things must be getting bad in the Ukraine, because the Philippine gov't told all our OFW there to come home.
one doesn't have to be cynical to see the MSM pushing the war war war meme: We saw this before both Gulf wars, by the way. And noting that propaganda is being pushed doesn't mean that behind all the propaganda there isn't a reason to think the Russians are the "bad guys" here.
Cardinal Vigano notes the backstory here.
summary: He gives a long background on the geopolitical history of the area. But he also notes, like the covid epidemic, the evil guys behind the scenes didn't cause the problem but they are taking an advantage of this. Mainly linked for later reading.
The real problem? Vigano is not an Alex Jones conspiracy theorist: he was a member of the Vatican diplomatic corps, and that groups is known for their knowlege of the story behind the story.
And he includes notes about how this foreign war might affect you:
The current Ukrainian crisis entails secondary, but no less serious, consequences on the geopolitical balance between China and Taiwan. Russia and Ukraine are the only producers of palladium and neon, which are indispensable for the production of microchips.
so where does Russia come into this?
“If it is true that a Chinese invasion of Formosa would put the global technology supply chain at risk, it is also true that a sudden shortage of raw materials from Russia could stop production, so as to make the island lose the “microchip shield” and induce Beijing to attempt the annexation of Taipei.”
add to this that China is licking their chops to invade or destroy Taiwan, who makes most of the good computer chips, and you see the problem.
All of this is pushing Russia to join with China, which is not good news.
and then there is stuff about crypto currancy, which Biden now wants to regulate... and of course China is trying to oust the USDollar as the main world currancy.
Vigano has a lot of history and diplomatic background on the Ukraine invasion, and here is StrategyPage's take on the war:
Above my paygrade: I'm a doctor, not an expert on geopolitical strategy or even conspiracy theories.
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Election time here. Background article in the (liberal) Inquirer notes that Leni isn't liked by politicians but has a lot of "volunteers" backing her (read young folks inspired by the social media), but one mayor pointed out Duterte had few politicians (or social media rich kids) support him and he won anyway.
there have been a few pep rallies locally in the city plaza which is near us. Covid restrictions have been pretty well lifted, so no problem. Businesses are opening up, and presumably a lot of OFW will be able to return to their jobs soon...and in our area it is time to start preparing the rice fields for the next harvest, so a lot of folks are busy.
Here, votes are bought, and a lot of folks take the money figuring that hey, they are all crooks, so at least I should get a few dollars. However, the problem is that when people feel strongly about an issue they can't be bribed...so Duterte won, despite all the money poured into other campaigns and the CIA funded press and social media, because he promised to push against drugs and crimes, and his time as mayor in Davao proved he was mean enough to do it...so now crime is down, a lot of folks had justice (or paid for a hit man to get justice), and I can walk the streets again without worrying we will be kidnapped...all elections are local, you know.
Before Duterete, the cartels who were trying to make the Philippines as a narco state so they could easily send drugs via OFW all over the world.
Duterte is now being criticized because he made pals with Putin, but the back story of this is that the US stopped a shipment of small arms to the Philippines to punish him for "human rights" violations, i.e. shooting druggies and pushers for resisting arrest (/s) and as a result the Islamicists took over a city in the south, and the Philippines lacked weapons, which were then promised to us by Russia.
but since ballot box stuffing and outright fraud in voting machines is suspected to play a part in the next election, it is uncertain who will win the next election.
Our area backs BongBong Marcos, because Leni is seen as a snobbish upper class lady whose main claim to fame is that her popularist husband died in a plane crash a couple years back. Which is why the Smartmatic voting machine fraud may come up again if things go to her.
but it is the local elections that could turn murderous: our maid attended a political meeting this morning but won't talk about it because "it is dangerous".
Dr. Ito call your office. Things are still dangerous here.
Sigh.
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in other news: Yes, rabies continues to be a problem.
often they hold clinics for free rabies shots for dogs, but the virus has messed everything up, so I suspect a lot of dogs never had their rabies Shot. And there are stray dogs thrown because their owner's can't afford to feed them: Although after two years of covid related poverty, most of the strays have disappeared.
Sigh.
One of our farmer's wives needed help to pay for rabies vaccine. The dog is a neighbor's dog, and he was too poor to get him a rabies shot. True, one could wait and see if the dog died, but rabies is fatal so no one wants to take the chance. We get one or two requests for help to pay for rabies shots each week.
The mayor had a program for free rabies shots, but apparantly they ran out of money. The treatment is three shots and each costs 7 dollars (or more? The farmer's wife said it cost her 13 dollars but that might have been for the antibody shot that you get first, and then you get the slower vaccine that takes a couple weeks to work)... this is not a lot of money for Yanks, but here it the minimum wage is 7 dollars a day, and farmers, who sell their crop, often run out of money about this time, because they need all their money to plant the next crop.
It is also considered hunger season, because this is about the time the farmers run out of their rice stores.
so employees will be asking for loans. And there are expenses to fix the farm machines, buy fertilzer , get good quality seedlings, etc.
There is a huge increase in the price of Fertilizer right now
To harvest 100 cavans, up to 8 bags of urea fertilizer should be applied. This amounts to P20,000 per hectare in costs on urea alone. But farmers should also apply phosphorus and potassium containing fertilizer. The farmer will spend about P30,000 per hectare on fertilizer alone. At P15 per kg per unmilled rice, this translates to about 2,000 kg or about 40 percent of the value of a one- hectare yield at 5.0 tons per hectare. That is for fertilizer alone. What about land preparation, seeds, labor and harvesting costs? This simple calculation suggests practical action by the farmer—cut down on fertilizer use or not plant at all, as some farmers had done. inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook
Blame the European Union, the cut back of petroleum production by Biden's anti fracking/drilling policies, and the dirty little secret is that the Russian Ukrainian war won't help because Russia, Belarus and China are major sources of fertilizer.
The dirty little secret is that most famines in today's world are not caused by lack of food but by wars, or because the price is so high that the poor can't afford to buy enough to stay healthy.
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in family news:
I just cashed in another long term investment, but alas most of it is gone to help with the farm expenses, (the lady who buys Kuya's rice every year without any problems in paying is now sending us bad checks, so I have had to lend him money for the next crop.) I also had to pay to fix up the shop/apartment we have in Manila, which is getting a new tenant. The cheap pipes and the electric wires and the roof need replacement.
Sigh.
Oh well. God will provide.
So hey, move to a tropical paradise and you won't have to worry, except for earthquakes, typhoons, floods, covid, and Dengue fever, add the worry that war (or shortages from war) might make things worse for us.
