For the better part of Friday, the Philippine online community was buzzing over a blog post on EllaGanda.com lamenting the Department of Social Welfare and Development’s handling of  relief goods donated to typhoon victims. The blog post showed photos of “relief goods rotting in DSWD warehouses”, allegedly still undelivered to victims due to the agency’s lack of manpower.

When the blog became inaccessible, other sites such as Jenni Epperson’s Mabuhaygirl.multiply.com and Gang Badoy’s abashet: what a glorious time to be free reposted the original entry and photos. Filipino Internet users spread the word via social networks and microblogs such as Twitter, Facebook and Plurk, even making DSWD one of the top Trending Topics on Twitter for a time.

Read the full story.

The solon was defending his mother, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, against widespread criticism over the expensive dinners at posh New York restaurants.

Unfortunately, sometimes when you open your mouth, you make things worse.

Now, we the Filipino people are being asked if we forgot that the President is not just an ordinary person and needs to keep her dignity. “Do you want your president to eat in a McDonald’s or some turo-turo?” Mikey Arroyo asked in last night’s TV Patrol World newscast.

No, because according to his logic, there’s more dignity for the President and her Cabinet and members of the Lower House to eat at a decent restaurant. “Decent” presumably translates to “like really, really expensive” because they decided to eat at the posh Le Cirque, which is touted as one of the world’s best restaurants and as a place to be seen for members of high society. Yup, a McDonald’s or a turo-turo it sure ain’t.

I found a video clip of Mikey Arroyo’s sound bites on YouTube. The video and audio aren’t in sync, though, but if you want to see the whole newscast, you can Google Pinoy Channel TV and look for Part 1 of the TV Patrol World August 18 clip. Mikey Arroyo’s segment is toward the end of that Part 1 clip.

Here’s the YouTube clip courtesy of pinaswatcher.

Come to think of it, I wonder how McDonald’s feels about being lumped together with “some turo-turo”?

Oh, and check out this link that Manuel L. Quezon III tweeted to The Presidential Wiener blog which shows different US presidents and famous politicians enjoying the time-honored tradition of being seen in public eating a hotdog.

Guess our president, majority of whose constituents are living in poverty and can’t even afford to eat regularly at McDonald’s, if at all, has more “dignity” than other world leaders.