The Ilocos Times

Pssst: Do you know how a man can hit his girlfriend without being charged with domestic violence? Read this. A Filipino police officer in Honolulu was recently shown in a videotape distributed to television stations apparently hitting with his fists his attractive Caucasian girlfriend in a restaurant kitchen. Police officers who responded to a 911 call did not file a police report.   The police department did not file charges against the Filipino thus raising an uproar in the community. The department referred the matter to the city prosecutor. He did not file charges and instead referred it to a grand jury for investigation. I do not agree with those who call it “punting” (an idiomatic expression for avoiding making a decision) since the prosecutor could defend his action that it was a way to issue grand jury subpoenas to reluctant or uncooperative witnesses so that he could compel them to testify under oath exactly what they saw and heard as the events on the videotape ...

By Dominic B. dela Cruz Staff reporter Laoag City— Laoag councilor Joseph H. Tamayo shot down a proposal to allow motorcycle riders not wear helmet when they are in the city’s poblacion area. Laoag City police chief P/Supt. Jeffrey T. Gorospe earlier made the proposal to do away with the wearing of helmet in the poblacion area to prevent concealment of identities of motorcycle-riding criminals. Mr. Gorospe said assassinations or shooting of civilians are usually carried out by riding-in-tandem criminals who take advantage of the helmet law to conceal their identities. The newly installed police chief cited an example where a traffic aide was accidentally dragged by a motorcycle whose rider was not identified because of the helmet as well as a hit and run victim who was hit by a motorcycle with no vehicle plate. He added that the wearing of helmet for motorcycle riders is a national law but he singled out Batac City where the wearing of helmet in their poblacion a...

“ The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next. ”-- Abraham Lincoln Philosophy according to the Free Dictionary is said to be the love and pursuit of wisdom by intellectual means and moral self-discipline. It is also an art of investigating nature, causes, or principles of reality, knowledge, or values, based on logical reasoning rather than empirical methods. But because of its complicated principles, philosophy remains as a mystery to most of the students. For the record, philosophy first surfaced when Thales of Miletus, a   pre-Socratic   Greek philosopher hypothesized about the nature of matter— that the originating principle of nature was a single material substance: water. Thales attempted to explain natural phenomena without reference to   mythology   and was tremendously influential in this respect and eventually lead to an essential idea of scientific revolution and because of his principles ...

Surprise , surprise. Forests now cover over half of the Philippines.   It actually increased from 23.9 percent in 2003 to 52.6 percent of the total land area in 2006, according to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). This is among the country's major achievements toward achieving international biodiversity targets by 2020, says a CBD country profile citing the Philippine Millennium Development Goal report of 2007. Protected areas increased from 8.5 percent in 1992 to 12.8 percent of total land area in 2008, including 1,169 marine protected areas (in the form of reserves, sanctuaries and parks). Improvements in the management effectiveness of these sites rose from 15 percent in 2000 to 30 percent in 2007.   The number of confiscations of illegally traded wildlife species regulated increased from 513 heads in 2005 to 11,124 heads in 2011; measures such as fish farming and eco-tourism in protected areas are being implemented. The Phili...

Ti Kinabirhen ti Sabong Amado I. Yoro Ewa Historic Villages Hawaii USA 96706 Adda kinabirhen dagiti sabong Ti nabara a sang-aw ti parbangon Napusaksak latta ti pingping ti langit Ti nasudi a pammasungad ti init Siputak ti rayos init iti lamolamo a tangatang Itag-ayna ti parmata saribiag iti law-ang Umang-anges ti pagorasan iti sibibiag a namnama ti panagbariw-as ken salukag a pussuak ti wayawaya Makakayaw ti buya ti nakaparsuaan Tumukno ti langit ti nalayog a parmata Sibogan ti nalamiis a linnaaw ti barukong Ti umang-anges a daga a pagbukaran ti ayat Ti alikaka ken dungngo ti dakulap ti panawen Tapayaenna ti kinabirtud ti sumingising a namnama Dumtengto ti pakauna ken paripirip dagiti umuna nga isem a panagbingngi sumangpetto kas nadayaw a sangaili Ti umuna a panagbukar ti umuna a panagtinnag Ti linnaaw ken ti arbis iti parbangon Iti umuna a panagbettak……. Sarabuen ti kulibangbang ti damo a pul-oy Umuna nga agek a s...

By Leilanie G. Adriano Staff reporter Laoag City —Over the past 12 years, the level of compliance of local government units to the provisions of the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act is low, said provincial environment and natural resources officer Juan delos Reyes. In view of this, the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) in cooperation with the National Solid Waste Management Commission has sent letters to all concerned local government units here to comply with the law. To promote voluntary compliance to the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000, otherwise known as Republic Act 9003, the DENR initiated a three-day seminar workshop, inviting all local chief executive of the province to improve their local governance through observing discipline and cleanliness. Of the 21 municipalities and two cities here, Mr. Delos Reyes said that about 50 percent has complied with the 10-year solid waste management law. For now, he said majority ...

The number of children living in poverty in the Philippines continues to climb despite the country's recent economic gains. According to a study titled “Child Poverty in the Philippines” by state think tank Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), there were already about 13.4 million Filipino children living in poverty in 2009. “This number represents 36 percent or more than one-third of all Filipino children aged below 18. Being poor, they suffer from deprivations of food, shelter, health, and education," said Dr. Celia Reyes, PIDS senior research fellow and lead author of the study. Using data collected from national surveys and administrative records of various government agencies, the key findings of the study demonstrate that both the number and severity of poverty among Filipino children have been increasing through the years. Around 10 million of these children face at least two overlapping types of severe deprivation in basic amenities wh...

Agmulatayo iti bukbukel Amado I. Yoro Ewa 9/25/0214 Daytoy ti bukel ti ayat Bay-annak a mangitukit dita barukong ken iti imeng dayta pusom iti namnama nga agrusing ken agtubo iti kaunggam: semilia ti biag ! Daytoy ti bukel ti isem Bay-am nga isangbay dagiti mailandayag a panagbukar dagiti agsapa kas met iti sabong iti muyong iti ayat ken pateg ti nakaparsuaan: ibabangon ti init! Daytoy ti bukel panagserbi Bay-am dagiti ima, takiag ken dakulap ti panawen a mangsakruy dagiti kaasi ken ayat ta itdenna ti pannakaagas dagiti babassit a sugat nga imbati ti duadua ken naglumen a pammati:  nakaukrad a takiag! Daytoy ti bukel pannakaawat pammakawan met daytoy a mamaglunit ti rikki ti susik dagiti saan a naannadan a rikna ken diktar ti panawen: rekonsilasion! Daytoy ti bukel ti katawa ti ragsak, ti namnama ti panagrangpaya ken panagsantak talinaay talna, kappia ken talged.

I am glad , dear karikna , that Ilocano gays, through the Sunflowers Organization, have finally made their voices heard on pressing issues faced by the LGBT community, particularly today on the case of Jennifer Laude, a transgender who was allegedly murdered by an American serviceman. It was actually your karikna who prodded Benly Academia (Pasuquin Sunflowers president, organizer of Asia's oldest pride march) and Kristina Cassandra (Miss Ilocoslovaklush 2014) to issue a joint statement on the case. They immediately obliged with a well-crafted and insightful statement. Here it is: “We join the whole LGBT community in condemning the brutal killing of Miss Jennifer Laude, and we urge our law enforcement agencies to do everything within their means and power, and with neither fear nor favor, to bring justice to the victim—she who lived a life of courage but who died at the hands of a bigoted coward. “We further request the media to report on the unfortunate case alwa...

Biannual FAO Food Outlook report and new Food Price Index released Rome —Food markets are more stable and prices for most agricultural commodities are sharply lower than they have been in recent years, according to the latest edition of FAO's biannual  Food Outlook  report and a new update to the Organization's monthly  Food Price Index , both out today. Bumper harvests and abundant stockpiles are key factors helping drive down international cereal prices, according to the report. World wheat production in 2014 is forecast to reach a new record, it says. For coarse grains, prospects for near-record production levels, combined with already-high inventories point to a very comfortable world supply and demand balance in 2014/15, especially for maize. While rice outputs could decline slightly this year, stockpiles remain "huge" and are sufficient to cover over one-third of projected consumption during the 2015-16 period. All ...

It’s been a busy month for me and I would like to share some of the insights I got from the meetings, conversations, workshops and research presentations I had recently to advance futures literacy, futures research and strategic foresight in government reforms, city futures, social innovation, learning and leading in an Asian century.   The task in these conversations was to unpack the Filipinos ways of imagining and knowing the future and to develop new tools and techniques or to modify some of the most impressive foresight tools to suit local nuances, knowledge, worldviews, languages and creativities. To facilitate these conversations I used the futures triangle method and scenarios, a deceptively simple tool, to explore the Filipinos futures landscape and map the drivers of change (how the present is understood), their visions (futures – their hopes, fears and aspirations) and the structures and thinking habits that prohibits people and institutions (the weights of his...