11:32PM Last Song
Before I go to sleep, I'd like to share a song with you. It's been part of my "to download" list for a while, but I just can't find it. I should probably give up pirating stuff and just buy the band's album, no? Ü

Switchfoot - This is Your Life
yesterday is a wrinkle on your forehead
yesterday is a promise that you've broken
don't close your eyes, don't close your eyes
this is your life and today is all you've got now
yeah, and today is all you'll ever have
don't close your eyes
don't close your eyes

this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, is it everything you dreamed that it would be
when the world was younger and you had everything to lose

yesterday is a kid in the corner
yesterday is dead and over

this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, is it everything you dreamed that it would be
when the world was younger and you had everything to lose

don't close your eyes
don't close your eyes
don't close your eyes
don't close your eyes

this is your life are you who you want to be
this is your life are you who you want to be

this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, is it everything you dreamed it would be
when the world was younger and you had everything to lose

and you had everything to lose

06:56AM They Have a New Pope
Joseph Ratzinger is the new pope. Why does this matter, one may ask, since I am not Catholic? Well, this is a country populated predominantly by Catholics. Regardless of the formal (Constitutional) separation of church from state, the Catholic church in this country has a strong say on the government's civil society policies.

For instance, a bill to limit the number of children in a family to two and promote sex education met dogged opposition from the CBCP. Why is population control such a big deal? John Paul II took a conservative stance on birth control (disapproving of the "artificial" but more effective means of birth control such as the condom), and the church in the Philippines adopted this hard-line stance as well. However, if the country's birth rate of 2.4 percent remains unhindered, the country's population of 84 million could increase by 100% in the next 30 years. Yikes!

I think this is what Thomas Hobbes was criticizing when he wrote The Leviathan. Hobbes wrote The Leviathan to defend a country's right to absolute sovereignty. In Hobbes' model of the social contract, the people give up their right to govern themselves to one sovereign, who must therefore be free to rule in any manner he so chooses. A country or outside authority imposing its rules on the sovereign would therefore be anathema to this social contract.

12:32PM New and Improved!
Well, actually, what that means is that the layout is new, as is the new phlog section. I'm not sure everything else has improved, though.

I realized an important part of a writer's development--to learn to express thoughts in a clear way, and to practice writing not just for the self, but for an audience as well. I think that I'll need to post more frequently here as a result. Ü Hopefully, what I'll post can alleviate boredom.

Stand by for a new layout and new features. :)

I can't update this week. I just got back from a three-day vacation and I'm still a little bit exhausted. I'm also stuck on a new layout for this site. Ü Be back soon.