references: impeachment

• 1. The Revival of Impeachment as a Partisan Political Weapon by Richard K. Neuman Jr.
• 2. The Impeachment of Judge Chase: Redefining Judicial Independence by Adam A. Perlin
• 3. IMPEACHMENT: A Constitutional Primer by Jason J. Vicente
• 4.  Impeachment of Judges: A Theoretical Stroke on Judicial Accountability by Sayak Chaudhuri
• 5. The Collected Works of James Wilson, vol. 1
• 6. The Collected Works of James Wilson, vol. 2
• 7. "High Crimes and Misdemeanors" by Frank O. Bowman III and Stephen L. Sepinuck 

places: mayacabac, dauis, bohol

my grand father left a piece of real estate in mayacabac,dauis, panglau island in bohol. 

he left the island as a young man when he decided he did not want to be a fisherman all his life. he would eventual retire as a municipal treasurer in the province of zamboanga del sur.

at the rates the resorts in the island are going (unconfirmed 50k for a nights stay). the small piece of common property is a gold mine.

in the municipality of Panglau, an american citizen was able to acquire a piece of property where a cave was located. it also had a 'balete' tree that scared the children around the neighborhood (Filipino folklore is rich with stories of 'encantos' and the supernatural). what the person did, i was informed, was to convert the cave into a bar with a swimming pool. this is just one of the things that make the place famous.

events: observations on the corona defense

these are some of the observations noted with regard to the conduct of the accused chief justice's defense at the resumption of the proceeding from the five day break in order to give time for the defense to prepare for its deliberations:

1. as an initial salvo, the defense lead cuevas employs evasive tactics by questioning the manner in which the impeachment court (IC) proceeded to trial from the articles of impeachment by the lower house. attacking in effect the IC and threatening to go to the SC on grounds of grave abuse of discretion.

citing francisco v. house of representative cuevas expressed the option as a relief from the situation. enrile however, stated that the case does not fall on all fours since it never reached the senate.

bernas had a more fitting metaphorical description of it. he said it was "like beating a dead horse". hmmm...a dead horse in the legal battleground! 

 2. defense through counsel manalo and rep.tiangco expounds on the internal working of the House of Representatives (HR) postulating that the impeachment on corona was politically motivated. this is glaringly unfair considering the judicial privilege invoked by the SC in its feb.14 Valentine Resolution where they even prohibited any employee of the judiciary to testify without an approval from the court 'en banc'.

the IC however chose to be liberal on the matter enforcing the rule on admission of evidence that their consideration for relevance be left to the IC within its internal deliberations.



related readings:
g.r. no. 160261-separate opinion by corona
g.r. no. 160261-separate opinion by tinga

doctrines: judicial privilege

If the doctrine on executive privilege is nothing but a constitutional myth then judicial privilege is a mythical monster against the freedom of information enshrined in Article III on the Bill of Rights of the '87 Philippine Constitution.

The charter expressly provides: " SEC. 7. - The right of the people to information on matters of public concern shall be recognized. Access to official records, and to documents, and papers pertaining to official acts, transactions, or decisions, as well as to government research data used as basis for policy development, shall be afforded the citizen, subject to such limitations as may be provided by law."

There are no known exceptions as far as i know except that the demand for information should not burden the bureaucracy in the manner of preparation with regard to matters of public record demanded by its citizen. We are after all in the 'age of information' and technology is the tool in which the right is sufficiently served.

That was before Ermita v. Senate came. There are also qualified exceptions towards state secrets with regard to the 'security of the state'. 

However, in the Supreme Court, where citizens invoke its adjudicative power with regard to controversies to enforce a right that was violated, the beast just doesn't square off.

In addition, a party litigant may invoke to keep the record of a decided case in private and not be a part of the public records but which is of course a different matter as this matter has got something to do with the individual's right to privacy. It is not something that the court may invoke. It is not the right of the court.


references:
        code on information
        lord bingham on the rule of law

events: corona impeachment

 (DRAFT)

art. VII of the impeachment charge questions the manner in which a TRO was issued in favor of the former president GMA.


i find the following excerpt on the rule of law elucidating with regard to its due execution:

      " My second sub-rule is that questions of legal right and liability should ordinarily be resolved by application of the law and not the exercise of discretion. Most modern commentators would not share to the full Dicey’s hostility to the exercise of official discretions. In the immigration field, for example, judges have routinely and gratefully invited the Secretary of State to exercise his discretion to grant leave to enter or remain to applicants who do not meet the tests for entry laid down in the immigration rules but whose personal history or circumstances demand  sympathetic consideration. But the essential truth of Dicey’s insight stands. The broader and more looselytextured a discretion is, whether conferred on an official or a judge, the greater the scope for subjectivity and hence for arbitrariness, which is the antithesis of the rule of law.25 This sub-rule requires that a discretion should ordinarily be narrowly defined and its exercise capable of reasoned justification. These are requirements which our law, in my opinion, almost always satisfies, because discretion imports a choice between two possible decisions and orders, and usually the scope for choice is very restricted. The grant of a civil injunction, it is always said, is discretionary. But if a clear violation of legal right is shown, and there is a clear risk of repetition injurious to the victim for which damages will not compensate, and there is no undertaking by the lawbreaker to desist, the trial judge ordinarily has no choice. His discretion can only, usually, be exercised one way. A second, very familiar, example is found in section 78(1) of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, which provides:


      “In any proceedings the court may refuse to allow evidence on which the prosecution proposes to rely to be given if it appears to the court that, having regard to all the circumstances, including the circumstances in which the evidence was obtained, the admission of the evidence would have such an adverse effect on the fairness of the proceedings that the court ought not to admit it.”


The use of the word “may” is relied on as conferring a discretion. But what the subsection does, I suggest, is to require an exercise of judgment, which may be difficult to make but which will determine the outcome: if the statutory condition is judged to be satisfied, the judge must refuse to allow the evidence to be given; if it is not, the subsection does not authorise the judge to exclude the evidence. For my third illustrative example I return to the immigration field. If an official were to grant leave to enter or remain to a person who did not meet the tests laid down in the immigration rules, but whose case presented no exceptional features whatever suggesting the need for special treatment, such decision would be incapable of rational justification and could not be defended as an exercise of discretion. There is in truth no such thing as an unfettered discretion, judicial or official, and that is what the rule of law requires."

granting that there was sufficient compliance with the requirements...primordial executive concerns through the Department of Justice should not have been easily dismissed. After all, situational realities, real dangers, possible adverse results are things which are well within the executive branch's' domain of certainty-determination.  not the courts' which by nature is insulated from the ever changing  realities of day to day-realities which are deemed- from moment to moment- uncertain.




reference:
      lord bingham on the rule of law

music: fad from the old hood

after a long absence from my hood.. i returned finding the little kids turned into young adults...they shared their favorite songs with me and and sharing it in return to the general public..budotz is a term applied to those who frequent the bunguyan beach fronts of davao city...adjacent to queensland and times beach...the female counterpart is budatz...for those who hang around the hotspot past midnight till the wee hours of the morning..fridays and saturday nights of the week... :-)...luv the showdowns!


http://lordpau.multiply.com/music/item/67/music_fad_from_the_HOOD

coming up: bar matters

lots of materials in upcoming posts..soon as i get back to my HOMEBASE..
right now i'm still unwinding from the pressures of the past months..it turned out to be a "bloody" one!

file management: working with review materials

first and foremost in importance on dealing with bar~review~ materials, which comes in such forms as dotPDF, dotDOC, dot MP3, dot WAV...what have you, is the manner of converting these files into formats which suit your needs.

• dot PDF files from ADOBE PAGEMAKERS/OPEN OFFICE(i think the most recent MS OFFICE has also added the "EXPORT as PDF" functionality) is the most important form due to its portability or fast transmission capability and its ever most important NARRATOR(READ-ALOUD) function which reads through your document consistently...barring brownouts..hehe!
• dotDOC is also good but the drawback is its vulnerability to VIRUSES.
• dotMP3 is nice to work with due to its adaptability/support in most GADGETS available in the market these days, be it PDA's, IPOD's, generic mobile music PLAYERS, and/or cellular phones(BLACKBERRY is the meanest).
• dotWAV is not recommended as they tend to take too much space in your HARDISKS/memory STICKs/SDs/microSD's.
• dotTXT files are the most BASIC and the easiest files to work with.

i will then work on some files which i will be sharing in the succeeding posts as an example on how to manage them according to your specific needs. like from PDF, a narrator may be activated(ms sam voice) and recorded through a recording software( i prefer AUDACITY for this purpose)plus a loop back chord from your AUDIO OUT(most CPU's tag them as SPEAKER) to your LINE-IN or MIC outlet(where the jack goes IN) then saving it in MP3 form (MP4 is more sophisticated in the sense that images and sound may be combined and compressed into relatively lighter files.

unfortunately, i haven't gone through the process of REVERSE~ENGINEERING dotMP3 files yet...i tried to search for the specific software but failed.
the work around for this of course is to have them transliterated, that is, from AUDIO to TEXT which requires the services of STENOGRAPHERS. and is, i should say, quite costly...
anyways...will keep on searching!

persons: benigno “noynoy” aquino III

saying that “ there would be a possible impeachment for SC justices who decided on the issue on MIDNIGHT APPOINTMENTS..”
hmmm…nice move towards JUDICIAL REFORMS!

to think that his father 'ninoy' bore the blunt of a SC that mis-postured during the 'marcos' regime...it is not at all unthinkable nor surprising for him to be declaring such statements... or having such an attitude...panahon na cguro...i cannot think of any other candidate who would give us even just a little bit of hope in order to implement the much needed JUDICIAL REFORMS!

SC decisions are not bound by DISSENTING nor SEPARATE opinions. we are told to watch out for them dissenting opinions as they tend to be controlling in a 'future' time.

notable on this aspect was the late CJ teehankee's consistent dissents..until 'people power' took over..a seated CJ was requested to resign.. of course,  but does it always take a revolution or an uprising to reward INTEGRITY?

the court 'en banc' quoted the OSG argument as follows:

• 1. When Chief Justice Claudio Teehankee retired on April 18, 1988, Chief Justice Pedro Yap was appointed on the same day;
• 2. When Chief Justice Yap retired on July 1, 1988, Chief Justice Marcelo Fernan was appointed on the same day; 
• 3. When Chief Justice Fernan resigned on December 7, 1991, Chief Justice Andres Narvasa was appointed the following day, December 8, 1991;
• 4. When Chief Justice Narvasa retired on November 29, 1998, Chief Justice Hilario Davide, Jr. was sworn into office the following early morning of November 30, 1998;
• 5. When Chief Justice Davide retired on December 19, 2005, Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban was appointed the next day, December 20, 2005; and
• 6. When Chief Justice Panganiban retired on December 6, 2006, Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno took his oath as Chief Justice at midnight of December 6, 2006.[85]

most proly 'leading' to a concept of precedents as if it was alright to appoint a new CJ soon as the seat is vacated...all in a day that is..
but it raises too many questions..

• for one: were these dates within an impending 'PRESIDENTIAL' elections?
• two: was there an on-going appointment ban in each of those moments?

"It is one thing to alter the law's direction of travel by a few degrees, quite another to set it off in a different direction."- Lord Bingham on 'The Rule of Law'

related readings:

• SC decision on CJ appointments
• FR. BERNAS on SC_CJ appointments
• TIME on NOYNOY

music: jason miraz/ LUCKY

Video: Lucky - Jason Mraz Ft Colbie Caillat   Benzer: lucky, ft