But for now, only one man will do: Floyd Mayweather Jr.

The undefeated American welterweight is the only boxer who continues to claim to be the world’s best pound-for-pound boxer after Pacquiao’s demolition job on Miguel Cotto on Sunday.

There’s a sense of inevitability about a Pacquiao-Mayweather fight for the opportunity it offers both fighters to settle the issue, not to mention the biggest payday it’s expected to generate for the fighters on down to their cornermen, water boys and hangers-on.

If anyone was looking for evidence of what the fight crowd wants next, they would have gotten it loud and clear when fans at the MGM Grand started baying for Mayweather’s blood after Pacquiao pensioned off Cotto.

None of this was lost on promoter Bob Arum, who was quick to say that if Mayweather wants a crack at the Filipino, he knows who to call. That said, an early 2010 super fight laced with a potential US$30 million prize looks increasingly likely.

Floyd Mayweather Sr, the American’s outspoken father and manager, promptly took Arum up on his word.

Mayweather, toasted by Ring Magazine as the world’s best pound-for-pound fighter on the basis of his five world championships in six weight classes, matches up on paper with Pacquiao, who now has won an unprecedented seven world championships in as many divisions.

And the boxing establishment is fast running out of gladiators to send his way, which makes it possible Mayweather will be Pacquiao’s last customer.

It’s almost tempting for Pacquiao to continue casting about for opponents by going up the weight ladder an eighth time, but at 5 feet 6 inches, he can only do so much to stay competitive without giving away too much in reach and punching power.

Like Mayweather, Pacquiao has bulked up considerably, but unlike Mayweather, he hasn’t climbed up and down the weight classes. Mayweather’s weight-switching success makes him extremely dangerous in his natural envrionment (145 lbs).

Much as Pacquiao’s fans may want to see their hero continue fighting and winning his way deeper into their hearts, they’ll have to accept his human limitations.

Of course, he can take on all comers, picking his way around lesser opponents and also-rans and risking his legend and legacy against one of the sport’s great spoilers – the lucky punch.

The accord is significant not so much for deepening diplomatic ties between the Philippines and China as for the fact that it allows greater protection and representation for Filipinos facing criminal charges on the mainland.

Many of our nationals, particularly those convicted of drug-related offences, are facing the death penalty, and Beijing is known for its dispatch in carrying it out.

China does allow consular visits to convicts and legal representation for the accused, but this is the first time that the practice is covered by a specific agreement.

The outcome can only be seen as a hopeful sign that Filipinos facing the Chinese judicial system will get a fair hearing and just treatment.

The benefit to us is so tantalising nobody has bothered to examine what the Chinese are taking away from the deal.

We can assume it is reciprocity, but given the difference between our jurisprudence and theirs, we can also say that the accord is not being celebrated in equal measure by the two sides.

We have more to cheer about.

The result, to quote Consul Kira Danganan-Azucena, is both heartwarming and overwhelming.

It has been an unprecedented effort by the community in the weeks that followed the tragedy. And it’s a measure of our single-minded purpose that the campaign has largely gone off without a hitch, save for an unfortunate misunderstanding over a supposed customs levy on relief goods from overseas that caused some donors to scale back their operation.

On the whole, there have been few distractions and indications are that aid from Hong Kong is getting through.

Already, there are suggestions to set up a mechanism that will allow us to respond even more effectively to future emergencies.

That would be a meaningful take-away from the Hong Kong experience that, hopefully, could lead to institutional changes in the way disaster response is handled at the national level.

This is significant because of claims that private initiative, not the national government, is driving the relief operation.

If these are true, the government must sort out its whole emergency response strategy before the next calamity strikes.

Some people might argue that they put things into perspective, given the lively competition for voters’ hearts and minds among declared candidates and silent movers still trying to test the waters.

But who are they kidding?

We know the outcome of the polling simply by looking at who commissioned it. In all likelihood, it’s going to be something  favourable to the one it’s done for.

That’s why the next thing we hear are complaints from other protagonists about the results being misleading and unreliable.

We can be sure the same thing will happen when the tables are turned. That leaves us – the purported end-users of the poll numbers – lost in the fog of conflicting claims.

We think that surveys serve a more meaningful purpose when they’re done for internal consumption, say, as a way to improve a product or service and even to take the public pulse in a private way.

Where they fail miserably is when they’re manipulated for political ends.

That’s what Mar Roxas learned to his dismay when he tried to push for the renaming of Edsa to Cory Aquino Avenue; and that’s what other politicians will find out if they try to exploit the nation’s sympathies over her passing.

Which makes Noynoy Aquino’s decision to distance himself from moves to draft him for a presidential run next year commendable. It shines against a hypocritical attempt by some members of Congress to show deference to Cory by halting moves on charter change as the nation mourned only to spring back with a vengeance just days after she was buried.

Cory deserves better than this show of false pretenses and her legacy should not be diminished by people trying to use her memory for political gain.

As citizens, we can do her justice by being watchful against such acts and by being quick to expose them for what they are.

That’s the least we can do to ensure that Cory Aquino remains a beacon of the nation’s dreams and aspirations long after we ourselves have passed on.

Yet, all she did was carry an unfinished wooden sculpture and complain how heavy it was in the labored, jumbled words of a four-year-old who had just toppled under its weight.

It’s unlikely she remembers any of it. Even I have difficulty placing myself on that day all those years ago. I think it was my mother who had direct knowledge of the mischief, having picked up both children from the ground.

It may have been an incident not worth writing home about, except for the people in it and for its incredible power to connect me to a cherished past. Because whenever I think of it, I remember my mother.

She was a schoolteacher and the most beautiful human being that ever stood before a class. Behind black-rimmed glasses, pointed at the sides like that of a mask, her eyes wore a smile that made you look at her with fondness.

A slight woman with large feet and slender fingers, she was a strong but reassuring presence in my third-grade class of giggly, sometimes chaotic eight-year-olds who would snap to attention at the sound of her voice. Hers was a kind of hush to my father’s boom. I would wake up to their whispers as they sipped coffee in the kitchen on countless early mornings. I thought nothing sounded sweeter than my name being called by either of them.

They would kiss as she went off to school, dance to their theme song, and walk the darkened footpath to the pier when my father would leave to return to work in another part of their world.

My siblings and I were home to feather her nest, but we always knew something was missing. Yet, none of it showed in the way she went about the job of raising us without Father half of the time.

When he died in 1983, she lost the other half of it, too.But she moved on, brought us up to her fullest pride, and got her fair share of life’s blessings as her grandchildren arrived one after another during her lifetime.On April 27, 1999, a day after returning home from her last summer with us in Hong Kong, she moved further on.

The afternoon we buried her, the air was the kind of hot and steamy it gets only after a serious burst of sunshine. The funeral procession from home to church to cemetery was a sea of umbrellas. Under them were familiar faces and many I had not seen in my life.

Last month, our entire family went home to mark her death anniversary as we had for most of the nine years she has been gone. I still see her standing before that third-grade class when I was a skinny kid with the checkered hat, buttoned-up polo shirt and socks that raced up to the edge of my short pants.

As for Mary Jane, she is a mother herself with growing children and a blissful life. I rarely see her now and would not recognize her if I bumped into her on the street.

But I will always remember the little girl who ran away with Jesus. And I will remember Mom.

Health authorities are expecting a scramble for vaccines against the H1N1 virus when they become available in September. Pressure will come from countries desperate to get their hands on the only known treatment for the deadly bug.

But because not all governments  have the same level of preparedness  – or even recognition that a health emergency exists – the work of the World Health Organization in coordinating the distribution of the vaccines becomes more complicated than it looks.

Hong Kong appears to be among the best placed to undertake mass vaccination  – if necessary  – with its experience in Sars. Although it has had a bad case of overreaction lately, it has fine-tuned its response mechanisms.

That is undoubtedly timely given that Hong Kong has just registered its first swine flu fatality even as cases continue to rise here and around the world.

The government has stepped up an information campaign to make people more aware of the disease and what they can do if they get it.

There’s no telling, of course, how effective these measures are until they’re actually put to the test.

We can only hope that their effectiveness is beyond question. We would not want to see how they work.