The solution, according to George

George W. Bush has the solution to the current Middle East Crisis. Caught on an open microphone at the G-8 summit of the world’s most industrialized nations, the President of the United States said the way to stop Israeli attacks on Lebanon was to "get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit, and it’s over."

This "shit" from Hezbollah is, of course, those Katyusha rockets lobbed from the Southern Lebanese border into the Israeli port city of Haifa, and the capture by Hezbollah fighters of two Israeli soldiers in an effort to hold them for a prisoner exchange.

Actually, George has a point, except that it just might be wishful thinking at this time. If you try to anticipate the future by what the Hezbollah leadership is saying, it’s not likely that they will stop spreading their shit anytime soon. Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, whose offices in Beirut were directly hit in the Israeli bombing, has defiantly declared that the guerillas remained at "full strength" and their "missile stockpiles are still full."

That’s probably because most of the casualties in Lebanon have been civilians. The Israeli armed forces, however, have shown no hesitation in bombing Hezbollah strongholds in Beirut, even if they happen to be in thickly-populated civilian areas. But hard-nosed Israeli commanders say that Hezbollah fighters routinely take shelter in civilian areas and if civilians willingly act as shields, they have to bear the awful consequences.

The Group of 8 (composed of the US, Russia, Germany, Japan, Britain, France, Italy and Canada) recently issued a joint statement which condemned both guerilla organizations for the present conflict – the Hezbollah, allegedly supported by Syria and Iran as de facto strategist and field commander, and Hamas, based in Palestine – and affirmed that Israel had a right to defend itself. The G-8 also asked Israel to exercise restraint, although it did not call for a ceasefire.

Hamas has been unrepentant too, despite the bombing of its security headquarters and the Foreign Ministry offices in Gaza City. The Israeli air strikes were in reaction to ambushes of Israeli troops in the occupied West Bank and indications that suicide bombings were being attempted in Jerusalem.

It is unlikely that the new Hamas-led government, which came into power by ousting the allegedly corrupt and inept Yasir Arafat regime, will be deterred from its resolve to wipe out the State of Israel. Hamas will not succeed, of course, but their intransigence, and that of Hezbollah, will dictate the fate of the Middle East in the foreseeable future.

The United Nations has been talking about sending in a multinational peacekeeping force to Lebanon. Israel has rejected such a force for now. And, in that open mike slip, Bush also revealed some frustration with UN Secretary-General Annan when he remarked that he "felt like telling Kofi to get on the phone with [Syrian President] Assad, make something happen."

The conclusion seems to be that Bush reflects the sense of the G-8 that the way to stop this crisis is to get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing its shit. What this means, too, I guess, is that Israel can be expected to be able to take care of Hamas in Palestine. But getting Syria and Iran into the equation complicates the problem and threatens to envelope the entire region in a crisis which may then escalate into a Third World War.

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The plan of Education Secretary-designate Jesli Lapus to fully restore English as a medium of instruction is not only welcome, it is long overdue. Already that so-called "edge" of Filipinos because of their superiority in English is fast disappearing.

That edge was our accidental advantage because of our history of having been a colony of America. But other more perceptive countries, such as Japan, China and Singapore, have realized that the lingua franca today of business, technology and diplomacy is not French, not even a major Chinese dialect, but English.

Those countries, which cannot be accused of a lack of nationalism, are catching up, simply because they have made the clear-eyed and unsentimental determination that the ‘market’ favors those who can speak and write English. Thus, Mandarin, Nippongo, to name just two of those distinguished tongues, have been placed in the back burner (albeit not entirely forgotten), and English put up front.

The new Secretary, who will assume his post this August, has announced three immediate priorities. Aside from fully restoring English as a medium of instruction, the new Secretary of the DepEd intends to fashion courses of instruction which emphasize the development of market-driven skills in high school, meaning technical and vocational courses. This will enable high school graduates, and dropouts, to enter the labor force immediately rather than become permanent vagrants.

He also intends to improve the quality of teachers through more focused mid-career training and education.

But Secretary Lapus, an acknowledged management whiz, will, I’m told, be fought every step of the way by nay-sayers and activists who are determined to immobilize him at the center of the very "political crossfire" he has asked to be relieved from.

On the other hand, according to Commission on Appointments member Senator Ralph Recto, former Tarlac Congressman Jesli Lapus won’t have a tough time getting confirmed. If this prediction proves accurate, Jesli’s real stumbling blocks will be within the DepEd.

But despite Jesli’s pleas to spare him from the political crossfire, it may precisely be the political savvy and nimbleness of foot his years in Congress have presumably taught him that will help him get his commendable programs through. Unfortunately, that is the hard, and sad, reality of governance in this country.