When presidents meet

It is good that President GMA will be visiting President Bush. It may be the last time for both to see each other as leaders of their nations. It may be worth noting that our president has an advantage during this meeting — she will continue to be president for two more years, longer than his term which ends in November.

Moreover, as I have said many times in this column, she can smile at him and say “Sorry but I’m still here” after the relentless efforts to bring her down and attempt yet another regime change in this country during her term. It may not have been official policy but there are enough clues to show that not a few of the political operators had Washington connections.

If I remember right, Bush let the cat out of the bag when he remarked about in one Apec encounter last year. What exactly did he mean when he told her that “he heard she was one tough lady” despite the attempts to oust her? No use dwelling on that but as I said many times in this column if ever President GMA will claim an outstanding achievement it will be this. That she stayed put despite the pressures and machinations of a wide array of forces some of which were encouraged by the US to bring about regime change. That is no small achievement.

Properly appreciated it will go a long way in our efforts toward real nation building that after all cannot be measured solely with dollars and cents. All Philippine presidents must learn from this lesson. She may or may not agree with me but this is her most important legacy. She asserted the sovereignty of this country by just staying put. This is not an exoneration of her government’s flaws but it did strengthen our independence that many times have been questioned by our Asian neighbors, These neighbors regard the Philippines as the soft spot in ASEAN efforts to consolidate and be treated with more respect as a regional grouping. Still that does not mean we cannot be special friends of the US but it would be even better if such friendship were conducted on more equitable terms.

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Of all the items in the agenda for the talks — food security, protection of the environment, the Philippine defense reform program, counterterrorism, nonproliferation, Asean’s community building, human rights, Burma (Myanmar) and global trade — all good things except for one. I was annoyed that the President will also thank Mr. Bush for the US Senate for its ‘historic’ 96-1 vote for the Veterans Benefits bill, which will benefit Filipino war veterans. Rather than thank him, she should use the occasion to ask him to help it get signed and sealed once and for all after its passes the House of Representatives.

After all this is a long standing US commitment to the Philippines that remains unfulfilled through decades and generations despite the efforts of Filipinos and some American politicians too ashamed that the promise has not been fulfilled. Indeed only a few hundreds of the veterans about 18,000 from 250,000 who will enjoy the benefits if at all because the rest have died waiting. So to thank the US Senate for its “historic” 96 to 1 vote in favor of the veterans equity bill giving pension benefits to Filipino soldiers who fought alongside American soldiers during World War II is inappropriate.

Our Asian neighbors will also keenly watch how the Philippine president comports herself in these talks. Already a few have expressed their dissatisfaction with the way the Philippines is being used as the weak point that allows the US entry to assert its unilateral policies in the region.

Among these are major policy initiatives of the Bush administration since September 11 that need to be clarified. There is enough evidence of the current administration’s strategy: “to secure a virtual carte blanche for the US military in the war on terror. “The effects of this virtual carte blanche include Washington’s new pre-emptive war doctrine to its refusal to subject US troops to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. So does the wide suspicion that Pentagon strategy includes inserting Special Forces teams in countries with a suspected Al-Qaeda presence without informing the host government. The unilateral acts follow the “the apparent willingness of some of President George W. Bush’s closest aides to attack Iraq in the face of almost universal opposition.” It is hardly a topic in a cordial visit but it should be kept in mind especially with the recent kidnapping of ABS-CBN staff in Sulu.

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MISCELLANEOUS: Instead of wishing that higher oil prices would go away we must begin thinking of how we will survive the oil crisis as it becomes worse by thinking out the coping strategy. A blueprint for a green revolution in the UK is set to be released any day now and we can get pointers from it.

It will provide that one in four British homes could be fitted with solar heating equipment and 3,500 wind turbines could be erected across Britain within 12 years as part of a green energy revolution.

The long-awaited renewable energy strategy, a copy of which has been seen by the Guardian, will say Britain needs to make a £100bn dash to build up its clean power supply if it is to reach its EU-imposed target of producing 15% of the country’s energy from renewable sources by 2020. “The UK could cut its greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 20% and reduce its dependency on oil by 7% within 12 years if it conducts the massive overhaul of energy production and consumption outlined in the strategy document, according to the government.”

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Here’s good news for cancer victims and their loved ones. According to Telegraph a cancer patient fully recovered after being injected with billions of his own immune cells. It is the first case of its kind, doctors have disclosed.

“The 52-year-old, who was suffering from advanced skin cancer, was free from tumors within eight weeks of undergoing the procedure. After two years he is still free from the disease which had spread to his lymph nodes and one of his lungs.

Doctors took cells from the man’s own defense system that were found to attack the cancer cells best, cloned them and injected back into his body, in a process known as “immunotherapy”. Experts said that the case could mark a landmark in the treatment of cancer.

It raises hopes of a possible new way of fighting the disease, which claims 150,000 lives in Britain every year. Ed Yong, health information manager at Cancer Research UK, said: “It’s very exciting to see a cancer patient being successfully treated using immune cells cloned from his own body. While it’s always good news when anyone with cancer gets the all clear, this treatment will need to be tested in large clinical trials to work out how widely it could be used.”