STSRO 25th Anniversary
It’s my pleasure to be here today, to celebrate with you the founding of an office, which was partly responsible for my only electoral defeat in 2010.
Seriously, I am happy to be with my friends, co-workers today. STSRO is a necessary institution because worse than taxation without representation, is taxation without research.
This is because while paying a tax is a citizen’s first duty, imposing it is the Senate’s last.
The fact is senators, like any breed of politician, love to spend taxes but don’t want to raise them.
But when they are forced to – when the coffers are running empty or when the national credit card has been maxxed out – they need advise on how to keep at the minimum the tax to be imposed.
When it happens, they need the advice of experts, preferably under their employ, and not those sent by the executive branch, whose proposals are usually taken with a grain of salt.
So this is the reason why this in-house think tank came to being: To tell us the real score, and not serve as amplifiers of executive positions.
And above all, to guide us how to inflict the least pain to taxpayers because the Senate role has always been to temper – and not to top – what the executive wants.
In my years of working with STSRO that has always been their mantra: Avoid new taxes if possible, and when such can’t be avoided, keep them low.
I’ve been an STSRO beneficiary, student, client, partner in all my years in the Senate, including a brief period from 2005 to 2006, which I now remember as a “very taxing season” for me.
So let me thank my friends in STSRO who tutored me during those years, an education that extends up to now, including those who were partly responsible for my sabbatical from 2007 to 2010.
I see them here today.
Lou, who can fly, not because she is a reserve Air Force colonel, but, truth to tell, is the real Vatwoman.
Vivian who wants to tax anything that emits smoke and everything that has alcohol in it.
Manny who dreams of tax theories in his sleep, which he often does on official time.
Julie, who was my resourceful committee secretary, who can find the ways and the means in securing documents and summoning people.
I wish good luck in your anti-rabies shots.
Richie, whose fiscal incentives bill is the longest-gestating proposal in Senate history, one that antedates Friendster, texting and smartphones.
Rodel, a prodigious author with clairvoyant powers because some of his books on taxation feature amendments to the tax code even if they haven’t been acted by Congress.
Thank you too Elvie, Sherry Anne, Bong.
But like a great movie all of these directors whose names I have mentiond won’t be able to do their job without a great support cast.
Elsie, who did a great service to STSRO by leaving for Korea; Dory, my kababayan; Beth, who has many degrees under her belt.
Salamat din sa dalawang Boni, Angel, Johann at Joan, Ariel, Malou at Marlyn, at ang pinakamagandang hayop sa balat ng STSRO, si Zeny.
Kung marami po ang pinasalamatan at kung parang Famas thank you speech ito, aaminin ko pong isang Famas winner ang sumulat nito.
In closing, let me remind you to keep your independence and always tell truth to power.
When the pull of popularity gets in the way of patriotism, then be there to tell us that to choose what is right over what is popular.
And you can only do your mandate if you churn out cutting-edge, not cut-and-paste studies, in-depth research, not Googled ones.
Your duty is to come up with original views, not executive positions you have repackaged in new fonts.
Your job is to advocate fresh views not annotate tired ones.
Again, happy birthday STSRO, and no matter how much I love you, I hope that our paths will never cross again.
