Rice crisis can be
the turning point

The latest news was that rice might go up to as much as P50 a kilo. That is to be feared. This should have been anticipated by government. But this might be the turning point, though.

It’s basic economics for commodities with inelastic demand, like rice, that a supply shortage of only five percent can raise the price to as much as 100 percent with panic buying.

Conversely, an excess of supply by five percent can drop the price very drastically.

This is where governance failed. And we are paying a very high price. More crises are yet to come. With the news, if we use the common American slang, we tell you. “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”

The price that we will pay? Government will be forced to import rice at wherever cost which will mean a very big dollar drain. The news said government will lose P60 billion in this importation.

It will be like this for the next few years, hampering the government’s ability to meet our other basic needs: the real crisis.

* * *

In the days of old when government had a big problem, it diverted people’s attention with entertainment. The Romans had two warriors fighting each other to death in the arena. The Spaniards have the bull fight. We have the cockfight.

Let’s take our mind off for a while from the rice crisis. The latest Pacquiao-Marquez fight in Nevada was a bit controversial as many Filipinos were not convinced Pacquiao won.

I don’t blame Pacquiao for getting peeved and saying, will it be Congress or the Senate that will investigate it?

Our people should be educated on how boxing bouts are scored. Boxing is scored by the round. The winner gets 10 points, the loser gets nine for each round. A knockdown, that’s another point less for the loser.

Then this is summed up at the end, each of the three judges giving his judgment. Pacquiao won by a whisker. But he won and Marquez did not file a complaint.

Many said, though, luck was brought by Mayor Bing Leonardia. Well, Bing himself said, Manny did well.

* * *

The problem was the over-publicity by the Pacquiao camp. It created a very high expectation that Pacquiao would knock Marquez down. He did not. So they got disappointed.

I did not see that bout though. I didn’t want to see Manny lose.

His having lost weight abruptly to make the weight requirement was bad. Besides, Marquez is good. He is fast and a jabber against Pacquiao who is more of a slugger.

If you cannot TKO a jabber, he will win on points. That was what I was afraid of.

* * *

In 1933, the heavy weight champion was a Spaniard, my tocayo Primo Carnera who beat Jack Sharkey who earlier beat Germany’s sensation Max Schmelling. Carnera was like a bull, not afraid of a flurry of jabs as he would go for a knock out.

But when he met Max Baer, a jabber who danced, running rings around him earning points, Carnera lost.

Joe Louis, the famous Brown Bomber boosted American pride when he beat Max Schmelling before World War II.

Joe Louis won the championship by beating Jim Braddock who got within the firing range of the Brown Bomber’s fist. But when Joe Louis met Ezzard Charles, he was beaten.

Ezzard Charles also beat Joe Walcott and Joe Walcott in a return bout beat him.

I remembered all these because, in college, my teacher in religion Fr. Dolse Garcia, University Rector would tell the stories of boxing bouts in class. The winners always prayed before and after each fight, he said, to justify he was not teaching boxing but religion.

My friend Robert Leonard Strause who always e-mailed me, was, I understand, a radio and television sports reporter when he was young in the U.S. He is now 82 and I believe he recalls all these fights, too.

* * *

Muhamad Ali beat Sonny Liston when he was still Cassius Clay. Then in Zaire he beat George Foreman. Again that was a test between a slugger and a jabber. Foreman was a slugger and Ali used the tactic of rope-a-dope, leaning on the rope getting pummeled and, when there was an opening, got Foreman with an uppercut.

I like Ali, a boxer-poet. He once said, “I will down him at eight to show I am great.” Or his other one, “I fly like a butterfly and sting like a bee.”

But the best of them all was Rocky Marciano who was an undefeated champion. In the 80s, I think, there was a study on the video of all fighters, their styles and tactics, and their decision was the best of them all was Rocky Marciano who, despite Ali’s speed, he would beat even Muhamad Ali.

* * *

The non-title fight between Ali and Joe Frazier in Manila promoted by Marcos was also entertaining. It showed what speed could do where Ali hammered Frazier very badly.

It was before the War when Pancho Villa of La Carlota made Filipinos proud. And so with another from La Carlota Little Dado who became a champion also. I have not seen their fight.

I heard of Little Dado in the 60s when he was hacked and killed with a bolo in a quarrel over land in La Carlota.

Flash Elorde was a champion, too, beating Harold Gomes.

Boxing is interesting. But the rice crisis is more important. I hope the Senate will push through with its investigation.*

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