I'd say you're right about the US not wanting the Philippines, but if you look at it from the Navy War College article about Taiwan and Melos you linked to today, there's a map of the region. It may illustrate a grain of truth. If China indeed becomes the ultimate enemy in American strategic thinking, Clark and Subic are going to start looking mighty good again...:)

Giving up Subic Bay was a massive mistake by the Americans. It would have been clear even then how strategic and potentially useful such a base could have been in the future to contain a growing China. The Americans now have to rely on Guam.

At the same time, having military bases does not imply neo-colonialism. Look at Japan and South Korea for a couple of Asian examples.

Addictive Indian food isn't limited in Malaysia only...

Have to agree with you. That guy was off his rocker, and a dependencia holdover from the 1970s. Even the great exponent of that theory, Cardoso, ended up becoming a market-driven leader of Brazil!

By the way, I have a hard time believing, even in 1930s China, that the average age of first sexual experience was 26! Maybe I've just read too much about Shanghai in that era...

That's the age people admit to having their first experience. It probably reflects as much a change in morality and attitudes to sex as it does the age people really did it. Funnily enough back in earlier times, by 16 you were expected to be producing kids already...that's why Shakespeare's Juliet is a 15 year old.

How things change.