The election is ‘over’

“Do you ever get the feeling that the only reason we have elections is to find out if the polls were right?”

—Robert Orben

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

INTUITIVE Filipinos will agree that election results in the Philippines are more or less already “known” the moment prominent survey firms start to reveal their respective survey results even if, in the case this year, the May 12 general election is still about two months away.

Big survey outfits have always “predetermined” the outcome of any Philippine election especially in the senatorial race this year, where 12 seats will be contested.

To compound the matter, most of these survey outfits have already reported that media and entertainment celebrities are expected to dominate the senatorial contest.

The same names of possible “winners” kept on showing up again and again as if the survey networks have hired Nostradamus in their operations.

Thus, we are saying that the 2025 election, at least in the senatorial race, is almost over—except for the actual voting that will be done on May 12, and only the Commission on Elections (Comelec) can officially declare the winners.

This could also be the reason why Filipinos were split on their opinions whether allowing these survey companies to constantly release survey results months and weeks before the actual voting day will help guide the voters to pick the right occupants in congress’ upper chamber.

 

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We are zeroing in on the senators because those who will be elected in this election will serve until 2031, and will join the winners of the 2022 election to form the Senate's delegation to the 20th Congress of the Philippines, with the senators elected in 2022 serving until 2028.

If survey firms play monkey business (we pray they won’t) and favor candidates who aren’t worthy to sit in the senate but “know how” to worm their way into the winning column (you know what we mean), the so-called taong bayan will again end up the real losers for having these cretins instead of the real statesmen and really brilliant senators.

This could be the gist of Comelec’s recent move calling to amend its latest resolution regulating survey firms conducting election polls so it can be fully enforceable in time for the 2028 presidential elections.

According to Comelec Chair George Garcia, “the Comelec is very much willing to amend our guidelines, to modify and change (provisions of the resolution), depending on the outcome of our discussion with the survey firms.”

Pollsters and research groups met with the Comelec earlier ‘February 27to iron out provisions of Comelec Resolution (CR) No. 11117, which mandates that only pre-registered entities are authorized to conduct and publicly disseminate election surveys.

They reportedly questioned, among others, Section 2, which mandates them to register with Comelec’s Political Finance and Affairs Department before they can conduct any election survey. They said the provision could be used for censorship.

 

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Among those who attended the signing of the pledge of commitment and the launching of Task Force Respect (Regulation and Enforcement of Survey Practices for Election Credibility and Transparency) at the poll body’s headquarters in Intramuros, Manila, were representatives from Social Weather Stations (SWS), Pulse Asia Research Inc., Ibon Foundation, Marketing and Opinion Research Society of the Philippines, Publicus Asia, Tangere, Laylo Research Strategies and WR Numero.

Surveys are supposedly lengthy and require more time to respond as compared to a poll. Many types of data analytics algorithms are reportedly applied on the responses collected and the insights generated are conveyed to various departments of an organization.

If we have a lot of time to generate reports and share it with our team members, surveys make a good choice for us.

Both poll and survey are reportedly used to gather feedback and choices of the target audience. In the same industry, both poll and survey can be used to gain insights that will help to make better decisions.

Online polls are also reportedly created during elections and give insights on the probability of particular candidates and political parties winning the seat.

This will give them an idea of how popular their party candidates are in that region. According to QuestionPro, election polls can help de-code what are the choices of different sections of the society, what concerns them most and what do they wish from the future government.

(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor of two daily newspapers in Iloilo.—Ed)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Journey to Ixtlan

“For me the world is weird because it is stupendous, awesome, mysterious, unfathomable; my interest has been to convince you that you must assume responsibility for being here, in this marvelous world, in this marvelous desert, in this marvelous time. I wanted to convince you that you must learn to make every act count, since you are going to be here for only a short while; in fact, too short for witnessing all the marvels of it."

—Don Juan

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

THIS an awesome vision of the world that is both a literary masterpiece and the gateway to a new and more profound way of thinking about ourselves, of living our own lives.

Carlos Castaneda's Journey to Ixtlan pales in comparison to The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge and A Separate Reality, the books he wrote while he was an anthropology student at the University of California, but Journey to Ixtlan and the lesson the Peruvian-American author has given the readers present an awesome vision of the world that is both a literary masterpiece and the gateway to a new and more profound way of thinking about ourselves, of living our own lives.

Castaneda's third book is about an alleged apprenticeship to the Yaqui "shaman," Don Juan.

It is the record of Castaneda's initiation into the mysteries of sorcery--of becoming a "man of knowledge"--at the hands of one of the most remarkable personalities ever to emerge from anthropological investigation: don Juan, the Yaqui brujo (sorcerer).

Don Juan's profound insight into the nature of things and his deep, disturbing knowledge of human nature made The Teachings of Don Juan and A Separate Reality immediate classics.

His brooding, powerful and vivid presence has haunted, perplexed and illuminated the lives of several hundred thousand readers.

 

HALLUCINOGENS

 

The two earlier books were concerned with the use of hallucinogens in don Juan's sorcery and recorded Castaneda's experiences, sometimes searing and terrifying, as he underwent the long and arduous apprenticeship of becoming a "man of knowledge."

Journey to Ixtlan transcends these experiences to show the reader the means by which a "man of power" sees, as opposed to merely looking, and how by his concentrated "seeing" he can, indeed must, "stop the world."

Castaneda reaches for power in a series of startling encounters with the unknown--a confrontation with death and the past in the form of an albino falcon; with the twilight wind that is really power; with a flesh-and-blood mountain lion that Don Juan attracts by using Castaneda as the bait in a test of courage; with a mountain fog that brings visions and terror in the high mountains and in the bright, arid desert.

These visions and experiences from the lessons of don Juan, the techniques and concentration and compassion of the hunter--the man who is "without routines, free, fluid, unpredictable"--finding in the world around him the power that he has learned see, use and control.

The title of this book is taken from an allegory that is recounted to Castaneda by his "benefactor" who is known to Carlos as Don Genaro (Genaro Flores), a close friend of his teacher don Juan Matus.

"Ixtlan" turns out to be a metaphorical hometown (or place /position of being ) to which the "sorcerer" or warrior or man of knowledge without reason or thoughts is drawn to return.

This is because his elevated perspective leaves him little in common with ordinary people, who now seem no more substantial to him than "phantoms."

The point of the story is that a man of knowledge, or sorcerer, is a changed being, or a Human closer to his true state of Being, and for that reason he can never truly go "home" to his old lifestyle again.

 

TEACHINGS

 

In Journey to Ixtlan Castaneda essentially reevaluates the teachings up to that point. He discusses information that was apparently missing from the first two books regarding stopping the world which previously he had only regarded as a metaphor.

He also finds that psychotropic plants, knowledge of which was a significant part of his apprenticeship to Yaqui shaman don Juan Matus, are not as important in the world view as he had previously thought.

The book shows a progression between different states of learning, from hunter, to warrior, to man of knowledge or sorcerer, the difference said to be one of skill level and the type of thing hunted, "...a warrior is an impeccable hunter that hunts power. If he succeeds in his hunting, he becomes a man of knowledge."

Throughout the book Castaneda portrays himself as skeptical and reserved in his explanations of the phenomena at hand, but by the end of the book Castaneda's rationalist worldview is seen to be breaking down in the face of an onslaught of experiences that he is unable to explain logically.

Our destiny’s revelations

 

“Though the mills of the God grind slowly, yet they grind exceedingly small; though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He all."

—Fredrich Von Logan, Retribution

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

MUCH has been written about "Karma," a universal law considered as immutable, a law of cause and effect constantly referred to by Oriental faithful and by both Luke and Matthew in the Bible.

In Dr. Deepak Chopra’s speaking engagement we attended at the St. Elizabeth Theater in Vancouver, Canada 15 years years ago, the author of the Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, stressed that “karma is used philosophically to indicate conditions in the present stemming from thoughts and actions in the past.”

Could the past thoughts and actions of the late former Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. and former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte became indications of the country’s current political, cultural, and economic conditions?

Karma's Sanskrit meaning encompasses both action and reaction --or consequences. Its Hindu meaning encompasses work, or the labor of the soul seeking to attain union with God, according to Sanskrit believers.

If we believe Sanskrit’s explanation of karma, many of us will lend credence to a possibility the present political storms that threaten to tragically dismantle the quarreling President Marcos Jr. and embattled Vice President Sara Duterte-Carpio are already the ramifications or by-products of their fathers’ past thoughts and actions.

 

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In the book, Edgar Cayce's Story of Karma, author Mary Ann Woodward arranged and selected the "sleeping prophet's" revelation of man's destiny.

During his lifetime, Cayce--the world-renowned prophet and psychic--gave a series of clairvoyant trance reading devoted to metaphysics and revolving around the central theme of reincarnation. The shock waves from his revelations still reverberate in scientific and religious circles.

Although Cayce was a practicing Christian, his trance readings frequently embraced concepts of Oriental religions, according to Woodward.

From these discourses comes Edgar Cayce's Story of Karma--his explanation of the powerful life forces generated by personal actions which can bless or plague us through many lifetimes.

Woodward wrote that Cayce told many seekers, in their physical readings, that their physical defect or disease was a karmic condition.

These readings emphasized the fact that our physical condition is directly dependent upon our mental and spiritual ideals, with their concomitant emotions, from one life to another.

"We do take it with us," wrote Woodward. "Moreover, our daily stresses and strains, our emotional upsets, affect us physically."

Many were reportedly told they would not be well, nor would their physical condition improve, until both their mental and spiritual attitudes changed.

 

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"They would have to give up such negative things as fears, hates, and resentments and become more in attunement with Creative Forces," she added.

Here’s what we learned more about the subject matter in the book: (4021-1) To be sure the attitudes oft influence the physical conditions of the body. No one can hate his neighbor and not have stomach or liver trouble. One cannot be jealous and allow anger of same and not have upset digestion or heart disorder.

(1523-9) This dependency was explained thus: For their have arisen the acute conditions not only from physical reactions but mental conditions that have been as resentments, which have been built into mental forces of the body. These are indicated in the reacting with the physical effects upon organ centers...now finding reflexes in various portions of the body.

(5283-1) This body is meeting its own self. For it is meeting its own shortcomings, when judged from some moral standards. The body, then, must first in its mental and spiritual attitude make amends, not merely promises to others but to self and the sources of health and of life itself. These should be the beginnings and the body not merely being dependent upon the applications which must be, or may be, made by others; for there are within self the conditions here taken which now bring undesirable results in the ability of the body to function in the manner either physically or mentally as is most desirable. But there would be first a change in mental and spiritual attitude.

 

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"Of course, physical applications help healing and do alleviate the condition, but true healing comes from the mental and spiritual self," added Woodward.

(1593-1) And there must be taken into consideration all phases of this entity's experience in the present if the conditions would be wholly understood. For mind is the builder, and if there will be kept a balance--the physical mind and the spiritual mind should cooperate, coordinate.

There are those forces which the entity, then (not merely the body but the entity--body, mind, soul, is meeting in itself, called--by itself oft--karmic reactions. But karma--Well, these are the conditions as we find them in the body: The body, the mind, the soul are one within the physical forces; for the body is indeed the temple of the living God. In each entity there is that portion which is a part of the Universal Force, and is that which lives on. All must coordinate and cooperate.

(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor of two daily newspapers in Iloilo.—Ed)

We aren’t perfect

“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

—C. S. Lewis

 

By Alex P. Vidal

 

WHILE other Christians believe that only God and the Bible have authority, we, Catholics, believe the ailing Pope Francis of Argentina is the highest representative of God on Earth.

No one can predict though what will happen next to the very ill Pope Francis, 88, except God.

Since God doesn’t report to us—or doesn’t have the obligation to tell us directly about the Pope’s life span, let’s now leave everything to the medical science, the area where there is no conflict with religion.   

Catholicism, which is dominant in my country of birth, the Philippines, is just a branch of Christianity, but the largest branch with about 1.3 billion followers worldwide.

We were born and baptized as Christians and our basic education in religion was about Christianity, about Jesus Christ as the "Son of God" our "Savior who died for our sins."

Our education further brought us to Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, among other primitive religions.  

Then came Gandhi, a Hindu, who had allegedly proclaimed “he loved Jesus but not the Christians.” There were Christians who allegedly parried Gandhi by saying “they loved the famous Indian pacifist but not Hinduism". A tit for a tat.

 

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Like all Catholics and Christians for that matter, the Pope, one of the most vilified persons in the world, isn’t perfect. Below are some of shocking myths we gathered about Christianity, which many of us may agree or disagree:

1. Christians force their morality on others.

-According to this myth, Christians are judgmental and act as society’s moral watchdogs. And they try to censor everything from the arts to sex education.

2. Christians suppress women.

-According to this myth, the church through the ages has stifled the voice and gifts of women and has treated women as second-class beings.

3. Christians caused the ecological crisis.

-According to this myth, the Christian religion is alienated from the natural world. The Bible says to subdue the earth, and Western Christian culture took that as a license to exploit nature.

4. Christians are anti-scientific.

-According to this myth, the church has historically suppressed learning in general and scientific inquiry in particular. Christians even promote pseudoscience by trying to force science to fit a literal interpretation of the Bible.

5. Christians have done terrible things in the name of Christ.

-This myth cited the wrongs that have been done in the name of Christianity—everything from the Crusades to televangelist scandals.

6. Christian missionaries destroy native cultures.

-According to this myth, Christian missionaries force indigenous peoples to give up their unique culture. Christians don’t respect the spiritual value in native customs and religions.

7. Christians are arrogant.

-According to this myth, all religions teach basically the same thing, but Christians insist their religion is the only one that’s right. They arrogantly claim that Jesus Christ is the only way to God. That may be true for Christians, but it isn’t true for everybody.

 

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Freelance writers Dale and Sandy Larsen of Duluth, Minnesota, ask if Christianity is defensible amid these myths.

“Isn’t it a backward religion based on primitive ideas that have no place in today’s world? Isn’t the Bible hopelessly out of date? And yet Christians insist on forcing their morality on other people!” they intone.

“And worst of all, isn’t Christianity the cause of so much pain and suffering in the world—from destroying native cultures to suppressing women to causing the ecological crisis?

“How can anyone take seriously a religion that is promoted by sleazy televangelists and that once sponsored the Crusade?

“These are honest questions that deserve straightforward answers. Separating the beliefs and actions of some Christians from our Christianity can be difficult. We need to go below the surface, see how these problems developed historically and go back to the Bible for the full story.”

They believe that there is “element of truth” in the above-mentioned myths.

“Some Christians are arrogant. Some Christians have made their faith into an exclusive club. But God’s forgiveness always reaches out to be inclusive, touching everyone who acknowledges need and and responds in faith to his mercy,” the conclude. “Anyone who has been hurt by Christians’ arrogance will need to summon extra courage and open-mindedness in order to take another serious look at Christianity.”

We must examine our heart. Are we willing not only to look at Christian faith but to find it true and begin to live by it?

Let’s examine the heart of Christian belief. Let’s examine the credibility of Christianity.

(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor of two daily newspapers in Iloilo.—Ed)