What the current administration has done has been taken from the playbook of Ferdinand Marcos Sr. My friends from ABS-CBN are grieving for their fellow workers who would be retrenched due to the closure of DZMM TeleRadyo, one of the casualties of ABS-CBN’s deal with Martin Romualdez’s Prime Media.

We’re just back to where we were 50 years ago.

Marcos Jr now controls the public narrative, with no opposition media left. Of course TV5 will not toe the line because First Pacific owns many businesses that are heavily regulated by the government: Meralco, Maynilad, PLDT, Metro Pacific Tollways, Philex Mining, PXP Energy…When my friend wrote an analytical piece on the Philippine government’s debt with the Chinese, his story was taken down upon the orders of Manny Pangilinan, chairman of PLDT, which owns my friend’s media outfit. He resigned after that, super pissed with what happened. He told me the higher ups told him that the concession of Maynilad at that time was still hanging in the balance and that Duterte has held them by the neck…

So no, TV5 will not toe the line.

The Internet is controlled by the trolls. I was just talking to an older ex-journalist who was one of the primary characters leading to the fold-up of Manila Times under Lisa Gokongwei. He wrote a story that implicated former President Estrada to the shady dealings on the PSE…as a result, the government then held hostage all the Gokongwei businesses, so Lisa had to kowtow and eventually had to close shop and sell Manila Times to an ally of Estrada. So anyway, I was talking to this friend and we talked about what happened to ABS-CBN x Prime Media. He said he initially thought about going back…but then he felt tired just thinking about being harassed by trolls. “I’m already old,” he said.

I said, I don’t blame you. I had been trolled when I criticized one government agency under Duterte. But I will never stop writing about the truth. Trolls are trolls, I said. (Hence, my viral post about the Marcoses).

Until when can I keep doing this when there is no strong opposition?

I had already given up on you, Philippines. But I still maintain this very toxic relationship with you.

My body clock seems to have been reprogrammed to wake me up at 6:30 am since moving here, while in QC I usually wake up at 8 am. Didn’t cook today since my mom hosts lunch and dinner on Wednesdays and Saturdays.

There were a lot of gamu-gamo (termites with wings) last night, circling around lamps/light bulbs. I told the girls these will die eventually and just keep the screens shut. These flying termites usually come out of the woodwork when there will be a huge storm coming, signalling the end of the hot and dry season (a.k.a. called summer–which is a misnomer because we do not have have summers here).

True enough, I read the news that Guam was being battered by a super typhoon that is headed this way.

And just my luck, my Tuesday meeting (supposedly yesterday) was moved to tomorrow because the CFO had urgent matters to attend to. So tomorrow hopefully the typhoon will not yet make itself felt or else I would be driving along a very wet and slippery SLEX and Skyway. My sis in law will hitch a ride with me and she will do her thing while I do my interview. Then both of us will go to Ikea to buy organizing stuff for my kitchen and a closet for the girls.

Meanwhile, I will be sharing the bed again with my furry babies.