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(Inquirer Ph) Tyson Venegas. Image from his Instagram
Tyson Venegas. Image from his Instagram page

Filipino-Canadian teen Tyson Venegas won the first-ever platinum ticket of the American Idol’s 21st season with his soulful rendition of Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind,” all while playing the piano.

Venegas, who was one of the contestants in Season 2 of ABS-CBN’s The Voice Teens, wowed Idol judges Lionel Richie, Katy Perry and Luke Bryan as he confidently hit each riffs and runs, showcasing his superb falsetto and voice curling techniques.

The performance of this 17-year old native of Vancouver, Canada was so powerful that Richie quipped that he needed to validate if he was indeed just a teenager as he said.

Richie asked Venegas’ mom, Iris, to verify his age. “He’s claiming to be 17-years-old, but he’s performing like a 45-year-old.”

Venegas’ mom told him that one of her son’s first concerts was Richie’s. “He was inspired by you, and that’s when he learned to sing from his heart.”

“We’ve flipped the switch now. I inspired him back then, he just inspired us today. Let me tell you, that performance was spot-on professional,” said Richie… Read More

(FMT) MANILA: A small plane with four people on board has crashed in the central Philippines and rescuers were searching for survivors on Sunday, officials said.

The Cessna 340 aircraft went missing early Saturday morning shortly after departing for Manila from Bicol International Airport in Albay province, south of the capital, the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) said in a statement.

The plane was carrying two passengers, a pilot and another crew member, the aviation regulator said.

A search-and-rescue team has identified a possible crash site near the airport, CAAP spokesman Eric Apolonio told AFP.

“The problem is the weather is bad and it hampers the visibility of the ground search,” he said.

Albay disaster officer Cedric Daep said the debris of a Cessna plane was found near the crater of the active Mayon volcano but authorities were still verifying whether it was the same aircraft that went missing on Saturday… Read More

(ForeignPolicy) The election of the Philippines’ new president, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., in May 2022 has proven exceptionally significant for Washington’s security alliances in the Indo-Pacific. Marcos, the son of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos, has prioritized the maintenance of healthy ties to the United States just as his father did during the Cold War. This marks a sharp departure from the foreign policy of Marcos’s predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte, who sought to systematically dismantle the U.S.-Philippines alliance, decrease Manila’s reliance on Washington, and diversify the country’s partnerships to include new opportunities with China and Russia.

Marcos’s return to normal alliance relations with the United States was not an abrupt nor surprising decision. Indeed, toward the end of Duterte’s tenure, it had already become apparent that the latter’s pro-China policies were failing spectacularly, as Beijing pressed ahead with its territorial expansion against its maritime neighbors in the South China Sea. China’s encirclement of Philippines-administered Thitu Island (also known as Pag-asa) with hundreds of militia boats, authorization of the Chinese Coast Guard to fire on non-Chinese vessels throughout the South China Sea, and mooring of more than 200 Chinese “fishing” militia boats at the disputed Whitsun Reef made Duterte’s policy to cooperate with China in the South China Sea appear not only out of touch with reality but even dangerous to Philippine national security… Read More

(ABC7News) SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — Those closest to Rita Price, the woman who was killed in last week’s San Francisco home explosion in the outer Sunset District, are speaking about their beloved friend. They’re asking the community not to forget Rita’s always positive, caring spirit.

“She’s a happy-go-lucky person. Every room she went into, she lit up. It was her big smile and laugh,” said Jules, who requested we use only her first name.

It’s that effervescent personality Rita’s close friends will remember the most. Photos provided by her close friends from San Francisco’s Balboa High School show Rita’s 1,000-watt smile was always on display, even after her near-death, paralyzing stroke in 2014.

“We didn’t think she was going to make it. We all went to say goodbye,” said friend Justine, who also requested anonymity due to shock. Justine recalls Rita still joking around right after she emerged from a coma… Read More

(Interaksyon) The Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) said that it will reevaluate the Hollywood film “Plane” after some lawmakers condemned the movie for supposedly portraying the Philippines “negatively.”

“Although the film is fictional, we still would not want our country to be portrayed in a negative and inaccurate light,” the MTRCB said in a statement on Thursday, February 16.

MTRCB said that it will take necessary actions if there is anyway “injurious to the prestige of the Philippines or its people.”

The action movie is about the survivors of a plane crash incident in Jolo, Sulu who were held hostage by an armed group.

In the movie’s trailer, Jolo island was described as a place that is “run by separatists and militias” and that “the Philippine army wouldn’t go there anymore.” … Read More

(Morning Star Online) BACK in September 2002, Dan Plesch wrote an article in the Guardian titled Iraq first, Iran and China next. Less than a year earlier, George W Bush had put China on a nuclear hit list along with Russia, Iran, Iraq, Syria and North Korea. Twenty years on, it seems China’s turn has arrived, now identified as the US’s most consequential geopolitical challenge.

Iraq was a turning point for the world as Bush “seized the unipolar moment.” Shock and awe and full-spectrum dominance in air, land, sea and space presaged a new militarism to bolster US global supremacy.

Blatantly displacing the UN on the pretext of “humanitarian intervention,” the US found a new means of rallying allies in a “coalition of the willing,” embedding key Nato partners into “out of area” operations.

As Plesch foresaw, the 2003 war set precedents to be used against other states that stood out against US global control. US militarism has advanced into air-sea battle plans to wipe out multiple cities across China at a single strike, with trillions of dollars sunk into upgrading full spectrum dominance capabilities; “humanitarian intervention” has evolved into a new cold war of “democracies against autocracies” edging the UN further aside… Read More

(RawStory) The Philippines condemned Tuesday the “aggressive” actions of a Chinese security vessel, which is accused of using a military-grade laser light against a Philippine patrol boat in the disputed South China Sea, leaving crew members temporarily blinded.

The incident happened on February 6 nearly 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Second Thomas Shoal in the Spratly Islands, where Philippine marines are stationed in a derelict navy ship grounded to assert Manila’s territorial claim in the waters.

The Department of Foreign Affairs said it had filed a diplomatic protest to the Chinese embassy in Manila over the “latest aggressive activities of the Chinese Coast Guard against Philippine official vessels” near the shoal… Read More

(Time) The Philippines has accused China of “a blatant disregard” and “clear violation” of sovereignty, alleging that a Chinese coast guard ship last week directed a “military-grade laser light” at a Philippine Coast Guard ship in the hotly contested South China Sea, temporarily blinding the Filipino crew onboard.

A statement released Monday by the Philippine Coast Guard said the Chinese vessel “illuminated the green laser light twice” and “also made dangerous maneuvers” to block a Philippine fleet from delivering supplies to another ship grounded at Second Thomas Shoal, also known as Ayungin Shoal, a disputed atoll 120 miles off the west coast of the Philippine island of Palawan.. Read More