000325733305077761 "I told her, when your father then was screwing Lewinsky and the girls there in the White House, how did you feel? Did you slam your father?" https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000327088757293056 "That video. Aren't you looking at what kind of woman that is? And they come here and say that she’s a prisoner of conscience? Mygod!" https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000327966365110272 "Who's sexist? Who doesn't love a hot woman?" https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000328424462798849 https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000329769408331776 "You know, in truth, you're a prisoner of your own horniness. That's where everything started--your adulterous relation!" "Those are the things that are really what makes life nicer... even the women policemen, I spank them if they--son of a bitch, that's what I do to them." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000330481181716481 "You're not allowed to bring your wives. Kabit ang [laughter] para mas maganda ang labanan." (err, not quite sure how to translate that second one since I don't understand what he's trying to get at myself, but something about being attached and a a beautiful battle?) “It's better that I buy medicine that makes women more beautiful. So the skin becomes beautiful. We'll even be happy just to watch them.” (fun fact, "kutis" is actually the origin of the English word "cooties") https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000331429543231488 "Lord, I wish only the ugly women had died. I wish the hot ones hadn't." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000332510096539649 "From afar they're beautiful, because they're exotic. You can't see them well but when you get close, they start to smell queer. I'm faithful to Filipinas. There's a lot of them but I'm faithful. Not necessarily to just one." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000333615413317632 "Whoever wants extrajudicial killing and wants to go to hell, well that's already where... all the women are. They're not in heaven. Heaven ugly [rhymes in the original tagalog]. They're all hot. Christ." "There are free pills... don't use condoms, because condoms aren't [tasty, or fun to use, he could have meant either one]." https://twitter.com/gibbygorres/status/1000333871286702080 And this guy missed this week's quote: http://mindanao.politics.com.ph/duterte-justifies-having-2-wives-kung-kotse-may-spare-tire-tao-pa-kaya/ "I have a second wife. I have one child with her. So I have two wives. If a vehicle, which is made of metal, would need a spare tire, how much more for us human beings?” he said." Argue fucked around with this message at 15:05 on May 26, 2018 |
# ? May 26, 2018 14:56 |
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Duterte: I am not antiwomanquote:During the signing of the Ease of Doing Business Act of 2018 in Malacañang, the President urged the public not to believe the accusations of those behind the #BabaeAko social media campaign.
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# ? May 30, 2018 11:17 |
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https://twitter.com/ABSCBNNews/status/1003224733398155264
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# ? Jun 3, 2018 18:37 |
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It's not clear, is duerte a self confessed rapist or just a massive fan of rape? Do people care?
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# ? Jun 4, 2018 07:05 |
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SMILLENNIALSMILLEN posted:It's not clear, is duerte a self confessed rapist or just a massive fan of rape? Do people care? as far as we know, Duterte hasn't raped anyone - he "only" has a very 50s-60s-era mindset when it comes to gender roles, and he runs his mouth a lot, so he's like more handsy than Joe Biden, and is openly foul-mouthed about how women need to get back in the kitchen and poo poo. People don't "care" because any supporter of the administration already thinks that "a grab-assy President that gets things done is better than a prim-and-proper President that doesn't", while anyone in the opposition camp is naturally horrified at how much of a boorish rear end in a top hat he is all the time. ______________________ On a separate topic: De Lima seeks Senate probe on 'influx' of Chinese nationals quote:Detained Senator Leila de Lima has urged the Senate to investigate an alleged "influx" of Chinese nationals in the Philippines. While the problem of rich-rear end folk buying up properties in the Philippines to drive up real-estate prices is very real, it's also very much a problem of capitalism in general, not with Chinese people specifically. That misattribution, combined with the low-key "they took our jobs" rhetoric coming from this statement feels like the harbinger of chauvinism, if not outright ethnic prejudice, towards Chinese people developing in the wake of Duterte's kowtowing to Chinese foreign policy and naked oligarchy. Assuming we make it that far, I am betting that an "opposition" figure in 2022 is going to run on right-wing nativist rhetoric. gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 11:37 on Jun 4, 2018 |
# ? Jun 4, 2018 08:31 |
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# ? May 28, 2024 16:04 |
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Not really, it's a problem of rich chinese using housing as a way to funnel money out of the country, blaming it on nebulous "capitalism" is and intellectually vacuous. It's not a random coincidence that countries with extremely strong social programs have extremely restrictive immigration policies.
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# ? Jun 4, 2018 21:39 |