Malayang Halalan

Is revolution actually Plan B for Noynoy Aquino if he loses?

In the early part of this year, members of the opposition took turns in warning that a revolt will certainly follow should election fail in 2010.
On the surface, such statements can look like our senators and a number of candidates are merely pressuring Comelec and Smartmatic-TIM to make sure that the country’s first automated polls [...]

Aquino, Villar exceed limits for political advertising

Will Manny Villar and Noynoy Aquino show the Filipino people that they will follow the law? Will they abide by the limits set by RA 9006 on political ads spending?

Cancelled… ABS-CBN’s Harapan: The Tandem Presidential Debate

For example, if Noynoy Aquino really wants to prove that he is a man of integrity and will fight corruption, we ought to hear about his definite and concrete plans to combat corruption. How does he plan to eliminate corruption in the most corrupt government agencies? Or better yet, how does he intend to eliminate corruption in just one government agency?

As for Manny Villar and his claim that he’ll lift people out of poverty, perhaps he’ll want to lay out his plan for turning residents of a place like Payatas into middle class micro-entrepreneurs.

Then again, Villar and Aquino may soon have to speak up in debates as they approach the limits (if they haven’t exceeded it already) set by Comelec on political advertisements.

Are Pulse Asia and SWS surveys objective?

In his book, The Opinion Makers, Moore makes the startling conclusion that pollsters “do not measure public opinion, they manufacture it.” He anchors this contention on the practice of polling firms to gloss over “voter indecision” during an election campaign. Moore notes:

Moore points out: “There is crisis in public-opinion polling today, a silent crisis that no one wants to talk about. The problem lies not in the declining response rates and increasing difficulty in obtaining representative sample, though these are issues the polling industry has to address. The problem lies, rather, in the refusal of media polls to tell the truth about those surveyed and about the larger electorate. Rather than tell us the essential facts about the public, they feed us a fairy-tale picture of a completely rational, all-knowing and fully engaged citizenry. They studiously avoid reporting on widespread public apathy, indecision and ignorance. The net result is conflicting poll results and a distortion of public opinion that challenges the credibility of the whole polling enterprise. Nowhere is this more often the case than in election polling.”

Villar loses 6 percent, Erap gainst 6 percent in latest survey

Not even Sen. Manuel Villar’s speech at the Senate claiming innocence with regard to the C-5 road extension controversy could avert the drop of 6 percentage points in his ratings in the latest Pulse Asia survey.

The results of the February 2010 Pre-election Survey for National Elective Positions conducted on Feb. 21-25 showed that support for Villar, the standard-bearer of the Nacionalista Party, had declined by 6 percentage points (or from 35 percent to 29 percent), and that his closest rival, Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III of the Liberal Party, would have won the presidency if the elections were held last month.