This is my collective criteria for those whom I consider desirable (not in order of importance).  I will have the impulse for a sexual indiscretion with a woman if she:

1.1              Looks clean & hygienic, at least, on the outside;

1.2              Has a sweet and fresh breath;

1.3              Dresses appropriately;

1.4              Possesses a proportional body structure, less than 10% under-weight or less than 20% over-weight, and has good carriage;

1.5              Has a face that is a pleasure to look at;

1.6              Acts, appears & sounds like having an above-average intelligence (but the brighter-the-better);

1.7              Will enjoy my predilection for giving prolonged oral sex, including my forceful orgasms;

1.8              Seems to be capable of walking from one end of the Ayala Ave. (Makati, Philippines) to the other, or  from the front of the UN building on Ist avenue up to the corner of 60^th street (Manhattan, NY) within 30 minutes, without palpitating;

1.9              Has no desire for scandalous publicity; and,

1.10          Feels confident in being or having all of the above.

The Abbreviated Disclosure of a Disgruntled Insider: “Juan Manuel Marquez’s inner circle could not be fixed for $5 million because it wanted either $10 million to lose to Pacquiao by points or $15 million to lose by faking a KO.”

“The Marquez inner circle calculated that loosing on points to Pacquiao for $10 million was very reasonable compared to the $5 million paid to Cotto, $2 million to Clottey, $3 million to Margarito, and $3 million to Mosley all of whom were also fixed.  It based its demand on the much higher projected income of the Pacquiao vs. Marquez III.”

“Additionally, that loosing by (T)KO to Pacquiao for $15 million was also quite reasonable than the $18 million paid to Dela Joya, and the $8 million to Hatton.”

“The Pacquiao inner circle refused for two reasons:  1) It could alternatively fix the fight through the judges who would be hand-picked by the Nevada Athletic Commission which was under the influence of big businesses that highly profited from the Pacquiao winning streak.  And that fixing the judges instead would be at a much lower cost than what the Marquez inner circle was asking for; and,  2) It held the belief that Marquez can be beaten squarely, if not the judges will do the rest.  The Pacquiao inner circle has begun believing its own lies—-Pacquiao beat the bigger fighters, he can easily beat the smaller but bulked-up Marquez.”

Questions and Answers:

1)      Do you have documents that will support the disclosure?

Answer:  Fixing is an under-the-table transaction.  Of course, there’s no document that’s why it is called under-the-table.  It is unrealistic to ask for any document.  If there is a document we wouldn’t be debating anymore.  We would already be in a legal venue.

2)      Do you have corroborating testimonies?

Answer:  Even if you and I were witnesses to the verbal agreement, we will never squeal because we both benefited immensely.  All we can do, if aggrieved (short-changed), is to surreptitiously drop hints so the right parties can start something later on.

3)       Many analysts say that it was not the same Pacquiao who controversially won vs. Marquez after the third fight.  And that the “real” Pacquiao (with lightning speed and superior power) was the one that demolished Dela Joya, Hatton, Cotto, Clottey, Margarito, and Mosley.

Answer:  This is a rhetorical question (no question mark at the end).  Your perception is actually the opposite.  The real Pacquiao was the one that controversially won Fight III.  The Pacquiao that “demolished” the bigger fighters was the fixer who knew he would neither be punched frequently nor hard by his opponents, that’s why he was confidently aggressive and looked invincible.      

4)      Are you not being unpatriotic or someone with a crab mentality?

Answer:  Pacquiao is a folk-hero.  Much higher than him are our national heroes (Rizal, Bonifacio, 2 Lunas, Mabini, Aguinaldo, Sakay, etc).  When historians and biographers like Teodoro Agoncillio and Ambet Ocampo scrutinize the lives of our national heroes, they are not called unpatriotic or accused as having crab mentality.  Are the fights of the Pambansang Kamao exempted from scrutiny/ exposure?

5)      Why do politicians, government officials, the media, businessmen and almost all Filipinos praise Pacquiao to high heavens, unlike you?

Answer:  The country badly needs a unifying hero like Pacquiao who would help us forget our problems, even for a day.  The “masa” believes what they see in the movies and, lately, what they see in the ring.  If Pacquiao gets exposed, the political capital and financial investments of many people who are supposed to be knowledgeable of the big picture will all go down the drain.   

            For more detailed discussions of the dubious fights of Pacquiao, kindly read my previous articles in this blog.

The youth has a lot to live for—fame, fortune, raising a family, going on an adventure, expanding knowledge and acquaintances, etc.  The same can’t be said about very matured people.  The very matured have much lesser time to live.  So, why do many very matured people become cowards?

1. They lack energy;
2. They can hardly cope with their ailments;
3.  They are preoccupied with making both ends meet; or,
4. They have lost their mental edge.

The very matured people already know that they are in the “pre-departure” stage.  They have less time to live.  Dying next year or the year after hardly makes any difference.  We will all die.  It is much preferable to depart shortly after making an “astounding achievement” than depart later having accomplished nothing memorable.

Since old people have much less time to live, they must have less fear of taking chances or risks in order to accomplish something big, no matter how controversial they are.  The longer they stay in the “pre-departure” stage, the more they must seek for their last big battle, aside from their health and financial pre-occupations.

Go ahead.  Make a serious effort, somehow, to overcome the above four (4) hurdles.  Even if you strive to accomplish something that you can’t probably finish, it will surely be worth the time and effort.  You will make your stay in the “pre-departure” stage more meaningful.

Don’t bother calling me unkind or a provocateur.  I will call you names too.  Remember:  If our Divine Creator could call on people who choose meditative and other peaceful vocations, with His unlimited powers, He can undoubtedly call on others to choose risky and more challenging paths while they are in the twilight of their lives.  Don’t depart in obscurity.  Make a difference to as many people as possible in just one glorious effort.  Even a series of small glorious achievements will be fine.  Embark on it now.

There can be no doubt that life on earth would become extinct sooner than we comfortably accept. The continuous degradation of the environment at an increasing rate is undeniably the crux:

1. Commercial progress is anathema to the protection of the environment, and the spiralling population is the both cause and the effect.
1.1 Every business needs a growing market;
1.2 Every non-business institution needs an increasing number of followers and believers;

All businesses, aside from snatching the customers or clients of competitors, base their projections on the increase of new products/services for old and new buyers.  On the other hand, every non-business entity owes its existence, not only on the continued support of loyal members but more importantly, on the allegiance of new and a growing number of followers and believers.

The geometric increase in the world’s population is directly related to the exponential degradation of the environment.  If we don’t limit population growth by earnestly decreasing the birth rates of countries in the third world, our living earth will violently limit it through calamities.  Forget what the Catholic papacy and business expansionists say.  Limiting population growth is the long-term solution.

2. Every person possesses the latent desire to aspire for better existence in the hereafter, not in the here-and-now. Ironically, there is an opposite mentality which is quite visible yet ignored: “…I will enjoy everything and whatever my power and wealth can bring me today. Let the next generation worry about the bad effects of what I endeavour to achieve. I won’t be here anyway…” This is the perpetually accepted dictum of the human race; and,

3. We delude ourselves that science and technology can catch up with the earth’s environmental degradation. Our greed for bigger incomes (euphemistically called and universally ingested or gulped as the “aspiration for higher standards of living”) would always come ahead of our financial allotments for saving the earth.

The lure of investing in the more profitable technologies, no matter how low their efficiencies, is much stronger than the need to shift investment into the most efficient ones.  A lot more should be invested in the research and development of the most efficient technologies and away from the usual mainstream like solar panels, wind turbines, etc. This investment bias or preference will be very difficult to eliminate.

The parting words of the actor Keano Reaves in one of his sci-fi movies “…At the precipice, we change…” is another Hollywoodic nonsense.  At the precipice, it is too late to change.

We are simply too callous about the above 3 issues.

I had previously written a longer essay, below, about this subject (Fear of Immediate Death: The Singular Solution to Man’s Indifference –Part 2).  This is my last article about environmental degradation.  I am not a bit alarmed in a different way, unlike those who deliberately manipulate the solutions to continuously profit.  Anyway, after another 100 years, the earth will just be a big ball of ice. Nothing else would matter.

I am inviting readers to add something or refine what this writer has listed down.

Requiring each finalist to answer just one randomly picked question is an insufficient basis for judging their mental capacity, psychological makeup, attitude, or even their verbal facility.  A lucky finalist may pick out a question which she feels comfortable with or is confident in answering; an unlucky finalist may pick out another question beyond her wits.

The participation of a woman in the Miss Universe Contest is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for her.  If the contest is about selecting the woman with the right combination of beauty and brain, why is there so much time allotted in finding “the beauty” but much less time on finding “the brain”?

Pageant organizers must allocate more time in selecting the winner who answers best the different questions from judges who have dissimilar values and interests in formulating their respective questions.  The contestants undergo a marathon in the beauty selection wearing swimsuits, their respective national costumes, during modular photo shoots, and during a host of publicity schedules wearing casual attires aimed at assessing each candidate’s rapport with co-contestants, the local audience and the world viewing public.  The remaining finalists must be given a more thorough Q & A segment upon which judges base their selection of the winners with finality.

A more comprehensive question & answer criterion must be formatted to eliminate the luck factor in the picking-out of questions:

1.   Each finalist must answer the questions of all the judges;

2.   If one finalist answered one question badly, she may be able to answer the other questions better; and,

3.   The scores given by a judge to every finalist who answered his question are averaged out with the scores given by the other judges.

It is a challenge to the pageant organizers’ creativity how to find ways and means to even-out the playing field in the Q & A segment while maintaining the financial viability of the contest.

After hearing his radio program callers, JB said if he were Ms. Venus Raj (of the Philippines) he could have answered, “I regret losing my virginity twice.”  I didn’t only have a big laugh at what JB said, I myself regretted not being able to elaborate on his fantasized answer because my phone call to his radio program didn’t get through.  If the Filipina finalist Venus Raj answered as JB Baylon suggested, William  Baldwin would surely demand an explanation or elaboration.  An exchange of repartee would ensue.  I would have suggested to JB Baylon that Venus Raj elaborate on her answer by explaining that, “I lost my virginity twice because I had vaginal and anal orgasms during my first sexual contact with my BF.”

My female readers, particularly those young and of above-average intelligence could have either laughed off Mr. Baldwin’s simple question with above-average wittiness or could have engaged him with anecdotes on seriously unique regrets of their lives.

How about you, dear readers?  Do you think Ms. Venus Raj could have won if she answered as JB Baylon suggested and elaborated the way I wanted her to?  How would you have answered the question of William Baldwin?

1.  Problem politicians “don’t have political will.”

This is a favorite complaint by those who have yet to realize that their expression has become hackneyed.  It presupposes that the accused doesn’t have a definite stand on a certain very important matter that requires urgent action.

However, one must accept the probability that person being accused as “having no political will” might already have a secret stand on the matter.  He may not sincerely subscribe to the accuser’s cause or worse, he might have already sold-out “his political will” to a third-party.  The accused has guts, alright.  He’s shrewdly silent about it.

It is like despising a voter for abstaining when the despiser simply can’t accept the fact that the abstainer doesn’t want to vote for anybody he doesn’t like.  Furthermore, the abstainer might not believe that anybody is worth his time voting for.

Certainly, another person may also abstain so as not to offend the protagonists.  His abstention is a stand—actually a third option—and it is his expression of his political will.

2.  “…..I have no opinion on that.”

Yeah sure!  Aren’t you just keeping your opinion to yourself, for various reasons?  Only cows, roosters and monkeys don’t have opinions.  Hackneyed: Man is a social animal.  All social animals have opinions.

Having no opinion is a myth.  An undeveloped and unexpressed opinion is by itself exactly that—an opinion.  If somebody says, “I don’t think or haven’t thought about it…” he actually means that he hasn’t refined his minuscule thoughts about something so he doesn’t feel confident talking about it.

Far from being truths, those two expressions are judgmentally bisexual.  They’re neither here nor there.

Come to think of it, there are many other laughable mainstream paradoxes…..

It took me less than an hour to make him list down the reasons for his staying alive so happily — according to my own stern standards.  He admitted that he:

1.  has enough financial source to last a few years beyond his life time;

2.  has a disciplined regimen for light physical exercise — muscular and

aerobic;

3.  undergoes intermittent medical and dental check-ups;

4.  has a very satisfying monogamous and heterosexual relationship;

5.  uses social connections for intellectual pursuits:

5.1  to be able to read and write extensively;

5.2  to hone whatever analytical ability he still possesses; and,

5.3  to desperately pursue the Moral High Ground by example, and by

laboriously untangling inherited biases and myths.

6.  sleeps soundly for a total of six to eight hours, in a 24-hour day;

7.  derives immense satisfaction in caring for his dog and aquatic pets,

but  grieves profusely when he has to acquire a replacement;

8.  has no diabetes, hypertension, and arthritis — is not prescribed to take any maintenance med;

9.  is vastly contented with his children’s statuses — he just wants to make a little difference in their lives;

10.  has laughed about the inevitability of death, years ago, has given

instructions on the disposition of his earthly remains, and that for him

going to heaven is a mere bonus; and,

11.  unabashedly desires to be able to choose his manner of dying instantly.

Am I wrong in making my uncle, my ideal man?  Do I shock your sensibilities if I want to grow old the way he does?  Are my earthly goals disappointing?  Tell me the traits of your ideal person that you want to replicate.  (Is there a politically correct word for “replicate?”  Do you have another idea what a swan song should be?

For brevity, I have reserved my clarification/elaboration on any of the numbers above for somebody who would ask for them.

As I’ve said, the foregoing are merely illustrations in the Philippine setting.  They are replicated virtually in all of humanity, in varying degrees, as the persons uttering the expressions find them convenient to use.  They are actually running out of alibis and use these expressions as fallback when cornered.  This writer has observed too many people resort to them: Americans, Australians, British, Canadians, Chinese,  Germans, Indonesians, Japanese, Koreans, Malaysians, New Zealanders, Russians, South Africans, Thais, the list goes on.

Why do they use self-deprecating expressions?

1.  A person who uses them wants to impress others with his humility and he is willing to blame, not only himself but, all of his countrymen;

2.  That person seldom realizes that he should only speak for himself.  With that lack of realization, he expects his countrymen to condescend to his own version of humility; and,

3.   He thinks that by deprecating his nationality, he enhances his credibility, even his intellectual projection (sic) to listeners.

When I hear somebody say,  “Ang mga Pilipino ay talagang…” or “Tayong mga Pilipino ay mga…”, I am bound to cut him off and tell him:

4.  “You SOB, don’t lump me with the others like yourself.”

5.  “I am a Filipino, you can’t speak for me.  Speak for yourself, you SOB…”

6.  “What you said is unfair to Filipinos.  You should only say, ‘I’ or ‘…Many Filipinos, like myself…’.” or,

7.  “What you said was non-siquitur.”

Many would argue that their countrymen, in general, have more bad traits, weaknesses, and excesses than other  human beings.  The bad contention is a result of not applying uniform parameters in their comparisons between groups of people.  The self-deprecators do not take into consideration the differences in educational attainments, economic advancements, political stages of development, religious practices, size of population in given areas, and other distorting impressions within a given time frame.

Many so-called intelligent people sum it up by saying, “There is a culture of corruption, cronyism, militarism, impunity, etc.” to disparage a certain sector of the population.  There we have it!  This summing-up can only be fair if it is labeled as A CERTAIN SECTOR OF THE POPULATION, not on the population’s entirety.

However, people who belong to a labeled sector will not all agree with the disparagement.  They have the right not to be lumped together.

Perhaps, there is wisdom in the saying, “…Many people will pursue culture brands, as though it were dangerous to meet it alone.”

I honestly predict that most women would turn a blind eye.  Some would remind their men of the risks.  But raise hell? Hell no!  Anyway, any man could easily convince his woman that what he is doing is for her and their children’s future.

It’s one thing that a husband commits adultery, but another thing when the same husband commits a crime which will greatly improve the family’s standard of living.

Certainly, the women can accuse men (including this writer) of the same hypocrisy.  It’s just that in this short article, I don’t want to take on the follies of both sexes at one time.

Can a wrong-doing be justified by its mere complexity or its benefits to one’s family?  I’d like to hear/read somebody who believes that a unique reason or circumstance can be enough justification.