Welcome to the Republic of Absurdity

Sometimes I really hate this government and by extension, my country. Why? Read this piece by Robin Hemley at McSweeney's:

Few countries can compete with the Philippines when it comes to corruption—it's always near the top of the list of most-corrupt nations and the G20 nations recently blacklisted it, along with only three other countries, for its banking practices. In polls, Filipinos tag customs as the most corrupt department. And for good reason.

Over coffee one afternoon, a book-industry professional (whom I can't identify) told me that for the past two months virtually no imported books had entered the country, in part because of the success of one book, Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. The book, an international best seller, had apparently attracted the attention of customs officials. When an examiner named Rene Agulan opened a shipment of books, he demanded that duty be paid on it...

Not the books, goddamn it. If ever there's a reason for me to join the rebels in the mountains, it's this one.

Ironically, because of their massive incompetence and ineptness, the Philippine government is not something out of the pages of George Orwell's 1984 or Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Rather, it's more like Terry Gilliam's Brazil-- in fact, the sheer absurdity of the government officials' language and reasoning is something straight out of a Monty Python movie.



(Link via kyu.)