Monday, May 30, 2022

 


A BANANA REPUBLIC; THE PLUNDERERS ARE BACK ENDORSED BY GUTTER DUTERTE



Angry young voters gathered in the Philippines on Tuesday to protest against Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the son and namesake of the former dictator, who clinched a landslide victory this week in one of the most divisive presidential elections in the country’s recent history.

Multiple election observers said they had received thousands of reports of election-related anomalies since the vote on Monday. Malfunctioning voting machines were one of the biggest concerns, with VoteReportPH, an election watchdog, saying the breakdowns had “severely impaired this electoral process.”

On Tuesday, Leni Robredo, Mr. Marcos’s closest rival in the race and the country’s current vice president, said that her team was looking into reports of voter fraud. But every opinion poll before the election had predicted that Mr. Marcos would win by a huge margin, and his lead by Tuesday was so overwhelming that reports of fraud and malfunctioning machines were unlikely to sway the result.

Mr. Marcos, known by his childhood nickname, “Bongbong,” had racked up nearly 31 million votes by 4:30 p.m., according to a preliminary tally. That was more than double the number of votes that Ms. Robredo had, giving Mr. Marcos the biggest margin of victory in more than three decades. Voter turnout was around 80 percent, an election official said Tuesday.

During his campaign, Mr. Marcos appealed to a public disillusioned with democracy in the Philippines, a country of 110 million and the oldest democracy in Southeast Asia. Yet for many Filipinos, the Marcos family name remains a byword for excess and greed, and a painful reminder of the atrocities committed by the father.


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Riot police were deployed in Manila on Tuesday to protect election commissioners. The vote this week was one of the most divisive presidential elections in modern Philippine history.Credit...Jes Aznar for The New York Times




Mr. Marcos’s 92-year-old mother, Imelda Marcos, was sentenced to up to 11 years in 2018 for creating private foundations to hide her unexplained wealth, but remains free. She posted bail, and her case is under appeal by the Supreme Court. Critics fear Mr. Marcos could use the presidency to scrap that case and other outstanding cases against the family.

Dozens of mostly young voters gathered in a park across from the elections commission building on Tuesday morning to protest the election results and Mr. Marcos, chanting, “Thief, thief, thief!” and “Put Imelda in jail.” Riot police stood watch over the demonstrations.

Paula Santos, a doctor in training, confronted the officers: “Personally, I am scared,” she told them. “I am turning 27 and I am scared for our future, especially now that I’m an adult. When I was young, I did not care about politics. But now I am having goose bumps because of fear.”
In the months leading up to the election, hundreds of thousands of Ms. Robredo’s young supporters had campaigned door to door, seeking to fight an online disinformation campaign that portrayed the violent Marcos regime as a “golden age” in the country’s history.

Ms. Santos told the officers that she had supported the younger Mr. Marcos when he ran against Ms. Robredo for the vice presidency in 2016 “because of the beautifully crafted posts and infographics I saw on YouTube.” “But then I saw other accounts, I did my research,” she said. “Knowing the truth is now in your own hands.”

“We’re not here to rewrite history,” she added. “We’re here to learn from it.”

In an interview later, Ms. Santos said that she and her 17-year-old sister cried on election night. Both of them had campaigned for Ms. Robredo. “I was expecting a close fight,” she said. “I didn’t expect it to be such a big gap between numbers. It was hard to believe.”


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Members of the Catholic church praying in front of the elections comission building in Manila on Tuesday. Credit...Jes Aznar for The New York Times




Across the country, many voters shared in her disbelief.

Recrimination and regret prevailed among some Filipinos as they considered the possibility of another Marcos as president, 36 years after millions of their countrymen ousted the Marcos family for looting billions of dollars from the treasury.

Robert Reyes, a Roman Catholic priest who spent every Wednesday for the past 11 weeks outside the elections commission building demanding a clean vote, said the Catholic Church had failed to “denounce evil.” The Catholic church, which has outsize influence in the Philippines, played a crucial role in overthrowing the Marcos dictatorship during the 1986 “People Power” uprising.

“Hopefully this will wake up the church,” Father Reyes said. “Because what moral authority does the son of a dictator who has not returned what his father has stolen have? What authority does he have to govern a country whose people were plundered by his father?”

Ms. Robredo has stopped short of formally conceding the race. On Tuesday, she told her supporters to accept “whatever the final result will be.”

“I do not consider this a loss because we have achieved many things this election season,” she said, speaking during a Catholic Mass in Bicol Region, where she is from.

She has hinted at a bigger role for her broad-based movement, which she said “will not die at the close of counting.”

Vote counting could continue through the end of the week. By Tuesday afternoon, Mr. Marcos had yet to deliver a victory speech. But in a statement, Victor Rodriguez, Mr. Marcos’s spokesman, said his “unassailable lead” meant that “the Filipino people have spoken decisively.”

“To those who voted for Bongbong, and those who did not, it is his promise to be a president for all Filipinos,” Mr. Rodriguez said. “To the world, he says: Judge me not by my ancestors, but by my actions.”


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Demonstrators faced off with riot police officers in Manila on Tuesday.Credit...Jes Aznar for The New York Times




Sara Duterte, the daughter of President Rodrigo Duterte and Mr. Marcos’s running mate, had garnered 31.5 million votes by Tuesday, more than triple the votes of Senator Francis Pangilinan, who ran as vice president in support of Ms. Robredo.


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Mr. Duterte has been accused of rolling back democratic institutions during his six years as president. Opponents have warned that the alliance between the Marcoses and the Dutertes could usher in a new era of autocracy in the Philippines.

Mr. Marcos and Ms. Duterte are expected to take office on June 30.

As the protests continued outside the elections commission building on Tuesday, demonstrators held up signs that said, “Never again,” and “Fight Marcos, reject Duterte.”

Maria Socorro Naguit, 72, a freelance writer at the protest, said she was 22 when the Marcos regime, during a crackdown on the press, shut down the magazine she worked for. “I’m here because it’s too much, you know?” Ms. Socorro Naguit said. “Honestly, I cannot countenance the return of the Marcoses.”

Watching the results come in on Monday night, Ms. Socorro Naguit said her first reaction was letting out curse words. “And I thought of the republic. Oh my god,” she said.

For Mirus Ponon, a first-time voter in Manila, Election Day was marked by excitement. The 20-year-old university student and civil rights activist stood in line for five hours to cast his vote for Ms. Robredo.

The euphoria didn’t last long. Several hours later, he was crying.

“You could see it coming from a standpoint of the structured propaganda and the machinery of the Marcoses,” he said. “But it’s something that makes you so depressed, as someone who loves the country. You want to continue to fight, yet the country and its people fail you.”


Ferdinand Marcos, who ruled the Philippines as a dictator from 1972 to 1986, is remembered for the thousands of human rights violations he committed, as well as his massive corruption. Indeed, Marcos holds the dubious title of being the most corrupt Philippine president (a title for which there is unfortunately stiff competition), and has been identified in one study as the second most corrupt government leader in the world, as measured by the value of public assets he stole. The profligacy of Ferdinand Marcos and his wife Imelda—even at a time when the Philippines was spiraling into recession and a debt crisis—was shameless, and symbolized by Imelda’s 2,700 pairs of shoes and extravagant shopping sprees.




Given the magnitude of the corruption and abuses he perpetrated, one would think that Marcos’ place in Philippine history and in Filipinos’ collective memory is already well-settled. But alarmingly, a “revisionist” account of his presidency has recently gained, and continues to gain, wide currency. Many Filipinos are now beginning to consider the notion that Marcos may not really have been so bad—that his “sins” were merely overstated by the victors who wrote post-Marcos history. (Some of these issues are discussed herehere and here, but they are more frequently debated informally in mass and social media platforms.) These revisionist narratives spiked during the 2016 Philippine elections, when Marcos’ son, Ferdinand, Jr. (known as “Bongbong”), ran for, and almost won, the Vice Presidency. During his campaign, Bongbong denied his father’s legacy of corruption and framed his own platform as a revival of Marcos’ supposed “golden age” of peace and progress. Bongbong’s efforts to whitewash his father’s historical record to suit his electoral objectives gained traction, and has even spread to other fronts, like Wikipedia and Facebook. It did not help that President Rodrigo Duterte favorably endorsed the Martial Law declaration that paved the way for Marcos’ dictatorial rule in 1972 (calling it “very good”), and that the Supreme Court, in a recent controversial ruling, allowed the interment of Marcos’ remains in the Libingan ng mga Bayani (“Cemetery of Heroes”).

From a historical perspective, this phenomenon is disturbing in itself; but, if not arrested, this distortion of collective memory about Marcos’ history of corruption would also have dangerous implications for the Philippines’ ongoing and future anticorruption efforts.  




First, a “whitewashed” history of Marcos’ corruption and kleptocracy can serve as a smokescreen for his family members’ own corrupt practices. While the “Marcos” name has been sullied by the dictator’s dismal record, his family members managed to get themselves elected to various public offices on the strength of their still-sizable base of loyalists and supporters. Imelda, Marcos’ wife, is currently a member of the House of Representatives; his daughter, Imee, is the Governor of Ilocos Norte, Marcos’ home province; Bongbong was a Senator before he ran for Vice President. For better or worse, the political careers of Imelda, Imee, and Bongbong are tied to Marcos’ own reputation. If Marcos continues to be perceived as a corrupt leader, his family members will be associated to corruption too. But if Marcos’ image is sanitized through historical revisionism, his family members can use the “vindication” of the “Marcos” name to cover up their own corrupt practices. This is particularly dangerous considering the corruption accusations currently being leveled against the Marcos family members: against Imelda, for her role in setting up bogus Swiss foundations; against Bongbong, for misappropriation of “pork barrel” funds; and against Imee, for undeclared campaign contributions to President Duterte, misappropriation of funds meant for tobacco farmers, and secret bank accounts exposed in the “Panama Papers” leak.
Second, forgetting Marcos’ corruption undermines the still-ongoing work of the institution established to recover his ill-gotten wealth. One of the first official acts of President Corazon Aquino, Marcos’ successor, was to establish the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG), and to task it with the recovery of public assets stolen by Marcos, his family, and his cronies—and to return that wealth to its rightful owners, the Filipino people. Needless to say, the historical basis of the PCGG’s existence is the fact of Marcos’ corruption; if this fact were to be expunged from the nation’s collective memory, the legitimacy of the PCGG will be severely compromised. This, in turn, will seriously undermine the ongoing efforts to recover the rest of the $10 billion worth of Marcos’ ill-gotten wealth, of which only $4 billion have so far been recovered. Now more than ever, continued public support for the PCGG’s efforts is needed. Under President Duterte, who has called Marcos “a hero to many Filipinos,” the PCGG is about to be abolished and absorbed by the Office of the Solicitor General. This move will undoubtedly dilute the PCGG’s historical and symbolic value as a tangible reminder of Marcos’ kleptocracy.
Third, remembering Marcos’ history of corruption is essential to fostering the environment needed for ongoing and future anticorruption efforts to succeed. If Marcos’ image is successfully sanitized by tampering with collective memory, it will send the wrong signal to public officials. It will tell them that corruption ultimately pays, because even if they are caught, they can still hope for some sort of historical vindication for their name and reputation in the future. This dangerous mindset is inimical to the success of any anticorruption effort, which depends heavily on fostering an environment of accountability and justice rather than of impunity. It is also important to continue holding up Marcos’ kleptocracy as a cautionary illustration of how the suppression of democratic values can enable large-scale plunder. When the people are armed with a truthful rendition of Marcos’ history of corruption, they are in a better position to be vigilant against similar acts. They will likewise be more inclined to guard and strengthen democratic institutions and norms, which in turn contribute to building an environment hostile to corruption.



Efforts to make the Filipino people forget Marcos’ history of corruption and abuse should be resisted. At this juncture, it should no longer be a matter of debate that Marcos was a thief. Not only is it in society’s best interest to preserve an accurate chronicle of its history, it is also an anticorruption imperative to keep the lessons of Marcos’ kleptocratic legacy salient and meaningful for succeeding generations. Charting a national course free of corruption will be even more difficult than it already is if this recent tide of pro-Marcos historical revisionism is not decisively turned.






Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said the family of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos has indicated a willingness to return a still-unspecified amount of money and “a few gold bars” to help ease the government’s expected budget deficit.

Duterte said without elaborating that he was considering designating three people, including a former Supreme Court chief justice, to negotiate with the Marcoses over the return of the assets.

Duterte said the Marcoses’ intention was relayed by a family spokesman, whom he did not identify, and indicated the Marcoses were of the view that the assets to be returned had not been stolen as alleged by political opponents.

“I will accept the explanation, whether or not it is true,” Duterte said in a speech to newly appointed officials.


There was no immediate reaction from the Marcos family, including his wife Imelda, who is currently a member of the House of Representatives.The Marcoses are “ready to open and bring back (assets) including a few gold bars,” Duterte quoted the Marcos family spokesman as saying. “It’s not that big, it’s not Fort Knox, it’s just a few but they said, they’ll return.”

Marcos was ousted in a 1986 “people power” revolt and died in exile in Hawaii three years later without admitting any wrongdoing, including accusations that he and his family amassed an estimated $5 billion to $10 billion while he was in power.

Marcos placed the Philippines under martial rule in 1972, a year before his term was to expire. He padlocked Congress, ordered the arrest of political rivals and left-wing activists and ruled by decree.

A Hawaii court found Marcos liable for human rights violations and awarded $2 billion from his estate to compensate more than 9,000 Filipinos who filed a lawsuit against him for torture, incarceration, extrajudicial killings and disappearances.

Although he rose to power last year on a promise to combat widespread crime and corruption, Duterte has acknowledged that one of Marcos’ daughters, a provincial governor, backed his presidential candidacy. Duterte has noted that his late father, a local politician, was a trusted Cabinet member of Marcos.

In November last year, Duterte approved the burial of the long-dead Marcos at the country’s Heroes’ Cemetery in a secrecy-shrouded ceremony, sparking protests and shocking many democracy advocates and human rights victims.

Burying someone accused of massive rights violations and plunder at the heroes’ cemetery, which is reserved for former presidents, soldiers and national artists, has long been an emotional and divisive issue. Duterte argued that it was Marcos’s right as a president and soldier to be buried at the cemetery, taking a political risk in a country where democracy advocates still celebrate Marcos’s ouster each year.

Sunday, May 29, 2022




A NEW PLATFORM FOR THE NEXT WAR

On March 9, 1862, the Union warship Monitor met its Confederate counterpart, Virginia. After a four-hour exchange of fire, the two fought to a draw. It was the first battle of ironclads. In one day, every wooden ship of the line of every naval power became immediately obsolete.

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. If the battle of the ironclads settled once and for all the wood-versus-iron debate, Japanese carrier-based aircraft settled the battleship-versus-carrier debate by sinking the cream of America’s battleship fleet in a single morning.

On April 14, 2022, the Ukrainians sank the Russian cruiser Moskva with a pair of Neptune anti-ship missiles. And that success posed an urgent question to the world’s major militaries: Has another age of warfare just begun? After 20 years spent fighting the post-9/11 wars, the United States military’s attention is again focused on a peer-level adversary. The Pentagon hasn’t been thinking this way since the Cold War, and it is attempting a profound transformation. Today, fierce debate attends this transformation, and nowhere more acutely than in the Marine Corps.

In March 2020, the Marine commandant, General David Berger, published “Force Design 2030.” This controversial paper announced a significant restructuring based on the belief that “the Marine Corps is not organized, trained, equipped or postured to meet the demands of the rapidly evolving future operating environment.” That “future operating environment” is an imagined war with China in the South Pacific—but in many ways, that hypothetical conflict resembles the real war in Ukraine.

The military we have—an army built around tanks, a navy built around ships, and an air force built around planes, all of which are technologically advanced and astronomically expensive—is platform-centric. So far, in Ukraine, the signature land weapon hasn’t been a tank but an anti-tank missile: the Javelin. The signature air weapon hasn’t been an aircraft, but an anti-air missile: the Stinger. And as the sinking of the Moskva showed, the signature maritime weapon hasn’t been a ship but an anti-ship missile: the Neptune.

Berger believes a new age of war is upon us. In “Force Design 2030,” he puts the following sentence in bold: “We must acknowledge the impacts of proliferated precision long-range fires, mines, and other smart weapons, and seek innovative ways to overcome these threat capabilities.” The weapons General Berger refers to include the same family of anti-platform weapons Ukrainians are using to incinerate Russian tanks, shoot down Russian helicopters, and sink Russian warships. The successes against a platform-centric Russian Goliath by an anti-platform-centric Ukrainian David have elicited cheers in the West, but what we are witnessing in Ukraine may well be a prelude to the besting of our own American Goliath.





The flying ship is a ground effect vehicle (GEV)  a vehicle that is designed to attain sustained flight over a level surface (usually over the sea), by making use of ground effect, the aerodynamic interaction between the wings and the surface. Among the best known are the Soviet ekranoplans, but names like wing-in-ground-effect (WIG), flarecraft, sea skimmer, or wing-in-surface-effect ship (WISE) are also used.



Carbon fibre planes: Lighter and stronger by design



















Currently, Boeing's latest plane, the 787 Dreamliner uses composites for half of its airframe including the fuselage and wing, while Airbus's A350 XWB has both its fuselage and wings made of carbon fibre.
While the use of carbon fibre has allowed the creation of sweeping wing tips, which can cut fuel consumption by up to 5%, both aircraft are still fairly conventionally shaped.
Yet, the great advantage of using carbon fibre as opposed to traditional metal is that it gives designers much more freedom when trying to juggle the conflicting demands of aerodynamic efficiency, fuel savings and reducing engine noise.
So, the airliners of the future are likely to be radically different.
Such shapes could include blended wing designs, where the fuselage and wings merge into each other - like some military aircraft today.

Similar shape BWB plane  burns 20 per cent less fuel than conventional aircraft and can carry more than 300 passengers

  • 'Flying-V' was developed by the Delft Technical University in the Netherlands and KLM is funding the design  
  • It has the same wingspan as existing planes and is named after the iconic Gibson Flying-V electric guitar 
  • The aircraft would be able to carry up to 314 passengers in the V-shaped layout of the craft its designers claim 
  • Passenger cabin, cargo hold and fuel tanks to be integrated in the design which uses 20 per cent less fuel
Dutch airline KLM are funding a pioneering aeronautical project which could see the shape and layout of commercial aeroplanes changed forever.  
The stunning 'Flying-V' design, financially backed by KLM, has the same wingspan as existing planes and is able to carry up to 314 passengers.
It is named after the iconic Gibson Flying-V electric guitar used by a number of legendary players - from Eddie Van Halen and Jimi Hendrix, to Brian May and Keith Richards.
The concept craft, developed by researchers at Delft Technology University in the Netherlands, flares diagonally backwards from it nose to create the striking V-shape. 
Its designers say this unique configuration uses 20 per cent less fuel. The wings would host the passenger space, cargo hold, fuel tanks and all other infrastructure, it is believed. 

A stunning 'V-shaped' craft developed by researchers at Delft Technology University in the Netherlands has been financially backed by KLM
A stunning 'V-shaped' craft developed by researchers at Delft Technology University in the Netherlands has been financially backed by KLM 









It has the wingspan of existing planes but is shaped like a guitar, with the nose flaring backwards diagonally to create the striking V-shape. It is believed to use 20 per cent less fuel, be more aerodynamic and still be able to carry up to 314 passengers
It has the wingspan of existing planes but is shaped like a guitar, with the nose flaring backwards diagonally to create the striking V-shape. It is believed to use 20 per cent less fuel, be more aerodynamic and still be able to carry up to 314 passengers. 





The aircraft name is derived from the moniker of the electric guitar developed by Gibson in 1958.



Designs were drawn up by Delft Technology University in the Netherlands.



KLM, the Dutch aeronautical giant, is funding the development of the unique plane. 



It has the wingspan of existing planes but is shaped like a guitar, with the nose flaring backwards diagonally to create the striking V-shape. 


Its total width is 215ft (65m) and its length will be slightly shorter, at 180 ft (55m). 

Its size makes it a comparable rival to the traditional Airbus A350 and the Boeing 787. pair of turbofan jet engines will be mounted at its rear and the design would drastically reduce both the carbon footprint of air travel and the expenditure on fuel.Pieter Elbers, the KLM chief executive, refused to reveal the exact extent of the project but it is being heralded as a potential leader in the field of 'sustainable aviation initiatives'. Its size makes it a comparable rival to the traditional Airbus A350 and the Boeing 787 and it would be able to use existing gates, hangars and runways. Its total width is 215ft (65m) and its length will be slightly shorter, at 180 ft (55m).

WHAT IS THE 'FLYING-V'? 




Details of what the inside will look like are scarce but it will inevitably allow for a range of innovative seating arrangements, rooms and fittings. 
The wings would host the passenger space, cargo hold, fuel tanks and all other infrastructure, it is believed
The wings would host the passenger space, cargo hold, fuel tanks and all other infrastructure, it is believed
Its total width is 215ft (65m) and its length will be slightly shorter, at 180 ft (55m). Details of what the inside will look like are scarcebut it will inevitably allow for a range of innovative seating arrangements, rooms and fittings
Its total width is 215ft (65m) and its length will be slightly shorter, at 180 ft (55m). Details of what the inside will look like are scarcebut it will inevitably allow for a range of innovative seating arrangements, rooms and fittings
Lightweight furniture will enable the plane to maximise its gains in fuel efficiency.   
Professor Henri Werij, dean of the university's faculty of aerospace engineering, said the object was to make aviation more sustainable, according to The Times. 
'New and energy-efficient aircraft designs such as the Flying-V are important, as are new forms of propulsion. Our ultimate aim is emission-free flight,' he said. 
The aircraft name is derived from the moniker of the electric guitar developed by Gibson in 1958.
Lightweight furniture will enable the plane to maximise its gains in fuel efficiency. Professor Henri Werij, dean of the university's faculty of aerospace engineering, said the object was to make aviation more sustainable, according to The Times
Lightweight furniture will enable the plane to maximise its gains in fuel efficiency. Professor Henri Werij, dean of the university's faculty of aerospace engineering, said the object was to make aviation more sustainable, according to The Times
The aircraft name is derived from the moniker of the electric guitar developed by Gibson in 1958 which was used by Chuck Berry, Brian May and Tom Petty
The aircraft name is derived from the moniker of the electric guitar developed by Gibson in 1958 which was used by Chuck Berry, Brian May and Tom Petty
A pair of turbofan jet engines will be mounted at its rear and would drastically reduce both the carbon footprint of air travel and the expenditure of fuel.
A pair of turbofan jet engines will be mounted at its rear and would drastically reduce both the carbon footprint of air travel and the expenditure of fuel.




In the twilight of age all things seem strange and phantasmal, 

  As between daylight and dark ghost-like the landscape My heart goes back to wander there, 

And among the dreams of the days that were, 

  I find my lost youth again. 

    And the strange and beautiful song, 

    The groves are repeating it still: 

  "A boy's will is the wind's will, 

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I should not be withheld but that some day 

into their vastness I should steal away, 

Fearless of ever finding open land, 

or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand...RF












    On the road of life one mile-stone more!
    In the book of life one leaf turned o'er!
    Like a red seal is the setting sun
    On the good and the evil men have done,--
         Naught can to-day restore!

    Life is real!  Life is earnest!
      And the grave is not its goal;
    Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
      Was not spoken of the soul. 

    Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
      Is our destined end or way;
    But to act, that each to-morrow
      Find us farther than to-day. 



    Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
      And our hearts, though stout and brave,
    Still, like muffled drums, are beating
      Funeral marches to the grave. 

    In the world's broad field of battle,
      In the bivouac of Life,
    Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
      Be a hero in the strife! 

    Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
      Let the dead Past bury its dead!
    Act,--act in the living Present!
      Heart within, and God o'erhead! 

    Lives of great men all remind us
      We can make our lives sublime,
    And, departing, leave behind us
      Footprints on the sands of time;

    Footprints, that perhaps another,
      Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
    A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
      Seeing, shall take heart again. 

    Let us, then, be up and doing,
      With a heart for any fate;
    Still achieving, still pursuing,

      Learn to labor and to wait...