The American connection
WHO is the Filipino with no American connection?
Even the most vocal anti-American student activist in my UP college days turned out to be a Filipino expat living the American dream in the United States of America.
I am blessed to be able to also study in Columbia University, on a scholarship to an Ivy league school. I owe it to that country for that study br eak.
I have other American connections. My other brother lives in Maryland with his family. In keeping with the Filipino custom of hospitality to a kababayan, I was welcome to stay there for several days.
Then there's my niece working in Arizona. She's supposed to go home this May, but with the lockdowns I doubt it if she could.
Then there's Ron Rathbun, my bilas, brother-in-law. I stayed at their home in another state. He also paid for my plane fare from New York to their Michigan home.
These myriad connections were my social connections. I can count on a fall back if I'm there. They form a network associated with trust, trustworthiness, civic norms, membership, and voluntary activities.
Ron is also an avid reader of my column. I also join him in his pastoral work for the poor as a member of the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic lay organization.
When he visits me, I get to exchange ideas for my column even if we have many disagreements on American politics. I appreciate his encouragement for me to write again just to exercise my brain. Fight fire with fire.
But he admits he gets tired of reading of Covid-19. Believe me, Ron, I do too. If I have my way, I love to tackle issues on climate change, pollution, forest degradation, my usual menu of topics for a change. For Ron, American politics would be welcome.
Of course, SunStar Bacolod is a community newspaper. It will not be competing with national news outlets, let alone global news outlets. Who cares with the results of the US primar i es?
But with Covid-19, it's a shoo-in. Every, Tom, Dick, Harry, and Jane with access to the internet would be interest ed .
But I have to touch on Covid-19, when his favorite news outlet Fox News declared on TV and social media: 'We have a responsibility.' Fox News hosts declare coronavirus a crisis in abrupt U-turn. The hosts encourage viewers to practice social distancing after weeks of downplaying the pandemic as an attack on Trump.