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Guilty! That is the verdict against former Philippine President Erap Estrada rendered by the criminal court specially created to try graft and corruption cases in the Philippines. Erap was convicted of plunder for having amassed millions of pesos by abusing his power to manipulate the stock market and serving as the godfather receiver of jueteng money. The Erap camp dismisses the conviction as politically influenced to justify the legitimacy of the Arroyo presidency. But if you consider the list of the witnesses other than the controversial Chavit Singson, Erap’s admitted jueteng collector who spilled the beans, there were honest to goodness professionals who had no ax to grind.

The counties of Prince William and Loudoun are reportedly initiating measures to create disincentives for undocumented aliens to settle in their jurisdictions.

First, they will cooperate with federal authorities to facilitate removal of undocumented aliens who are in the custody of the local police for crimes unrelated to their immigration status. Second, they will deny services or benefits to undocumented aliens other than essential humanitarian services.

Millions come to America to live the American dream. I have always associated the American dream with a life sheltered in economic security, symbolized by home ownership. Well, most of us are now living the American dream. We have our own homes, we drive cars, we fly on planes, and we even spend without money in our pockets.

Life in America is fun. You can even make fun of the president and live to tell about it.
Notwithstanding the houses, the cars, the vacations, the movies, McDonald’s, Mickey Mouse and credit cards, we can’t seem to have enough. We are not free from our never ending wants which are always one-step ahead of what we have. And so we continue to pursue the American dream, bigger dreams this time.

Summer is getaway time for most people. Those who love more pigmentation soak the burning sun on the beach. Those who want to escape mowing the yard play golf. Those who want to do something fishy take their hook, line and sinker and stare at the water.

I’ve spent my midsummer driving through miles and miles of highways north, south and Midwest. Never have I driven over 5,000 miles in five weeks before. But family matters, and so I did.

Sen. Hillary Clinton recently jibed that she is the better candidate to deal with Usama Bin Ladin considering her experience with bad and evil men. How true, how true. She thinks that she can make them behave. My unreliable source says that Bill Clinton was at McDonald’s devouring a big Mac after a short jog when he heard the quote on the radio and he almost choked. We already know what Hillary did to the bad boy she knows best. By that measure, Usama need not worry. He will get a pardon too.

"D.C Madam - Deborah Jeane Palfry who faces charges of running a prostitution ring under the cover of an escort service posted on the internet the telephone numbers of her clients over the years. At $300 per hour, the stock room clerk at K Mart likely will not find his name on the list. The rich, the powerful and the famous must be sweating a little bit. While they abhor the media spot light, they actually fear more a Lorena Bobbit act by a rampaging wife.

First to bite the dust is freshman Republican Senator David Vitter from Louisiana. He admitted being a client of the escort service years ago before he ran for the Senate. He apologized and said that he already confessed to his wife and to God.

A judge of the District of Columbia Superior Court ruled against Roy L. Pearson, an administrative law judge who filed suit against a Korean husband and wife operator of a dry-cleaning shop.

Pearson complained that the shop lost his pair of pants. The couple tried to return his pair of pants later, but Pearson denied that it belonged to him. He claimed $54 million in damages principally for alleged breach of the shop owners advertised warranty- “Satisfaction Guaranteed”.

Note:

A California judge sentenced Hollywood brat Paris Hilton to 60 days in jail for violating her probation. She was caught driving without a license and under the influence of alcohol. After serving five days in jail, the sheriff sent her home on house arrest.

It does not take the noise of Rev. Alan Sharpton to tell America that something is amiss when a rich celebrity is suddenly deemed unfit for jail while the rest of us mortals take the brunt of the full force of the law.

The immigration debate is creating a lot of noise these days after a bipartisan group in the U.S. Senate in collaboration with the White House crafted a compromise comprehensive immigration reform legislation.

The proposal puts emphasis on border security and enforcement. It will offer a probationary status for illegal aliens once benchmarks for border security and enforcement are met; it will create a temporary worker program to fill jobs that Americans are not doing; and it will overhaul future immigration by creating a merit-based system that will give more priority to aliens with skills rather than family ties.

It is premature for illegal immigrants can celebrate. Even if this proposal will survive, they have to wait until the government has met the required benchmarks, including building miles of fence at the border, hiring of more border patrol agents, continued “catch and return” at the border and setting up an employment eligibility verification system. These benchmarks will likely take a few years at least.

An exasperated Pinoy tells me that the Department of Labor section at the Philippine embassy in Washington, D.C. was practically closed for business since mid-April this year.
The reason? He was told by people at the Embassy that the Labor Attache went on extended vacation without designating an officer-in-charge authorized to conduct business for the Labor Department until his return.

This Pinoy has a relative in the Philippines who was offered a job by a diplomat of another foreign embassy in Washington, D.C. The employment contract was submitted by the prospective employer to the Labor Department section at the Philippine Embassy. This office is charged with verifying the identity of the employer and to determine if the terms of the contract comply with the local labor laws.

I was on the road when I heard the news on the radio that an unidentified Asian male went on a shooting spree in the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, VA. I got chills in my spine when I heard the word "Asian" associated with a massacre. I prayed- Oh please, not a Filipino. You cannot help but worry that some reckless minds may engage in blind rage to do harm to people who look like the shooter.

My heart goes to the victims and their families. Promising lives have been cut short. My sympathies also go to the family of the shooter. The Korean parents are reportedly very hardworking blue collar workers who sacrificed individual leisure working very long hours just to get their two children to college. They are just like many Filipino parents who forego personal comforts just to provide a better future for their children. For all their good intentions, their son still turned out to be a living nightmare no parents deserve.

As the debate over the funding of the U.S. troops fighting in Iraq rages on, it is important that the voices of those primarily carrying the burdens of the war be heard.

I yield my space in this issue to the voice of a 22-year old soldier in Iraq whose name is Eddie Jeffers. He wrote a letter to his father David Jeffers, and his father circulated the letter in the internet. Here are excerpts from the letter...

“I stare out into the darkness from my post, and I watch the city burn to the ground. I smell the familiar smells, I walk through the familiar rubble, and I look at the frightened faces that watch me pass down the streets of their neighborhoods. My nerves hardly rest; my hands are steady on a device that has been given to me from my government for the purpose of taking the lives of others.”

The House of Representatives led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi passed a $124 billion war-funding bill that sets a deadline by September 2008 for U.S combat troops to withdraw from Iraq.

The vote was largely along party lines with Republicans opposing the bill because of the imposed deadline and most Democrats voting yes. The few Democratic holdouts could not accept the idea of further funding the war effort and want the troops to come home now and not later.

There is universal agreement among Filipinos in the U.S. of the need to translate our numbers into our political empowerment. Some people just talk about it, others live by their words.

At a recent fund raising concert to benefit the candidacy of Vellie Dietrich Hall for Board of Supervisor representing Mason District in Fairfax, Virginia, Filipino-American Kris Valderrama a duly elected Delegate to the Maryland Assembly and a Democrat came with her two little girls to lend her support. The fact that Vellie is running under the Republican banner is a strong statement of Kris Valderrama's belief that regardless of party, the victory of any Filipino-American candidate advances the cause of our political empowerment.

Last night, I had a bad dream. I saw the entire Philippine islands underwater. The ocean was simmering under the hot sun and I could see the image of Al Gore in the sky.

The once upon a time future POTUS is now a Hollywood darling, thanks to his global warming script.

Gore is on a crusade to force industrialized nations to curb carbon dioxide emissions, a byproduct of fossil fuels. Gore tells us that man made emissions is the principal cause of global warming. If left unabated, it will result to a continuing rise in sea level with devastating consequences to coastal communities.