blackshama's commentary on Philippine issues

Mao Zedong had an idea where the capitalist roaders in the Party would bring Chinese society. But in the end, Mao couldn't prevent the trip down the capitalist road. So we had the Bird's Nest stadium and now have the melamine in the baby formula scandal! The phrase was coined just before the Cultural Revolution and has been a staple in Mao Zedong thought. But US treasury secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve chief, Ben Bernanke have been labelled as "socialists" by the American intellectual establishment. If they convince Congress about the necessity of their 700 billion dollar bailout of sinking banks, then the US government would have nationalized a big chunk of the US financial system. But what scares the American public and their senators is neither Paulson and Bernanke can't say where all this would lead to! President George W Bush has gone public almost pleading to pass the bailout plan. The plan can be called the Paulson-Bernanke Thought. Thus the US h...

The Lehman Brother's collapse has been likened in Asia as a tsunami. Like the great wave that washes out seaside villages, this one threatens to wipe out pension funds of people. The blurbs report that the state pension fund organizations, SSS (for private sector employees) and the GSIS (for public servants) have invested in the billions of dollars with these sunk banks. Also the big local banks also have significant exposure too. The politicians are now demanding that the banks and pension fund organizations declare their exposure. I don't think that is a good idea for people may just go on a bank run of nightmare proportions. This is something that our Glorious Queen won't even contemplate about. Commentators have said that the recent Wall Street disaster is the worse since the 1929 stock market crash. The 1987 crash pales in comparison. Since even the ordinary person has some savings exposed in stocks or as mutual funds and other mid term relatively low risk investments,...

There is no doubt that automated teller machines (ATM) have convenient for many Pinoys. Many now receive their salaries through their ATM accounts in the banks. However during times of heavy withdrawals especially at Christmastime and during other holidays the ATM system is overtaxed and that the network crashes. This causes probably millions in loses for the banks and merchants. This should give banks pause for thought. Banks probably have done studies on Pinoy use of ATMs behaviour thus machines are situated in malls and near offices. Pinoys tend to withdraw their whole pay at a time. Thus the volume of transactions that costs much. We are still really a cash based economy and people tend to use ATMs as a sort of electronic bank book. Obviously the system can't handle the large withdrawals that cause long queues at the machines. Criminals also have taken advantage of this and they "prey"on the unwary. Businesses and merchants also lose. If a customer can't get his/h...