link the entire country through a network of transport infrastructure.

As a country in the path of typhoons and in the Pacific Rim of Fire, we must be prepared as the latest technology permits to anticipate natural calamities when that is possible, to extend immediate and effective relief when it is not.

Real government is about looking beyond the vested to the national interest, setting up the necessary conditions to enable the next, more enabled and more empowered generation to achieve a country as prosperous, a people as content, as ours deserve to be.

The contracts for Iraqi rebuilding are commercial contracts. I think being in the coalition of the willing puts us in the radar screen, but we also have to compete with other countries that are in the coalition of the willing, but the Philippines is a country that has produced world-class skilled workers that we have seen all over the world.

As the leader of the nation, I say in behalf of the Filipino people to the world: we are strong and principled believers in democracy.

College education is the great Filipino dream. But in a world of rapid technological change, getting a job or keeping it depends as much on how well one reasons as how well one uses his hands.