In all my eighteen years, I have never seen a president-elect who was as enthusiastically received as Barack Obama was when he was sworn into office. His inauguration was such a big thing that even people in my age group, who don’t normally give a damn about politics, stayed up to watch it. Nowadays, we would only do that for DVD marathons or concerts. It makes you wonder why that is.

My own opinion is that Obama’s case is special for two reasons.

The first is that his presidency comes at a time when things could not be bleaker. This makes his spirited reception all the more surprising. Obama’s predecessor may have been cooperative in helping him make the transition, but he also left a ton of trash for him to clean up. Among that sea of garbage is a messed up war, a botched foreign policy, and a mismanaged economy. It is perhaps unfortunate that he’s got his work cut out for him by this much.

The second is that Obama continues to defy the realms of possibility. Here is a name that was virtually unheard of in the political arena five years ago. Now, he is perhaps the biggest name in all the arenas, political or otherwise, which you can imagine. He is so charismatic that he invites comparisons to Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy, and even Abraham Lincoln. Add to that the fact that he is an African American, one who was once even criticized for not being “black enough” because he had Caucasian blood. His success is downright intriguing, to say the least, but intriguingly enough, it is also inspiring.

It is because of these two reasons, the impossibility of his odds and the improbability of his achievements, that he inspires hope within the rest of us.

I believe that’s the most important commodity we have nowadays. We live in a time where even rich people become homeless and nations get bankrupt. If this is the way the things are going to be over the next few years, it’s going to be hard for a lot of us to keep on living. But if money isn’t going to make the world go ’round, then we need something else to back on.

I guess this is what Obama understood about his presidency. He understands that he will take the front in a time when change is so real it’s so hard to believe in. Even so, expectations of him are nothing short of monumental. And if he is going to succeed—indeed, survive—in his presidency, he knows that the first thing he must do is to rally his people. That is why in his inauguration speech, he focused on “the faith and determination of the American people, upon which this nation relies.”

Nothing inspires people better than the knowledge that you believe in them.

Deflecting expectations aside, his story in itself is something we can draw hope from. Toward the end of his speech, he talked about equality, the spirit of democracy. “This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed,” he said, “Why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.”

If he can overcome the odds, then we can, too.

As for us, the people who will soon inherit the world, he is a person we can look up to. I think it’s admirable that he tries to present his best face without being hypocritical, such as in his ongoing effort to quit smoking. In a world where it has become so easy to set morals aside, he reminds us that there is still value in being persons of integrity and character.

In the end, Obama’s election is a reminder that good still wins in this world, that there is space for hope in these trying times. No one can say for certain what the future will bring, but I am certain of one thing.

There is at least one change we can believe in.

At the Ayala Avenue-Paseo de Roxas junction in Makati last Friday afternoon, the multi-sectoral rally against Charter Change proved at least two things.

First, that rallies still work– sort of. During the days that followed, the Senate voted to junk the Constitutional Assembly, and House Speaker Prospero Nograles declared a ‘ceasefire’ on moves to amend the Constitution.

Second, it proved that people still cared. Well, some people, at least. The multi-sectoral rally did live up to its name. It drew a wide spectrum of protesters, from priests to politicans, capitalists to conservatives, students to street people. It was, on a miniature scale, almost ideally representative. Despite the disillusionment that pervades society when it comes to issues of politics, it is encouraging to know that some people still care about whether our government is doing the right thing.

It didn’t occur to me that it happened last Friday, though, until I came home that same night, when I came home to the sound of my parents watching TV Patrol in the living room, and in my head I blurted out, “Oh, that was today?” I guess I had been too preoccupied with my academic work the past week to be able to keep abreast with national news. I had the television turned off on most nights.

But the truth is, I consciously avoid following news on national politics whenever I can help it, which unfortunately isn’t very often because there is only one place at home to study in, and that place is where my parents watch the evening and midnight news, whichever is on by the time they arrive. Part of me is disenchanted whenever I hear talk on political squabbles or scandals or Charter Change, because it seems to me that nothing positive ever happens. But alas, due to ANC being on all the time, I am regrettably quite informed, and very disillusioned.

I used to be one of those young people who actively kept aware, though. I used to stay up to watch congressional sessions and impeachment votings, even if the results were mostly in favor of the Administration. But besides that, I used to make myself heard: I aired out my views to classmates and friends, whether or not they gave a damn, I blogged my positions, and I tried to join demonstrations whenever it was within my means to do so.

Nowadays I just sit around and watch re-runs of old sitcoms. I figure my voice won’t matter in the end. This issue proves my point.

It isn’t so much that amending the Constitution is such a horrible thing to do, it’s that they’re amending it for all the wrong reasons.

For one thing, this isn’t the first time that the Administration has brought it up. In fact, if my memory serves, they bring it up at least once every year. Not only that, they’re intent on making it happen before election time arrives, before her term expires. It’s been shot down again, but I’m wiling to bet a million bucks that it will come back to life by the time next year rolls around. This issue is turning out to be immortal.

For another, the method which they advocate to do it with, a constituent assembly, seems suspect. Loosely speaking, it will bring both the Senate (24 senators), and the House of Representatives (250 congressmen), the two houses of Congress, together in a meeting to vote on charter change. If three-fourths of all the members (198 votes) vote in favor of it, then amendments can be made to the Constitution. It would be fairly easy to predict how this one will go.

Somehow, I find it hard to convince myself that this little charade is for anything else than to keep some people in power.

Of course, it’s not like my voice will matter. My congressmen haven’t asked me whether I would be in favor of Cha-Cha, and I doubt they’ve asked anyone else who isn’t in government. I’ll have to wait until 2010– if we ever get there.

It’s thoughts like these that make me wish I had switched to another channel.

I’ve been looking forward to the Obama-McCain debate for quite some time now, but I must say that after watching CNN’s coverage of it last Saturday, I was rather disappointed.

I expected someone to take the lead in this campaign, but no one did. More emphasis was seemingly put on antagonizing the other candidate’s stances than on a fruitful discussion about policies. In particular, the debate became very intense when it came to the issue of Iraq and the Middle East. Obama continued to depict McCain as a supporter of the Bush administration; McCain continued to paint Obama as an inexperienced candidate. Afterwards, both campaigns released statements saying that their candidate had won. I don’t know who to believe.

Nonetheless, if there’s anything I admire about the political culture of the United States, it’s the fact that citizens continue to value these kinds of exchanges. Debates are an excellent avenue for presenting platforms and comparing policies. As far as government goes, these are the most important things we need to look out for when we elect a country’s leaders.

Funnily enough, while we’ve based much of our own system of government on theirs, this tradition of discussing platforms and policies through an intellectual clash is something that we’ve never inherited.

In our country, not much value is placed on the practice of debate in elections. Instead, our political culture (if it exists) is obsessed with pandering to images– and images only.

In the Philippines, the practice of elections approximates American Idol: it is mostly a battle of personalities. It explains why campaign jingles work, why actors win, and why few candidates seems to pay attention to making a real platform– which might also account for why there are no political parties here in the real sense of the word. We might as well turn elections into a reality show.

Then again, it’s not like there’s much we can do about that. If it’s true that history repeats itself, then this phenomenon of voting for the most handsome candidate is merely a repetition of how we used to select our datus based on who seems most charismatic. It’s all just a cycle that will continue to recur, and there is nothing we can do to change it.

Also, the idea of making Juan de la Cruz listen to some boring debate about whether candidates support the E-VAT is not quite as convincing as, say, the monetary ‘handouts’ that politicians would give to voters. The harsh realities of politics in the Philippines will continue to be there, and they will be much stronger forces than the force of reason.

It’s not like they’ll take these ideas seriously, anyway. Their ideas will not matter if they don’t put them into action. And it’s hard to put faith in a system that has promised us so many big things before, but have continued to fail us today.

But maybe that’s the problem. Since when did ‘progress’ or ‘poverty elimination’ become platforms? Why does no one ever talk about concrete measures, like the reform of relief programs, the passing of laws, or the repealing of policies? Allow me to be crazy and say that the reason why we there is no hope is because we’re not given something real to believe in.

I believe that there is a value in re-engineering the way we think and go about elections. I believe that more emphasis should be placed on the platforms and ideas put forth by candidates, instead of selecting leaders based on, literally, face value. I believe that there is room for the growth of a real political culture in the Philippines, that this will eventually ensure that we select the appropriate people for office. I believe that while there are many obstacles along the way, it is not yet too late to start. It took four centuries for the United States to get to where they are, and I think we have the capacity to do the same.

One hot topic that seems to recur in the newspapers and among my socially-aware peers is HB 4110, known more commonly as the Reproductive Health Bill. The bill, which is national in scope, promoted information on and access to both natural and family planning methods. It also claims not to “have any bias for or against either method.” The author of the bill, Rep. Edcel Lagman, has characterized the bill as pro-life and pro-family.

Supporters of the bill commend it for promoting the exercise of freedom of choice, as well as for being a timely response to the causes underlying overpopulation and, in the long run, poverty. Opposition to the bill, on the other hand, centers on claims that it is anti-life, that it promotes a culture of promiscuity, and that sex education is best practiced at home.

In my own opinion, it is the most reasonable alternative we have at the moment.

I think it’s unfortunate that the term ‘population control’ has negative connotations. Whenever mentioned, it seems to imply that we reduce people to mere numbers or statistics, or connote unacceptable and unnatural methods of prevention. That’s why it’s hard to give bills like these a fair hearing. But I propose that we set aside our biases for just a moment.

I want to begin with an observation: people who live in poverty are basically uninformed when it comes to reproductive health. It does not help either that society deems sex as a taboo topic. These people, then as now, find out through their friends, or by trying it out themselves. It is situations like these that cause more, usually unwanted, pregnancies. These pregnancies make their already-complicated lives even more complicated.

In an ideal situation, traditional methods would be enough. People would abstain because they would know the consequences, and their values would be consistent with it. But reality isn’t like that. People’s values differ, and they don’t always know the consequences.

If we really want to help them out, then the best we can do is to inform them, and give them their options. Isn’t this what we value in a democracy? Besides, if there’s anything that should be going for this bill, it’s the fact that it does not value one method over another. This means that if society’s values are as consistent as they appear, then most people would probably just listen to their parish priest anyway.

I understand the most of the controversy stems from the notion that modern methods would be available. Apparently, making these available would constitute an attack on our values. They would also, presumably, turn us all into sex maniacs, because condoms are available at our nearest convenience stores.

I don’t know what’s more oppressive, though—that we insist on imposing one system of beliefs for all people, or that we allow these ‘threats’ to exist for the sake of giving people knowledge. That’s because I don’t believe in an absolute notion of good. Or, maybe I’m just a liberal, believing that democracy is all about giving people choices, and that the furthest government can step in is by recommending some choices over others.

It’s the same banana with the ‘culture of promiscuity’ argument. True, safe sex is not the same as responsible sex, and I’m sure adults with ten or more children would understand.

As for experimental teenagers, well, they’re going to be exposed sooner or later. The question is whether we’ll let them get there first before they know anything. Or, maybe I’m just a cynic, not believing we can expect many of us to listen to abstinence talks because the world today encourages us to find out for ourselves what’s good for us, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

In the end, it’s not just a question of values, but a question concerning the just distribution of resources. I agree, this problem must be addressed, but I’m afraid we’ll have to wait forever before we get anywhere. In the meantime, more children are being born into lives that will become more and more difficult, the more that they keep on coming.

Maybe that’s the greater oppression.

I have not given thought to heroes until these past two weeks, when the commemoration of National Heroes’ Day reminded me that if there’s anything they do for us at present, it’s that they give us long weekends.

I don’t mean to imply, though, that holidays are all they’re worth; they’ve done so much more for this land than many of us ever have—or so we are taught to believe. But these weekends feel like they’ve just been long weekends, nothing more. And it does feel kind of sad that we don’t seem to remember why we commemorate them in the first place.

Maybe it’s because the nature of our heroes has changed. Times are different now, and the heroes of old have ceased to be relevant. Perhaps it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that “hero” is now synonymous to “icon”, since many of the people we call “our heroes” happen to be icons as well, like boxers and movie stars.

While I don’t necessarily agree with it, there is nothing wrong with that. Who a person considers to be his hero is his own business.

But if we have started to look for our heroes in places other than where they used to be, like at the forefront of causes or building the nation, so that our standards for heroism have changed, does that mean that we’ve lost them? Have heroes—people of courage and self-sacrifice, who fight for the greater good—disappeared?

Heroes are important because they remind us of man’s capacity for good in a twisted world. That’s why we need them, and that’s why we hold on to them: they give us something to believe in. They give us hope.

That’s also why, nowadays, we have turned to sectors like media and sports for our heroes. They are able to help us get through the drudgery of reality. When Michael Phelps won his eighth gold medal, we are able to set aside the problems of high prices and government corruption for a moment, and recall the greatness of the human spirit. When Manny Pacquiao won against Barrerra (or Morales, or Diaz), we remember that we, as a nation, still have something to be proud of. We look up to them because they can, to a certain extent, be looked up to.

After all, if we look to the realm of politics or society, will we find anyone we can look up to? Maybe there are, but the fact of the matter is we just don’t see them. Or if we do see them, they aren’t inspiring or ‘heroic’ enough to move us to action.

But who would want to be that kind of a hero, anyway? In a system where the lines have become so blurred that heroes are persecuted for doing the right thing, what incentive would you have to be one? Ironically enough, it seems that to play the role of a hero is to accept playing the role of the villain.

But even more ironic is the fact that we kill our heroes while crying out, at the same time, that we need them.

Then again, it’s possible that I’m looking in the wrong places. There are a lot of good people out there who are doing what they can to help change the way things are. They come in different faces: volunteers who help build houses, professionals who prioritize the less-fortunate, even icons who use their status to highlight their advocacies. In a sense, you can call them heroes because they serve as examples for doing the right thing.

It’s not like I mean to discredit their good works, but I don’t think you can boil down heroism to just being good. I think heroism also means doing the right thing even in the face of persecution, because that means you’re brave enough to stand alone. Taken in that sense, heroes are really hard to find. Ironically enough, perhaps that’s what makes them more valuable.

But even more ironic is the fact that it seems to be the heroes who face the greatest persecution who are be able to rally the most people.

I don’t know about you, but I haven’t found those people yet. I’m still holding out for a hero.

Since last Wednesday, going to school has become a horrible experience for me and my siblings. Without virtually any warning, the MMDA decided to close on that day the U-turn slot just right before the Katipunan flyover across Ateneo. By Monday, all the U-turn slots across Miriam College were closed. Presumably, this measure was meant to ease the perennial traffic buildup in the area, especially during school hours.It didn’t.

Instead, the opposite happened. Huge bottlenecks now occur under the Katipunan flyover as well as the U-turn slot going to UP. Those who want to avoid the standstill would have to journey all the way to the U-turn slot at the end Katipunan in Blue Ridge. This is no small inconvenience, considering that it’s around three kilometers away from the Ateneo gate, and fuel prices are skyrocketing.

Last Friday, the situation blew out of proportion. According to a traffic bulletin, the Katipunan traffic slowed to a halt a quarter before seven in the morning. This was because the vehicles coming from UP and beyond who were making a U-turn at Miriam had occupied all the lanes. In a matter of minutes, traffic on the other lane slowed down as well. Some vehicles went against the traffic to join the cars making a U-turn at Miriam. No officers arrived to take control of the situation until half an hour later, and the gridlock lasted until around nine. Many students were late. Some were forced to walk to school in order to elude the standstill.

As a response, the MMDA closed both U-turns as well. Now, everyone resorts to the U-turn under the flyover, where all the traffic from Xavierville goes. The bottleneck there gets so bad that even commuters are affected.

As you can see, I’m not a big fan of the change in traffic scheme. I think it makes things more difficult for motorists. True, Katipunan traffic has never been easy to deal with, but neither is EDSA traffic, or España traffic. But I don’t think there’s a pressing need to change things in Katipunan right now. The old scheme may not be perfect, but it’s working because motorists are already used to it. If it’s not broken, why fix it?

To be fair though, I’m not saying we shouldn’t introduce changes that might improve things. And every time we do, we’re obviously bound to encounter some difficulties. We shouldn’t be so quick to judge either.

But sometimes that route leads to a dead-end. And when you get to that point, the only thing to do is to stop and turn back.

In the first place, the scheme itself didn’t seem to be well-thought out. Traffic was simply diverted to all the wrong places. The situation last Friday could have been avoided if the traffic officers had been there to maintain order from the beginning, not to mention that motorists seemed unprepared for the situation. More effort should have been exerted in disseminating the information about the plan.

It’s when things like these happen that I begin to wonder whether our government remembers that we’re still people, not mere pawns on a policy-making chessboard. Our lives are affected by the laws they enact and the measures they implement, not to mention that it is their responsibility to serve us. There is more to traffic management than just closing U-turns; people have to be on time for school, they spend money on gas, and their lives could be put in peril by car accidents.

In the same vein, there is more to the Bangsamoro agreement than just a piece of paper. There are all the people that you would displace to consider. There is more to agrarian reform than just economics and business. There are the lives and livelihoods of farmers to consider. There is more to the ZTE deal than just internet access. What’s at stake is the blood, sweat, and tears of millions of Filipinos in the form of tax money.

Then again, I guess they just can’t consider every single thing. That’s just reality.

But won’t you agree that we deserve a lot better?