Obama’s Last Inaugural Address

  

Listening to the speech makes me think that living in this planet is simple. Humanity is guided by basic inalienable rights: the right to life, liberty & the pursuit of happiness. Inaugural speeches are carefully made for posterity so that they are remembered and will be relevant for the next many hundred years. And as such, a good inaugural speech must talk of the basics and the constants and founding documents & declarations but also about new ideas & technology and the promises for posterity.

An inaugural speech may be just a sound bite of inspiring & stirring words, but, for me and for others in this planet, the rhetoric can be the first act that may guide succeeding acts, or policies, or programs or laws. It should be the narrative framework of governance. President Obama’s inaugural address was a moving speech because not only does it remind us of our basic rights, the speech articulates the “constants in our character” as the “celebration of initiative & enterprise, our insistence on hard work & personal responsibility.” 

The Obama narrative reminds the world that they have come a long way. They have to remind themselves that their forefathers & mothers have exchanged a monarchy system with a “government by the people & for the people.” As such a society which is 1% rich and 99% poor is so out of context with their history as a nation. And the great task of maintaining and improving a nation is not the monopoly of government. 

The American dream is indeed a “brand” and President Obama had to articulate that again & more in an inaugural address. And that American brand does NOT exclude the work of women, nor wives nor daughters nor the rights of gay brothers & sisters. Obama said, and I quote, 

“It is now our generation’s task to carry on what those pioneers began, for our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts….Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law, for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal, as well.”

The people of the United States have just been through super storm SANDY, just as we have been through typhoon BOPHA & the Davao January flood and so addressing climate change is so right. Obama made a reference to the past and to the future generation and that the past & future are not disjunctive ones.  The American life is a journey with many lessons. Obama said, “We, the people, still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity. We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.”

An inaugural speech which makes a reference to the disadvantaged & the vulnerable will always ring true to those of us working with the poor. Obama said, “For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn. We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky or happiness for the few. We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us at any time may face a job loss or a sudden illness or a home swept away in a terrible storm. The commitments we make to each other through Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, these things do not sap our initiative.”  

picture credit : Barack Obama FB page 

2013: My New Year’s Prayer

"You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. 
That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies; that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life."
                           ~J Krishnamurti

My favorite anecdote about prayer is about court pleadings. One time, a devoutly religious client of our office upon reading the last page of a case pleading saw that it contained a prayer concluded & said, “because of this prayer, we will win the case.” My late father, as a member of Adoracion Nocturna in our parish wrote a paper on prayer which I remember today with so much fondness. Mincode, my NGO network’s Pablo Relief Operations in 3 Provinces that were hardest hit by Typhoon Pablo is called "Our Help is our Christmas Prayer!"

So, my first act for 2013 is to articulate my litany of prayers:

Access to beaches: For many of us, owning beaches is not important but access is.  It is heartwarming to note that the Department Of Environment & Natural Resources (DENR) is enforcing the 20 meter plus 5 meter water easement from the highest water mark. This easement of “25 meters from the water line” is based on the 20 meters easement from the highest water mark plus the 5 meters setback from walkway or beach pavement. My prayer is that this is enforced in all of our 7,100 islands.

Baganga: During this relief period, some of us are already grappling with short term & long term rehabilitation of communities. We will be putting up cacao nurseries in Baganga in time for planting in the next few months. Rice & corn grains can already be planted with perennial fruit & forest trees soon after clearing or grubbing operation is had with fallen trees. My prayer is enough funds for this endeavor. 

Copra price is very low & our prayer is for the coco levy funds to be used for the rehabilitation of the coconut industry. My prayer is for many coco farmers to be organized (as against individual farmer recipients of coco levy funds) around the proper use of these coco levy funds.

Divorce is long overdue. We thank our own Congresswoman Luz Ilagan & Gabriela for representing us women in this advocacy. Except for our Muslim communities, we are the last nation - state in this post modern world that does not have divorce & so our prayer is for the divorce law to be available as an option.  Our advocacy for divorce is related to our fight against violence against women. It is also in keeping with the women’s movement toward the promotion for bodily rights, autonomy and empowerment of the oppressed gender. It is not against men. It is against oppressors. 

Exercise: It has been said that sitting in front of e-gadgets is the new vice. My prayer is enough time to stretch and run or walk and burn calories. Even doing household chores is better than sitting.

Facebook & Social Media: There is so much to say and our prayer is for our right to freedom of expression to be always guaranteed. My prayer in this age of social media when news can be reported by anyone & accessed readily is a professional redefinition of the journalist’s role. Because anyone or everyone is now into reportage, the professional journalist’s role should be to make sure that facts in news reporting are correct and analysis is incisive & can be empirically validated.

I joined the signing of the people’s petition by the The Save Our Sunset (SOS) Manila Bay Coalition against the reclamation of Manila Bay. The prayer is to “stop the planned and future reclamation of Manila Bay & …to enact a master plan that maximizes the opportunities and potential of the waterfront for the enjoyment of the people,” among others.

Finally, from Regina Brett, I am adopting this as my prayer for aspiring writers, “A writer writes. If you want to be a writer, write.”

"Everyone has unique gifts and talents. 
What you love is what you're gifted at. 
To be completely happy, to live a completely fulfilled life, you have to do what you love."  
                       ~~~ Barbara Sher 

www.mindanaotimes.net/womenwise-2013-more-new-year-reflections/ 

I just finished writing a project design and I feel kind of drained. It is a pleasant tiredness, though, like one who has created something. Ernest Hemingway has a line on this, “After writing a story I was always empty and both sad & happy, as though I had made love & I was sure this was a very good story although I would not know truly how good until I read it over the next day.” 

Writing a project design which one wants to implement in a year or two is akin to planning our next days and weeks and years. In futures studies, we call this colonizing our near & far future. This is not unlike when one is planning a program of study or when one decides what university course to pursue. A Facebook friend of mine shared that she made a mistake in taking a college course. So, my advice was to look forward to when the course will grow on her, in time, or that she should turn back because to continue with the journey means she is further removed from where she wants to go. Of course, this is granting she knows where to go. A relevant mantra here are these lines from Alice in Wonderland: 

Alice, asked the Cat, Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'

`That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat.

`I don't much care where--' said Alice.

`Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat.

`--so long as I get SOMEWHERE,' Alice added as an explanation.

`Oh, you're sure to do that,' said the Cat, `if you only walk long enough.' 

In writing project designs, like in life, one imagines the outcomes and results. What will it take to get the desired results?

In writing project designs, like in life, one imagines the outcomes and results. What will it take to get the desired results?

Every January, I always try to plan my year so as not to end up just doing the motions. But, recently, I find myself enjoying the moments like in a drift.

I am also in a stage where it is so easy to say that I have been there or I have done that. So, my mantra is no more of the same, please.

Truth to tell, there are always spaces for changes, like 2012 is an end of an era & 2013 is another era. We live our lives in seasons and cycles. The 10 year primary & high school cycle,  the four or more university years, the trying twenties, the young & middle adulthood, the empty nest syndrome years, & the retirement years. Life sounds simple when seen this way. And life is simpler too, when planning is done in cycles. What university course to take? What do I want to be? What will I do to be rich or famous? What will make me happy?

New Year is about resolutions. My mantra for when one quits bad habits comes from these lines, again, from Ernest Hemingway, “By then I knew that everything good & bad left an emptiness when it stopped. But, if it was bad, the emptiness filled up by itself. If it was good you could only fill it by finding something better….”  Or finding that which is just as good.

I found myself listening to singer Adele during the holidays and for the lovesick & brokenhearted out there, she says, “Never mind, I will find someone like you.”