ON THE ARMS DISPARITY BETWEEN PHILIPPINES AND CHINA

I just had a discussion with a Makati resident regarding Vice President Binay and why Makati residents will consistently and continuously keep voting for him in spite of the numerous allegations of corruption which, if true would mean that his dynasty squandered billions and billions of pesos. Well, to be honest, she was a bit of a simpleton, her main argument was that the “poor” keep getting benefits under Binay, hence they will keep voting for him - damn poor argument and full of holes.

To begin with, Makati City is possibly the richest city in the Philippines and one with a relatively small resident population. The fact that there are still “poor” people in Makati speaks volumes on the utilization of capital.

That leads me to the thesis of this article:  The way we handle our capital leaves much to be desired. Plans get bogged down for want of corruption, corruption saps funding and capital that would result in first class projects.

Contrast this with the Chinese Approach

We often hear of people complaining of the poor roads, housing and other infrastructure in an area, say a city. Doesn’t it just put you to shame that the Chinese can just go ahead and build new infrastructure seemingly in the middle of nowhere, while over in this country, a road reblocking is already considered a huge undertaking!?

Chinese Armed Forces

It isn’t just infrastructure where the Philippines lags behind China. We also lag behind militarily.

(Above) Chinese “infrastructure” project in the West Philippine Sea

versus

Philippine Naval Installation, the BRP Sierra Madre

[Source: Both pictures are from Rappler]

The problem with the Philippines is that we never had a “martial tradition”. Procurements for the military are treated in the same way as any other government project rather than as a class of their own. This means that if we buy aircraft, for example, we have to put out a public bidding, everyone’s going to know how much our budget is, etc.

Naturally, the media is going to pick all this up and all of our tech acquisitions, both planned and accomplished are going to go on TV, print etc.

A little secrecy helps

Chinese don’t need to fly spy satellites over us if the media keeps this up. All they need to do is download the iWantTV app and watch the news for everything relating to troop movements and deployment.

This is really a problem with our gossippy, I-can-piss-higher-than-you braggadocio culture. A new helicopter is big news! You can count on ABS-CBN showing off our latest frigate and letting the entire WORLD know exactly where it is anchored.

The 2015 SONA

The President’s last State of the Nation Address went into the details of the AFP modernization program. One of the highlights of the 2015 SONA was an interview with a Philippine Airforce Man on how, “the long wait is over” - That we are finally going to start receiving aircraft to beef up the Philippine Air Force (PAF). You will see this PMA graduate stating the obvious in the clip below.

In a country like ours, things like these make the SONA!

Clearly, we’ve got to improve our own domestic capacity for infrastructure projects and arms/equipment manufacture. Government can start by following the National Socialist model of partnering with local manufacturers and helping them grow.

PRODUCT PLACEMENT IN TERMINATOR: GENISYS

Is Skynet the future? Is Silicon Valley going to be the end of humanity as we know it? It’s quite possible.

Skynet has gone through a number of iterations. The original Skynet “origin” story involved the Terminator’s chip and hand in Terminator (1984) getting used as the basis of a computer that was used to control nuclear missiles. That computer eventually became “self-aware” and tried to destroy humanity.

The Skynet origin story in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) was also program used to control nukes.

Generally, in the first three iterations of the franchise, it appears that Skynet was powered by mac. I found an OLD meme on 9gag that proves this.

The latest film in the franchise, Terminator: Genisys, has a different take on the Skynet origin. The film paints Skynet as “Genisys”, a very popular app or OS [update?] that is set to upload itself into billions of computing devices - computers, tablets and smartphones. And people are eagerly and, like a herd of bleating sheep, are eagerly awaiting its arrival.

Feel like you're being herded onto Windows 10? Well, you should

What does that remind you of?

Personally, it reminds me of the big bad wolf of Redmond.

We are all eagerly awaiting the release of Microsoft’s latest OS, Windows 10. Its being pushed as a FREE UPDATE for most consumers [i.e. non-enterprise] running PC and tablet versions of Windows 7 and 8.1  as well as Windows Phone 8.1. Among the features being pushed is a universal app environment for everything from PCs, Tablets, Hololenses, Gaming Consoles, Smartphones and the “Internet of Things”.

source: Windows Blog

Another ominous feature is Cortana, a personal assistant program and possibly the beginning of AI becoming self-aware.

It just makes Microsoft’s product placement in Genisys all the more ominous - Almost everyone there is rockin’ a Nokia/Microsoft Lumia

It even fits the in-movie declaration of Genisys being in a billion devices after its release which roughly parallels the intent of Microsoft to bring Windows 10 to a billion devices.

So, which tech company do you think will one day create Artificial Intelligence smart enough to destroy us?