Free market = free individuals. Markets are composed of individuals -- rich and poor, young and old, men and women, buyers and sellers, producers and consumers, traders and manufacturers, and so on. Thus, to free the market from unnecessary restriction, prohibitions and regulations, is to free the individuals.
I noticed recently the existence of some free marketer blogs by fellow Filipinos. Many of them are young, smart guys, in their 20s to 30s, much younger than me. I will enumerate them here.
(1) Prudent Investor Newsletter http://prudentinvestornewsletters.blogspot.com/
It is owned by a new friend, Benson Te. Benson writers on various topics, especially on finance. The blog's world ranking of blogs and websites based on alexa.com stats is 3.04+ million as of this writing. This is rather high and a good rank.I have met Benson only about 3 weeks ago, during a meeting by a facebook group called "Filipinos for Ron Paul" with Atlas' Tom Palmer and Jude Blanchette.
(2) Colorful Rag: Philippine Society and Politics http://colorfulrag.blogspot.com//.
It is owned by another friend, Paul How, also from facebook group, "Filipinos for Ron Paul." Paul used to work at the Senate of the Philippines and is now on freelance writing and consulting. Paul did not provide a picture in his blog. His most recent postings are "Public franchises as slavery", "Fighting the greedy telcos", and "SONA writing tips from Noynoy's left and right idiot boxes."
Paul writes kilometric, a testament to his eloquent writing power. Check the blog to see for yourself.
(3) The Vincenton Post http://fvdb.wordpress.com/
Probably the hottest, most visited free marketer blog in the Philippines today, . As of this writing, its world ranking in alexa.com is 1.798+ million, a big jump from its last week's ranking of 2.25+ million.
It is owned by Froilan Vincent Bersamina, a young writer who is an avid reader of Ayn Rand and her Objectivism philosophy. His most controversial article is "To all UP students: education is NOT a right!" referring to students and alumni of the University of the Philippines (UP), a premier state university and also my alma mater. Posted last July 24, it has attracted 701 comments as of this writing -- this should be among the biggest number of comments for a single blog posting that I have seen.His second most commented article, posted a day after, is "A challenge to my critics!" that attracted 88 comments and counter-comments.
I have not met Froilan personally yet, but he is one of my nearly 900 friends in facebook. In one of his fb status updates, he talked about the huge number of counter-comments and critics that he got from that posting and subsequent postings on the subject of education, rights and privileges. He should be the most hated free marketer thinker in this country from the statists and left-leaning individuals now.
His writing style of being direct and even combative is working well for him. Some left-leaning guys concede that while they disagree with his ideas and philosophy, they recognize that his arguments are solid.
(4) The New Resistance http://newresistance.blog.friendster.com/
and the New Commonwealth Herald http://www.newcommonwealth.org/
The owner of these two blogs is a friend but would not want his name to be mentioned. The first blog is not updated, the last posting there was November 2006, about Philippine education, from the Spanish colonial period to this century.
(5) Elevic Pernis -- The Road to Weirdom http://elevicpernis.com/
It's a new blog owned by Elevic Pernis, a new friend in facebook whom I have not met personally yet. Elevic started blogging only last June this year, and has posted a few articles yet, mostly on opposing greater subsidy to UP.
Elevic describes himself as "a Misesian, i.e. a student of Ludwig von Mises. I heed his injunction to participate in an intellectual battle against all forms of oppression that seek to destroy the individual."
(6) Professional Kibitzer: A Second Look at Everything http://professionalkibitzer.wordpress.com/
This is another new blog, new as in created only this month!
The owner of this blog is a good buddy in MG Thinkers, Robin Lucas. He's my VP there. Robin is probably 2 decades younger than me, he also came from UP, Manila campus. He was a former debater, being an official of the UP Debate Circle.
Robin's first article here is "The Tragedy of Land Reform." It's not exactly a new article, but that paper was posted in several other sites and blogs. Robin says he will upload more materials within the month.
Watch for it guys.
(7) Joven's Corner http://filipinogodlesscapitalist.blogspot.com/
Another newly-created blog this month. The owner, Joven Morales, describes himself as "A stuent of Objectivism."
(8) Perpetual Cycle of Life http://carlostapang.spaces.live.com/
It is owned by a new friend, Carlos Tapang. Carlos is an IT professional, worked and lived for 25 years in the US, went back to the Philippines, Cebu City, only last year, with his family. While in the US, he was one of the tens of thousands of individual donors and supporters of Cato institute (www.cato.org).When Tom Palmer and Jude Blanchette of Atlas came to Manila last month, Carlos flew to Manila to join us and attend all of Tom's 4 talks in 1 1/2 days.
Carlos is setting up an IT company in Cebu to sell certain softwares for physicians in the country. He is fuming at the amount of bureaucracy and regulations that both local and national government agencies are giving to start-up entrepreneurs like him. Such experience was partly mentioned in his blog.
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I'm sure there are other Filipino free marketer bloggers out there, whether they are based in the country or based abroad. I will feature them here later once I find them.
I wish to see more free market groups, associations, think tanks and research institutes, publications, and blogs in this country. Competition among capitalist enterprises is healthy for all of them both in the short-term and long-term. The same way, competition among free marketer groups should be healthy for all of them. So long as differences in perspectives or approaches will be treated with respect. Ad hominem and related attacks when they criticize each other should be avoided.
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