MANILA, Philippines?The gigantic crowd that is viewing the remains of Corazon C. Aquino and the expected mammoth crowd that will show up at her funeral procession Wednesday, shows how much people love her.

She was not a perfect leader, but she did her best to become a good president.

Tita Cory may have failed as a good leader?what can you expect from a housewife who was unwillingly thrust into the country?s highest post??but she was sincere and had personal integrity.

Three administrations later, the country has a leader who claims to be an economic wizard, but whose sincerity and integrity are questionable.

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When President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo asked her audience to pause in prayer for her ailing predecessor during the State of the Nation Address (Sona), many people thought she sounded insincere, a hypocrite.

They were right in their thinking.

Kris Aquino, Tita Cory?s youngest daughter, said GMA (Arroyo?s initials) recalled two soldiers assigned as security detail to her mother after the former President called on President Arroyo to resign in 2005 in the wake of the ?Hello Garci?scandal.

Every former president is entitled to a security detail.

GMA showed how petty she is when she deprived her predecessor of bodyguards just because she told her to step down for election fraud.

She?s not only small in size but in character as well.

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Sen. Noynoy Aquino, Cory?s only son, said the family had decided to do away with a state funeral because his mother was ?a simple woman who shunned pomp and pageantry.?

It?s not for Tita Cory?s family to decide whether she should have a state funeral or not.

That decision is best left to the government since former President Cory belongs to the people.

The late ex-President?s family?s refusal to accord her a state funeral is understandable since the offer came from Malacañang.

But President Gloria is not the government.

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A news report said that Malacañang would submit a report card on the gains it has made in rooting out corruption.

The report would be submitted to the Millennium Challenge Corp., a US government agency that determines which poor country should be given aid and which should not based. Corrupt Third World countries are not given aid.

What ?gains? in fighting corruption is the Palace talking about?

How could there be gains in the fight against corruption when the corrupt people are in the Palace?

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Director General Augusto Syjuco of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (Tesda) called his directors throughout the country supposedly for a conference.

But his real purpose for calling them to Manila was to ask each director to submit to him a list of 150 persons who would become his campaigners for senator, according to a Tesda insider.

Syjuco is the guy with a white beard whose face you see in billboards side by side with that of President Gloria?s trumpeting his accomplishments at Tesda.

If he wins, we will have an ermitanyo (hermit) in the Senate.

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Young criminals are taking advantage of RA 9344 or the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act.

A 15-year-old suspected motorcycle thief from Aborlan, Palawan, broke into the office of the theft and robbery section at the Puerto Princesa City Police Station.

He was arrested earlier by the police for allegedly stealing a motorcycle and turned over to the local social welfare officer.

But the boy got away from the city social welfare office and climbed the second floor of the station.

Caught inside the theft and robbery section office, he said he came to steal a cell phone inside the chief?s drawer.