MOVE OVER, my beloved Karl. It is not religion but lotto that is now the opium of the people. Most sadly, here is one more Marxist dogma meeting its deconstruction in capitalist decadence – gambling.
That lotto has already– to steal television’s Survivor tagline – outplayed, outwitted and outlasted religion as, again to quote Marx, “the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions,” was most manifest in the recent grand lotto draws.
The P500 million, turned P600 million, and finally over P700 million drawing the collective sigh of the whole nation – both oppressors and oppressed; burning the heart with desire for all that money can buy; and ransoming the very soul from hellish privations.
See the lines to the betting booths getting longer, much, much loooonger than those going to Sunday communion. Witness how each unwon multi-million jackpot draw hordes of new converts betting their very faith in a chance of one-in-29-million. With those odds, some leap of faith taken there really.
And the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office could not have been happier, having posted record sales of P4.1 billion for the 6/55 Grand Lotto alone from May to November this year. The recent jackpot of P741,176,323.20 won by a single individual recorded as the highest ever in the 15-year history of the lotto in the country. That single draw…well, drawing reportedly some three million bettors, governors and congressmen, senators and even the President with his Palace factotums among them.
It did not come as any surprise then for Malacanang to get hold of the PCSO – 6/55, 6/49, 6/45, 6/422 lotteries, the sweepstakes, and scratch-a-prize locked in.
“One of the main objectives of the Office of the President (OP) is to enhance the health services and charity programs to the public as well as to immediately respond on calamities, disasters relief and emerging illnesses…
“In order to ensure the effective implementation of the social agenda of the President as well as to effectively facilitate the health services and charity programs of OP there is a need of placing back to OP the control and supervision over PCSO.” So rationalized President Aquino of Executive Order No. 14.
It was precisely the same reasons cited by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo when she ordered the transfer of PCSO supervision initially to the Department of Social Welfare and Development in 2004, and finally to the Department of Health a year later.
So should we expect now yellow ribbons and P-Noy’s follicle-challenged mug splashed on new ambulances coming out of the PCSO?
But why must the PCSO’s charity be limited only to health and social services?
“State college education is also a serious charity case.” So said Sen. Ralph Recto in a statement carried in the media. “Aside from helping the poor and the sick, there could still be room to accommodate one more ‘patient’ – (state universities and colleges) suffering from fiscal cancer.”
A very good point raised by the senator more known for being the husband of star-for-all-seasons and Batangas Gov. Vilma Santos than for all his worth as grandson of the great nationalist Senator Claro Mayo Recto. Recto’s words assume urgent and critical consideration given the current ferment in the campuses and the streets with thousands of students and teachers in protest over alleged cuts in the budgets of more than 100 SUCs all over the country.
Recto, chair of the Senate ways and means committee, proposed that SUCs be made eligible to become one of the “beneficiaries” of the 30 percent of revenues that the PCSO sets aside for charity work.
With the PCSO now under the direct control and supervision of the Office of the President, the chief executive could allot another 10 percent of its income to support “financially sick SUCs.”
Indeed, a noble and novel proposition as it provides what could be the perfect solution to one of the country’s most pressing problems in the field of education.
Most efficacious too, with PCSO charity there going beyond dole – of giving fish to feed man for the day, and raised to scholarship – of teaching man to fish to feed himself for a lifetime.
Essential charity there that will most assuredly redound to greater faith of not only the bettors but also the whole citizenry in the PCSO.
That lotto has already– to steal television’s Survivor tagline – outplayed, outwitted and outlasted religion as, again to quote Marx, “the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions,” was most manifest in the recent grand lotto draws.
The P500 million, turned P600 million, and finally over P700 million drawing the collective sigh of the whole nation – both oppressors and oppressed; burning the heart with desire for all that money can buy; and ransoming the very soul from hellish privations.
See the lines to the betting booths getting longer, much, much loooonger than those going to Sunday communion. Witness how each unwon multi-million jackpot draw hordes of new converts betting their very faith in a chance of one-in-29-million. With those odds, some leap of faith taken there really.
And the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office could not have been happier, having posted record sales of P4.1 billion for the 6/55 Grand Lotto alone from May to November this year. The recent jackpot of P741,176,323.20 won by a single individual recorded as the highest ever in the 15-year history of the lotto in the country. That single draw…well, drawing reportedly some three million bettors, governors and congressmen, senators and even the President with his Palace factotums among them.
It did not come as any surprise then for Malacanang to get hold of the PCSO – 6/55, 6/49, 6/45, 6/422 lotteries, the sweepstakes, and scratch-a-prize locked in.
“One of the main objectives of the Office of the President (OP) is to enhance the health services and charity programs to the public as well as to immediately respond on calamities, disasters relief and emerging illnesses…
“In order to ensure the effective implementation of the social agenda of the President as well as to effectively facilitate the health services and charity programs of OP there is a need of placing back to OP the control and supervision over PCSO.” So rationalized President Aquino of Executive Order No. 14.
It was precisely the same reasons cited by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo when she ordered the transfer of PCSO supervision initially to the Department of Social Welfare and Development in 2004, and finally to the Department of Health a year later.
So should we expect now yellow ribbons and P-Noy’s follicle-challenged mug splashed on new ambulances coming out of the PCSO?
But why must the PCSO’s charity be limited only to health and social services?
“State college education is also a serious charity case.” So said Sen. Ralph Recto in a statement carried in the media. “Aside from helping the poor and the sick, there could still be room to accommodate one more ‘patient’ – (state universities and colleges) suffering from fiscal cancer.”
A very good point raised by the senator more known for being the husband of star-for-all-seasons and Batangas Gov. Vilma Santos than for all his worth as grandson of the great nationalist Senator Claro Mayo Recto. Recto’s words assume urgent and critical consideration given the current ferment in the campuses and the streets with thousands of students and teachers in protest over alleged cuts in the budgets of more than 100 SUCs all over the country.
Recto, chair of the Senate ways and means committee, proposed that SUCs be made eligible to become one of the “beneficiaries” of the 30 percent of revenues that the PCSO sets aside for charity work.
With the PCSO now under the direct control and supervision of the Office of the President, the chief executive could allot another 10 percent of its income to support “financially sick SUCs.”
Indeed, a noble and novel proposition as it provides what could be the perfect solution to one of the country’s most pressing problems in the field of education.
Most efficacious too, with PCSO charity there going beyond dole – of giving fish to feed man for the day, and raised to scholarship – of teaching man to fish to feed himself for a lifetime.
Essential charity there that will most assuredly redound to greater faith of not only the bettors but also the whole citizenry in the PCSO.
