Thea Tan

I’m responding to this because Budget Babe has been melting down and trolling my timeline with a link to this post. Notice the classic pattern here: the moment she gets called out for peddling claims without hard evidence, she completely shifts the goalposts. Instead of showing proof of her “nefarious” claims, she deflects by attacking Malacañang and bringing up totally unrelated topics to distract everyone from the original issue: her peddling a blanket insinuation but contradicting BetterGovPH’s disclaimer. 1. She claims: Malacañang (Claire Castro) defending congressional budget additions ("insertions") ruins the President’s 6-month budget plan (the NEP). Yes, she makes a legitimate point about the inefficiency of the budget preparation cycle. Tama naman that the Executive spends months conducting technical reviews, cost-benefit analyses, and prioritization before submitting the NEP, so unvetted alterations during bicameral hearings can undermine the Executive’s policy planning. But I disagree with how she frames Malacañang’s defense of “budget allocation shifts” as supporting the “bastardization” of the President’s budget (the NEP). Malacañang simply defends reality: the Constitution granting Congress the exclusive "power of the purse." The NEP is intentionally designed as a proposal, not as a final mandate that’s unchangeable. Congress has the legal right ("power of the purse") to slash, reduce, or completely defund specific line items or agency budgets in the NEP. The money saved from those cuts can then be moved, reallocated, or "inserted" into other programs or projects, as long as the final total does not exceed the President's initial cap. Why would the Executive publicly engage in open warfare with Congress over the legislative edits when they can engage in fiscal negotiations and compromise instead? 2. Now, BB is dragging us into another subject: the Foreign-Assisted Projects (FAPs) She said Congress should not cut funds for FAPs (which are international loan agreements) just to make room for 7,000 extra project insertions. Bringing up FAPs is a textbook distraction to avoid answering for her own lack of evidence in her “nefarious” claim. While I agree that defunding or reallocating funding for FAPs is risky governance, I disagree with her claim that those 7,000 insertions were funded strictly by stripping FAPs’ funding. This requires line-item proof that those budget insertions directly came from FAPs’ funding. 3. BB said: these project insertions lack transparency and documents, so the President should veto them Of course, questionable insertions without papers should be vetoed — and the President will handle those. But expecting a blanket veto on projects that DO HAVE have proper documentation and real proposals is just bad governance. If you truly want to function as a helpful budget watchdog, don't just throw around blanket claims that thousands of projects lack documents. Why don’t you list down the specific line items without papers and hand them over so they can actually be reviewed and vetoed? Show us the work, not just the drama. 4. She said: the final budget passed by Congress should not look different from the President’s initial proposal, and if Malacañang allows it, "the President's Budget doesn't really matter". This is a fake dilemma. Just because the final budget differs from the proposal doesn't mean the Executive's plan was useless. This means Congress used its constitutional power to make adjustments. Di ba may separation of powers ang Executive and Legislative so they can provide checks and balance? We can see that “in action” here. Budget Babe’s strategy is simple: when some netizens caught her pushing unverified claims of “nefarious” (activities) in the 2027 budget insertions, she brings up a new topic and throws out new political buzzwords (FAPs, flood control, Malacañang) (Continue reading)

Hi, @chrstphrstr, I actually remember you from our FB interaction many moons ago regarding potentially running your clients’ ad campaigns on my ad tech DSP platform. You were running ad campaigns for early-stage startups then. How’s it going? I read the news item you shared. I wrote multiple posts about it. I believe I am not contradicting BetterGovPH’s post. In fact, I agree with their disclaimer on their FB page.

🤡 𝗢𝗨𝗧𝗥𝗔𝗚𝗘 𝗩𝗦. 𝗚𝗢𝗩𝗘𝗥𝗡𝗔𝗡𝗖𝗘: 𝗪𝗛𝗬 𝗧𝗛𝗘 ₱𝟰𝗕 "𝗦𝗖𝗔𝗡𝗗𝗔𝗟" 𝗜𝗦𝗡'𝗧 𝗪𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗜𝗧 𝗦𝗘𝗘𝗠𝗦 [a thread] See? The internet sees a huge number next to a Marcos name and instantly hits copy-paste on the outrage machine. But if you actually look at how government funding works instead of just reading sensationalized posts like the one attached, the narrative falls apart pretty fast. 1. First off, Majority Leader Sandro Marcos doesn't get a ₱4 billion check written to his personal bank account. That money goes directly to the DPWH DEO to build actual, physical projects executed through official government bidding. (Continue reading)