206 Chasing the Wind: Assessing Philippine Democracy, Second Edition media organization for media practitioners in the Philippines. For media organizations themselves, the powers of the National Telecommunications Commission are limited to the allocation of frequencies to TV and radio stations, and do not extend to supervision over content. Print publications need only register as business enterprises. But the media are not totally independent of government control. The government owned/sequestered stations almost always broadcast news and commentary favorable to whatever administration is in power. The Movie and Television Review and Classication Board (MTRCB) not only rates and classies motion pictures whether foreign or domestically produced; it also has the power to prevent the exhibition of those movies it rates as “X”. The Philippine government has its own media system: the Presidential Communications Ofce which administers state-run and state-managed news agencies, such as the Philippine Information Agency, Philippine News Agency, PTV-4, and Radio TV Malacanang (RTVM). But much of the Philippine media is privately-owned and controlled by different political and economic interests in a pattern that has been consistent since the period of US colonization (19001946). But Philippine media are not only privately-owned. The corporations that own them are also part of conglomerates with interests other than broadcasting or publishing. In most cases these conglomerates also have political interests, given the reality of state regulation over commercial enterprises in the Philippines. But some media organizations have direct political links in terms of their publishers' being themselves political players and even candidates for various ofces including the Presidency (Sheila Coronel 1999). This has permitted, at various times and depending on the political climate, the printing and airing of diverse views, although limited to a narrow range (from far right to center) of the political spectrum. However, a number of individuals with relatively radical views have managed to be heard and read through the media primarily because the political categories (Left, Right or Center; Liberal or Conservative) in the Philippines have tended to be nebulous. The pattern of ownership was established during the US colonial period (1900-1946), when political parties went into publishing as a means of defending themselves against their political rivals as well as an instrument in advancing their political interests. Eventually business interests also went into publishing, and expanded into broadcasting after the Second World War. The pattern has held till the present. The economic interests of media owners have ranged from real estate to telecommunications; from the hotel business, fast food franchises to shopping malls; from airlines and shipping to public utilities. Inevitably, not only the drive for prot, or at least the minimization of losses, but also the defense and advancement of these interests have helped shape media reporting, commentary and analysis.