I do agree about the effects of undercutting education funding, though. But it is nice to know that even this situation, the Philippines has one of the highest literacy rate at 92%.

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Lance, who do you feel is worthy if being your president then?

It’s pure stupidity treating GMA as the country’s president. and GMA really cares for her own interest. she has a heart for herself alone. not for us.

I believe that debt servicing is v. important, if only there was an ideal trickledown of the debt we’re incurring. There are anomalous budgeting and auditing going on in the government but I just don’t like the idea of someone calling the IMF/WB as “loan sharks.” Hmph.

And about the corruption, it doesn’t matter where the funds are routed, corruption is there. I guess it is natural to hate the one that steals the most through corruption but the fact is, corruption is everywhere. Assume GMA stole some of her 25 billion, how much would that be compared to the money lost on _all_ corruption cases?

And there’s also the public image factor. If she does a good job on a project she started, she looks good. You forget Victor, it’s politics. :-p

Another point, is that our debt can be negotiated to suit us better. Brazil did that. Venezuela did that. Why can’t we?

Anyway, I don’t know where you got the numbers but it is always an SOP to state sources, especially of such statistics. Second, from what I read here you don’t seem to know much about the “Healing” project. If so, then it’s unfair of you to tag it as dubious. I Googled it and this is what I found: here. Apparently, a portion of that 13 billion is for some sort of welfare, after all. If you did know more about that program, you failed to fully explain it here to justify. Third, the national budget isn’t just sliced into debt payments, the presidential fund, social services, and the military. There’s so much more. Contrary to what you said, there is _not_ enough money for education and health care, or for anything else for that matter, because, as you made clear, too much goes to debt payments. There could be enough if you take all the money away from everything else and drop it into the health care and education piggy bank. You refute that GMA could very well allocate less on that and siphon more to others but I am quite sure GMA made it clear when she ran for the presidency that alleviating our fiscal crisis is one of her major projects; she is simply acting on that. But you cannot deny the good it did us. Less debts equate to more money to spend on us, the people. Just because your priorities do not coincide with the president’s does not mean they are skewed. Besides, a president doesn’t just decide on that on her own. A group of people who are veterans and would most probably know a hell more than you and me about how to run a country help a president set the budget.

(On an extremely unrelated note, your comment textbox is too small. Increasing the textbox’s height would be convinient, especially when making long comments.)

And to you, Makoy, I do not know how you could possibly contemplate not paying the debts. It doesn’t work that way in the real world where me, Bikoy, the president, the Filipinos, and unfortunately, you, are in.

tama ka sa punto mo bikoy.. ang laki ng badyet ni gloring sa debt at military/intelligence samantalang ginigipit ang education at social services..

Also, one of my points, Gloria has the nerve to allot 13 billion for something as dubious as “Healing the Wounds of EDSA” and yet all she allots for health care is a mere 11 billion. Gloria’s pork barrel sums up to 25 billion.

Point is, there is enough money for education, for health care. But that’s not Gloria’s priority.

Raising taxes increases government revenue, therefore increasing its capability to fund debt payment and social services.

How come gorvernment expenditure per person actually decreased?