Editorial 2/23/16 (EDSA Revolution, urbanization, presidential elections, debate, politics, traffic, credibility, Marcos)

Philippine Star 

Those who lived through that dark period in the nation’s history lament that Filipinos, particularly the youth, appear to have forgotten the struggle to end the abuses of a despotic regime. But young Filipinos don’t have a short memory. When it comes to martial law and the struggle to end a dictatorship, the memories simply aren’t there. Thirty years is a long time, and a generation has grown up with no personal experience of the days when people lived in fear of their own government.  Freedom, it is often said, is like air – taken for granted and missed only when it is taken away. [full text]

Mindanao Times 

In the ever widening urban sprawl, the need for green spaces has taken a more urgent need no matter what real estate companies claim. We are still blessed with nature but this cannot be sustainable if we turn a big portion of our land to buildings and other commercial complexes. For  residential areas, open spaces provide residents the chance to plant trees and clean the air from pollution. It gives all of us room to breathe. [full text]

Sun.Star Cebu 

One can actually find better formats for the debate in the reality shows that are proliferating everywhere nowadays. Comelec can, for example, host weekly one-on-one one hour round-robin debates that could extend until the last day of the campaign period if needed. One-on-one debates are better than what was done in CDO because these allow candidates to expose the bankruptcy in each other's platforms. [full text]

Manila Bulletin

After racing over 100 kilometers in the 148-km first lap of the 7th Tour of Luzon from Antipolo to Lucena last Thursday, the international group of cyclists found itself unable to proceed due to a traffic jam caused by road construction. The lap was thus unceremoniously cancelled. The incident showed, among other things, that the traffic problem has grown beyond Metro Manila where, to this day, after so many months of various solutions tried by so many officials and agencies, the consensus is that it has not been solved. Two to three hours is now normal to get from one end of the Metro area to the other – an hour more during the rush hours. [full text]

Inquirer 

Santiago’s preferred candidate to succeed her in the event that she is incapacitated for the presidency is a man who promotes make-believe Philippine history, where no human rights abuses ever happened, the institutions of government were not destroyed by one-man rule, and an economy progressively run to the ground was on its way to becoming another Singapore. That basic contradiction in her much-touted advocacy for clean government was evident from the day she announced her ironic pick for running mate.[full page]