One reason, it is said, why Ferdinand Marcos stayed in power far beyond his unprecedented second term was because he had seen how badly our former presidents and especially former first ladies were treated by the snooty rich and he would have none of it. Now, one question being put to our prematurely campaigning presidential aspirants in some inane TV forum is, “If elected, will you send Gloria Macapagal Arroyo to jail?”
That is no incentive for the outgoing and termed-out president to think of riding into the sunset or writing her memoirs. One current text message fires its own bullet: “Amend the Constitution now and allow two terms for the President: the first one in office, the second in jail.” Mrs. Arroyo has to think of life after Malacanang, and that’s what we are seeing right now.
It would be a violent trampling of the Constitution if Mrs. Arroyo tried by any means to extend her term as president. She knows it will not fly, so she won’t do it. But nothing prevents her seeking a change in the Constitution to allow her to stay on. The Russians and some Latin Americans have done it, so Mrs. Arroyo’s allies in the House of Representatives are eager to have a constitutional shift to parliamentary government where she could----not necessarily would---- become prime minister (PM).
There are several steps. 1) The House proposes the appropriate constitutional amendments without the Senate; 2) the Supreme Court (SC) rules that the procedure, if and when questioned, is constitutional and correct; 3) a plebiscite is held and the people ratify the proposed amendments; 4) parliamentary elections are held in which Mrs. Arroyo is elected Member of Parliament (MP); and 6) Mrs. Arroyo is elected PM by her peers.
The plan could miscarry if: 1) the House excludes the Senate from the process and the SC says no, it cannot be done; or 2) the SC says it is all right but the people rise in protest and throws out the entire government, including all the justices; or 3) the process goes all the way up to a plebiscite but the people reject the proposed shift, and their votes are counted and reported accurately by the Commission on Elections (Comelec); or 4) their votes are misreported and they rise in revolt.
The parliamentary scenario is repugnant to many, not necessarily because of what is being proposed but rather because of its timing. Not now, says the sign in many places. They do not want Mrs. Arroyo to benefit from it, that’s all. “Kami naman,” they say. Despite her reputed unpopularity, however, Mrs. Arroyo remains the strongest political player who is in a position to dictate her terms. She has survived all challenges and left no real challengers standing except for a few showbiz-oriented characters who are busier posing for their TV ads than having a real impact on our people’s lives.
She will stay in power if she can, and we will just have to stop her if we can. As the process is constitutional, we will have to use constitutional means. That means meeting the parliamentary proponents in open debate on the floor of the House, in the media, and ultimately in court. Should we fail, we could either submit gracefully or take up active resistance. But the result of the latter is not predictable and the consequence of failure incalculable and usually more than unpleasant. And what if the people do not respond at all?
Should the initiative prosper and the people accept it, we will have to elect MPs, one for each district. Mrs. Arroyo could then run in Pampanga, Pangasinan, Quezon City or Iligan. If Pampanga, which is our best bet, Governor Ed Panlilio, the priest-turned-politician who now wants to become president also, will have a rare opportunity to frustrate her bid, if he is truly as popular in Pampanga as he appears to be in some unorthodox small circles in Metro Manila. That would cut her off the prime ministership, without necessarily making the giant-killer a prime ministerial candidate.
Should Panlilio fail to stop her, she surely becomes material for PM. But only if her party wins most of the seats, or failing that, if her party coalesces with other parties to form the majority bloc. Becoming PM then is not a given and cannot be assumed as such. It will be up for grabs, and Mrs. Arroyo will have to fight for it. Others could contest the prime ministership.
For example, Danding Cojuangco of NPC, who missed the presidency in 1992, could become an MP and seek the PMship. So could former President Joseph Ejercito Estrada, without having to worry about the legality of his becoming head of government again. So could former President Fidel V. Ramos, if he’s still strong with Lakas. So could Manny Villar, Mar Roxas, Makati Mayor Jojo Binay, MMDA’s Bayani Fernando and everyone else who wants to become president. Even Smart’s Manny Pangilinan and former Speaker Jose de Venecia could also join the fun. They could all coalesce just to deny Mrs. Arroyo the PMship, if they want.
The only real problem is that these are politicians divided by a common ambition, and they seem to have carved their political motto upon stone: “Divided we stand, united we fall.”
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Will you march for the senators and “presidentiables?”
We hold an unbroken record of losing our battles to President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, but there is still no sign we have learned our lessons well. We call her names, crack all sorts of nasty jokes against her, denounce her as evil, but she has outplayed all her adversaries and she could very well do it again.
The latest row is about House Resolution 1109 “calling on members of Congress to convene for the purpose of proposing amendments to or revisions of the Constitution.” This has produced a rally in Makati, screaming news headlines and fiery broadcasts, editorials and commentaries, but very little understanding of the real situation on the ground.
The resolution has all the virtues of a beginner’s piece in English composition, but it is not criminal at all. It is suspiciously devious, but it contains no constitutional proposal at all. It does not say the House of Representatives alone will propose constitutional changes without the Senate, even though that could be the congressmen’s intention. The protest anticipates the offense.
HR 1109 recalls that under the 1935 Constitution, “the Congress in joint session assembled, by a vote of three-fourths of all Members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives voting separately may propose amendments.” Under the 1987 Constitution, however, “any amendment to, or revision of, this Constitution may be proposed by the Congress, upon a vote of three-fourths of all its Members.”
This means that while the Congress previously could not propose any constitutional amendment unless the two Houses first assembled in joint session, it can do so now, without the two Houses sitting together. There is no need for HR 1109 at all. The only thing needed is for every proposal to be supported by at least three-fourths of all the members of Congress, which is bicameral.
This means 18 of the 24 senators and 201 of the 268 congressmen, or a total of 219 lawmakers out of the 292 total membership of the two chambers. Now some congressmen theorize that if the House could muster all of the 219 votes from among themselves alone, then there would be no need to involve the Senate at all.
That view appeals to some, but overlooks one thing. Even if all 268 congressmen should support an amendment, that would represent the vote of one House only, i.e., one-half of the Congress, and not the entire. If the two Houses sit together and vote as one, that’s another story altogether. But since the Constitution does not require them to sit in joint session, they have to vote as they sit where they sit, which means separately. Should they decide to sit together for reasons of convenience, they would still have to vote separately as though they were not sitting together.
As of now, the House has done nothing to create a justiciable issue which the Supreme Court (SC) may be asked to rule upon. My fear, however, is that should the House proceed in that direction, there could be any number of decent people who would not mind the SC upholding its position just because they believe the Senate, which cannot seem to enforce its own rules on almost anything now, and has the most number of prematurely campaigning “presidentiables,” has become a major part of the problem and may have lost its reason for being.
The senators who are promoting themselves to become the “opposition’s” bet in 2010 are the very same ones who destroyed the opposition in 2007. That is their undisputed achievement. They were part of the farce where three political parties ran senatorial candidates in the two opposing camps. The NPC had Tito Sotto and Tessie Oreta in the administration and Loren Legarda, Francis Escudero, Sonny Osmena and Nikki Coseteng in the opposition. Manny Villar’s NP had Ralph Recto in the administration, and Villar and Alan Peter Cayetano in the opposition. Mar Roxas’s LP had Mike Defensor in the administration and Noynoy Aquino and Kiko Pangilinan in the opposition. (Kiko later declared himself independent.)
We had not seen anything as gross and as unprincipled before, but not a single one of them said it was wrong. That was the first death of the opposition.
After the election, Villar confected an alliance with the administration senators in order to become Senate president, thereby reducing the numerically superior opposition into a minority. That was the second death of the opposition. Now Villar, Escudero, Legarda and Roxas want to be seen as the luminous knights of the “opposition”? It ought to be a capital offense for any politician to presume they can fool all the people all the time.
The conflict today is no longer between the administration and the bogus “opposition.” They are all in it together, divided only by their common ambition to continue Mrs. Arroyo’s program. Not one of them wants to dismantle the status quo, not one wants the system changed. The real conflict now is between the sitting national politicians and the Filipino people. The people are the real opposition now ---opposition to the administration and the bogus “opposition.” Many of our people would still take to the streets if needed, but not likely for the preservation of the Senate and its sex video-viewing members or for the glory of any of the “presidentiables.”
The latest row is about House Resolution 1109 “calling on members of Congress to convene for the purpose of proposing amendments to or revisions of the Constitution.” This has produced a rally in Makati, screaming news headlines and fiery broadcasts, editorials and commentaries, but very little understanding of the real situation on the ground.
The resolution has all the virtues of a beginner’s piece in English composition, but it is not criminal at all. It is suspiciously devious, but it contains no constitutional proposal at all. It does not say the House of Representatives alone will propose constitutional changes without the Senate, even though that could be the congressmen’s intention. The protest anticipates the offense.
HR 1109 recalls that under the 1935 Constitution, “the Congress in joint session assembled, by a vote of three-fourths of all Members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives voting separately may propose amendments.” Under the 1987 Constitution, however, “any amendment to, or revision of, this Constitution may be proposed by the Congress, upon a vote of three-fourths of all its Members.”
This means that while the Congress previously could not propose any constitutional amendment unless the two Houses first assembled in joint session, it can do so now, without the two Houses sitting together. There is no need for HR 1109 at all. The only thing needed is for every proposal to be supported by at least three-fourths of all the members of Congress, which is bicameral.
This means 18 of the 24 senators and 201 of the 268 congressmen, or a total of 219 lawmakers out of the 292 total membership of the two chambers. Now some congressmen theorize that if the House could muster all of the 219 votes from among themselves alone, then there would be no need to involve the Senate at all.
That view appeals to some, but overlooks one thing. Even if all 268 congressmen should support an amendment, that would represent the vote of one House only, i.e., one-half of the Congress, and not the entire. If the two Houses sit together and vote as one, that’s another story altogether. But since the Constitution does not require them to sit in joint session, they have to vote as they sit where they sit, which means separately. Should they decide to sit together for reasons of convenience, they would still have to vote separately as though they were not sitting together.
As of now, the House has done nothing to create a justiciable issue which the Supreme Court (SC) may be asked to rule upon. My fear, however, is that should the House proceed in that direction, there could be any number of decent people who would not mind the SC upholding its position just because they believe the Senate, which cannot seem to enforce its own rules on almost anything now, and has the most number of prematurely campaigning “presidentiables,” has become a major part of the problem and may have lost its reason for being.
The senators who are promoting themselves to become the “opposition’s” bet in 2010 are the very same ones who destroyed the opposition in 2007. That is their undisputed achievement. They were part of the farce where three political parties ran senatorial candidates in the two opposing camps. The NPC had Tito Sotto and Tessie Oreta in the administration and Loren Legarda, Francis Escudero, Sonny Osmena and Nikki Coseteng in the opposition. Manny Villar’s NP had Ralph Recto in the administration, and Villar and Alan Peter Cayetano in the opposition. Mar Roxas’s LP had Mike Defensor in the administration and Noynoy Aquino and Kiko Pangilinan in the opposition. (Kiko later declared himself independent.)
We had not seen anything as gross and as unprincipled before, but not a single one of them said it was wrong. That was the first death of the opposition.
After the election, Villar confected an alliance with the administration senators in order to become Senate president, thereby reducing the numerically superior opposition into a minority. That was the second death of the opposition. Now Villar, Escudero, Legarda and Roxas want to be seen as the luminous knights of the “opposition”? It ought to be a capital offense for any politician to presume they can fool all the people all the time.
The conflict today is no longer between the administration and the bogus “opposition.” They are all in it together, divided only by their common ambition to continue Mrs. Arroyo’s program. Not one of them wants to dismantle the status quo, not one wants the system changed. The real conflict now is between the sitting national politicians and the Filipino people. The people are the real opposition now ---opposition to the administration and the bogus “opposition.” Many of our people would still take to the streets if needed, but not likely for the preservation of the Senate and its sex video-viewing members or for the glory of any of the “presidentiables.”
Sunday, March 1, 2009
The Pimentel bill and our naked “presidentiables”
A Senate bill authored by Senators Aquilino Pimentel Jr. Ramon Revilla Jr. and Francis Escudero on “the right of reply” has divided defenders of press freedom into two opposing camps, ironically on how best to serve that freedom. It has raised such a storm that Escudero, Mar Roxas and Loren Legarda----all with presidential ambitions----have been compelled to announce their “withdrawal of support” from the bill after supporting it all the way up to third reading. Malacanang’s own spokesmen have contributed their own kneejerk by presumptuously committing the President to veto the bill.
The bill was first introduced by Pimentel as Senate Bill No. 1178---“An Act Granting the Right of Reply and Providing Penalties for Violation Thereof.” The Committee on Public Information and Mass Media chaired by Revilla Jr. and the Committee on Justice and Human Rights by Escudero came up with S.B. 2150, a substitute bill of the same title, with Revilla Jr. and Escudero joining Pimentel as co-authors. Under Committee Report (CR) 43, they asked the Senate to pass the bill.
The Senate has approved the bill, and the House of Representatives is now working on its own. If the House bill passes, a bicamercal conference committee will have to reconcile the two bills. The final version will be ratified by both Houses; then it goes to the Prsident for signature.
Some opponents of the measure have tried to hype the three senators’ so-called “withdrawal” to show the bill is bad news. The purported “withdrawal,” however, has no value whatsoever. It is pure moonshine--- cheap political posturing. It is like withdrawing money from a bank after you have closed your account. Let me explain.
Escudero, as co-author, is partly responsible for crafting S.B. 2150 and CR 43, which asked the Senate to approve the bill. Without SB 2150 and CR 43, we would not be having this discussion at all. Nothing in the Senate rules allows him to disown his report or his vote on the bill.
The same with Roxas and Legarda. Although not co-authors, they voted for the bill, and their votes can no longer be withdrawn. What “withdrawal” then are they talking about? Legarda’s unctuous quote about choosing an “untrammelled press” over a press “dictated to” by state authority is a false proposition; it is sheer pompous nonsense.
The saucy propaganda by the three senators is a clear attempt to exploit the ignorance of the ignorant, if they can. They assume the people know nothing about the first rule on voting and will swallow their cheap posturing, hook, line and sinker. They are more afraid of losing the media for their presidential ambitions than of anything toxic in the bill. So they want to assure the media that, regardless of their having voted for the bill, they too are now against it. Routine demagoguery and opportunism. But the people are not such damn fools. They see how truly naked these “presidentiables” are.
Simply put, the bill seeks to guarantee the right of every person, natural or juridical, to reply to any accusation or criticism in any media of communication. The media have always recognized this right; in fact, one of the canons of responsible journalism provides that no one shall be accused of any wrongdoing without being given the chance to present his side. Responsible media organizations that try to live by this canon cannot be terrified by a law that would compel the irresponsible to be faithful to the norm.
But both responsible and irresponsible media are obviously intimidated by the boundless implications of a law that would require them to provide equal space and time to every individual who feels unjustly accused or maligned in print or on the air. Without adequate standards in the law, there is reason to be concerned. What happens, for instance, when a newspaper says it stands by its story about an official’s wrongdoing even while printing the official’s denial of the same? Is it obliged to print the succeeding denial? At what point is the right of reply fully satisfied? This has to be in the bill.
Since Pimentel and his critics share the same passion for press freedom, can they not work together through the House bill, which is still on the floor, and the bicameral conference committee when it is finally convened, to make sure that the focus is on the right of private citizens, who are not normally quoted by media, rather than on the right of public officials and personalities, who are? Can the bill not provide that the media’s prompt publication of an individual’s reply to any published accusation against him would sufficiently bar him from filing a libel complaint on the same incident against the same media organization or practitioner?
Shouldn’t all of us aim for a law that seeks to promote a sound media environment that encourages public officials and citizens alike to reply to attacks and criticisms in the media in the most civilized manner and not to take out a contract on “offending” journalists and broadcasters?
The bill was first introduced by Pimentel as Senate Bill No. 1178---“An Act Granting the Right of Reply and Providing Penalties for Violation Thereof.” The Committee on Public Information and Mass Media chaired by Revilla Jr. and the Committee on Justice and Human Rights by Escudero came up with S.B. 2150, a substitute bill of the same title, with Revilla Jr. and Escudero joining Pimentel as co-authors. Under Committee Report (CR) 43, they asked the Senate to pass the bill.
The Senate has approved the bill, and the House of Representatives is now working on its own. If the House bill passes, a bicamercal conference committee will have to reconcile the two bills. The final version will be ratified by both Houses; then it goes to the Prsident for signature.
Some opponents of the measure have tried to hype the three senators’ so-called “withdrawal” to show the bill is bad news. The purported “withdrawal,” however, has no value whatsoever. It is pure moonshine--- cheap political posturing. It is like withdrawing money from a bank after you have closed your account. Let me explain.
Escudero, as co-author, is partly responsible for crafting S.B. 2150 and CR 43, which asked the Senate to approve the bill. Without SB 2150 and CR 43, we would not be having this discussion at all. Nothing in the Senate rules allows him to disown his report or his vote on the bill.
The same with Roxas and Legarda. Although not co-authors, they voted for the bill, and their votes can no longer be withdrawn. What “withdrawal” then are they talking about? Legarda’s unctuous quote about choosing an “untrammelled press” over a press “dictated to” by state authority is a false proposition; it is sheer pompous nonsense.
The saucy propaganda by the three senators is a clear attempt to exploit the ignorance of the ignorant, if they can. They assume the people know nothing about the first rule on voting and will swallow their cheap posturing, hook, line and sinker. They are more afraid of losing the media for their presidential ambitions than of anything toxic in the bill. So they want to assure the media that, regardless of their having voted for the bill, they too are now against it. Routine demagoguery and opportunism. But the people are not such damn fools. They see how truly naked these “presidentiables” are.
Simply put, the bill seeks to guarantee the right of every person, natural or juridical, to reply to any accusation or criticism in any media of communication. The media have always recognized this right; in fact, one of the canons of responsible journalism provides that no one shall be accused of any wrongdoing without being given the chance to present his side. Responsible media organizations that try to live by this canon cannot be terrified by a law that would compel the irresponsible to be faithful to the norm.
But both responsible and irresponsible media are obviously intimidated by the boundless implications of a law that would require them to provide equal space and time to every individual who feels unjustly accused or maligned in print or on the air. Without adequate standards in the law, there is reason to be concerned. What happens, for instance, when a newspaper says it stands by its story about an official’s wrongdoing even while printing the official’s denial of the same? Is it obliged to print the succeeding denial? At what point is the right of reply fully satisfied? This has to be in the bill.
Since Pimentel and his critics share the same passion for press freedom, can they not work together through the House bill, which is still on the floor, and the bicameral conference committee when it is finally convened, to make sure that the focus is on the right of private citizens, who are not normally quoted by media, rather than on the right of public officials and personalities, who are? Can the bill not provide that the media’s prompt publication of an individual’s reply to any published accusation against him would sufficiently bar him from filing a libel complaint on the same incident against the same media organization or practitioner?
Shouldn’t all of us aim for a law that seeks to promote a sound media environment that encourages public officials and citizens alike to reply to attacks and criticisms in the media in the most civilized manner and not to take out a contract on “offending” journalists and broadcasters?
Monday, February 23, 2009
The rising cost of a spoiled American breakfast
President Arroyo’s latest attempt to meet US President Barack Obama has cost the nation a lot---not only in terms of money but above all in terms of national honor, dignity and self-respect. Now it threatens to exact its own pound of flesh from the US government itself. Suddenly some of our senators are talking of junking the RP-US Visiting Forces Agreement.
It all started on the wrong foot. First Mrs. Arroyo flew to Davos apparently hoping to bump into Obama at the World Economic Forum. He did not attend. Then she flew to Washington, D.C. after stopping in Italy, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain to see Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast. She had no better luck.
No one had the good sense to advise Mrs. Arroyo that Obama was not going to Davos, and that even if their eyes should meet at the Washington breakfast, there was no way of arranging a “photo opportunity” on the spot. If a Mother Teresa had strayed into the breakfast, then Obama might have sought her out.
As a rule no president travels 10,000 miles one-way to attend a prayer breakfast where he or she has no speaking part. The Fellowship, which sponsors the annual event, knew this. Thus they invited US-based guests from 170 countries but not a single foreign head of state. Of the 8,000 locals and foreigners invited, however, only 3,000 chose to attend the $425-per head “event.”
The annual prayer breakfast is held on the first Thursday of February at the huge ballroom of the Washington Hilton. I know the place, having attended the Catholic Prayer Breakfast there at least twice, with then President George W. Bush as honored guest. From what I saw, the arrangements did not promise any possibility of a “photo op.”
The guest of honor sits in a recessed area, fenced off waist-high from the rest of the hall where the other guests sit in round tables of 10 to 12. He enters the room through a private backdoor minutes before he speaks and leaves through the same door immediately thereafter. He never mixes with the guests.
At the Catholic breakfast there last April, my wife and I sat one table away from President Bush, with Sen. John McCain, Sen. Sam Brownback, two bishops one Dominican provincial, and Cathy Ruse, the wife of the program-host Austin Ruse. People lined up to be photographed with McCain, and we had an abundant eye-to-eye contact with Bush. But nobody tried to approach the President, and he did not extend his hand across the divide. He left soon after his speech. The same thing must have happened with Obama. Mrs. Arroyo could have been seated next to Obama’s table, but he could not have reached out to shake hands, even if he had noticed her presence.
There is no need to explain that Mrs. Arroyo failed to get her “photo op” because Obama arrived late and had to rush out. The simple truth is that no meeting took place because no meeting had been arranged. Presidents do not bump into each other because they went to the same restaurant.
Now, is it purely coincidental that after this terrible fiasco some senators should suddenly start suggesting the scrapping of the VFA? Some are even beginning to look bigger than themselves just for pointing out that under the counterpart agreement a Filipino soldier who commits a crime in the US shall be detained not at the Philippine embassy but “in penal institutions in the United States suitable for the custody level of prisoners.” Do they know if the embassy has any extra space at all even for just one such detainee? Or the funds and security personnel for that purpose?
The VFA is certainly a flawed agreement. The apparently “permanent” presence of the US forces and the current conflict on criminal jurisdiction over the convicted Corporal Smith have shown this. While we have agreed to host short US military visits, what has happened since is that as one military exercise ends another begins, thereby creating an apparently “permanent” US presence. It seems a neat way of circumventing the Constitution which provides that no foreign troops, bases or facilities shall be allowed in the country except under a treaty duly concurred in by the Senate and recognized as such by the contracting parties.
We should confront these issues. But never for reasons that are suspect. That the senators have suddenly become audible on the VFA right after Mrs. Arroyo’s latest fiasco, and the omission of the Philippines from Hilary Clinton’s itinerary on her first Asian visit as US Secretary of State makes this unusual burst of energy rather suspect.
The VFA is not a stand-alone agreement. It is but an implementing agreement of our 1951 Mutal Defense Treaty. Its abrogation will only scrap the agreed rules under which American troops come for joint exercises but not our duty to host such visits under the agreed terms of our “mutual defense.” Not all those who are now talking about the VFA apparently appreciate this. This is where the danger lies.
20 February 2009
It all started on the wrong foot. First Mrs. Arroyo flew to Davos apparently hoping to bump into Obama at the World Economic Forum. He did not attend. Then she flew to Washington, D.C. after stopping in Italy, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain to see Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast. She had no better luck.
No one had the good sense to advise Mrs. Arroyo that Obama was not going to Davos, and that even if their eyes should meet at the Washington breakfast, there was no way of arranging a “photo opportunity” on the spot. If a Mother Teresa had strayed into the breakfast, then Obama might have sought her out.
As a rule no president travels 10,000 miles one-way to attend a prayer breakfast where he or she has no speaking part. The Fellowship, which sponsors the annual event, knew this. Thus they invited US-based guests from 170 countries but not a single foreign head of state. Of the 8,000 locals and foreigners invited, however, only 3,000 chose to attend the $425-per head “event.”
The annual prayer breakfast is held on the first Thursday of February at the huge ballroom of the Washington Hilton. I know the place, having attended the Catholic Prayer Breakfast there at least twice, with then President George W. Bush as honored guest. From what I saw, the arrangements did not promise any possibility of a “photo op.”
The guest of honor sits in a recessed area, fenced off waist-high from the rest of the hall where the other guests sit in round tables of 10 to 12. He enters the room through a private backdoor minutes before he speaks and leaves through the same door immediately thereafter. He never mixes with the guests.
At the Catholic breakfast there last April, my wife and I sat one table away from President Bush, with Sen. John McCain, Sen. Sam Brownback, two bishops one Dominican provincial, and Cathy Ruse, the wife of the program-host Austin Ruse. People lined up to be photographed with McCain, and we had an abundant eye-to-eye contact with Bush. But nobody tried to approach the President, and he did not extend his hand across the divide. He left soon after his speech. The same thing must have happened with Obama. Mrs. Arroyo could have been seated next to Obama’s table, but he could not have reached out to shake hands, even if he had noticed her presence.
There is no need to explain that Mrs. Arroyo failed to get her “photo op” because Obama arrived late and had to rush out. The simple truth is that no meeting took place because no meeting had been arranged. Presidents do not bump into each other because they went to the same restaurant.
Now, is it purely coincidental that after this terrible fiasco some senators should suddenly start suggesting the scrapping of the VFA? Some are even beginning to look bigger than themselves just for pointing out that under the counterpart agreement a Filipino soldier who commits a crime in the US shall be detained not at the Philippine embassy but “in penal institutions in the United States suitable for the custody level of prisoners.” Do they know if the embassy has any extra space at all even for just one such detainee? Or the funds and security personnel for that purpose?
The VFA is certainly a flawed agreement. The apparently “permanent” presence of the US forces and the current conflict on criminal jurisdiction over the convicted Corporal Smith have shown this. While we have agreed to host short US military visits, what has happened since is that as one military exercise ends another begins, thereby creating an apparently “permanent” US presence. It seems a neat way of circumventing the Constitution which provides that no foreign troops, bases or facilities shall be allowed in the country except under a treaty duly concurred in by the Senate and recognized as such by the contracting parties.
We should confront these issues. But never for reasons that are suspect. That the senators have suddenly become audible on the VFA right after Mrs. Arroyo’s latest fiasco, and the omission of the Philippines from Hilary Clinton’s itinerary on her first Asian visit as US Secretary of State makes this unusual burst of energy rather suspect.
The VFA is not a stand-alone agreement. It is but an implementing agreement of our 1951 Mutal Defense Treaty. Its abrogation will only scrap the agreed rules under which American troops come for joint exercises but not our duty to host such visits under the agreed terms of our “mutual defense.” Not all those who are now talking about the VFA apparently appreciate this. This is where the danger lies.
20 February 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
THE HIDDEN LIFE OF AMARGO RAZ
A novel by Francisco Tatad
(A synopsis)
The future has arrived. A neat line is drawn between the apostate countries and those that have kept the faith. China has become a world power, and America, although diminished, leads the Club of Twenty-One. The apostate population has aged and shrunk, replaced by machines here and there, but abortion and euthanasia have become the law and custom all over the apostate world.
In the Republic of Admana Arch, the Empressident rules without a constitution and a parliament. She speaks to the public through state media, and has blocked all other information networks, including the Internet. She is the toast of the Club of Twenty-One.
In thirty years, she has rid the country of unwanted children and seniors, closed the sexual divide between men and women, put men and machines on equal status on the shop-floor. She has outlawed marriage among the poor, except those of the same sex, and heterosexuals who are completely sterile or past childbearing.
Unauthorized pregnancies are automatically aborted, and everyone is put to sleep at seventy-five, with some notable exceptions. To ensure controlled growth of the population, a number of pre-selected eighteen year-old virgins are annually sent to fertility camps to mate in darkness for the purpose of producing state children. They are quickly segregated and sterilized thereafter. If the mating is fruitful, the woman reports back to camp during her pregnancy until she gives birth. Upon birth, the child is taken to a special camp to be raised by the state. The state child is sterilized upon reaching puberty, unless preselected for mating duties later.
In this post-New Age world, where the culture of death appears to have won, Filipino Catholic writer Francisco Tatad sets The Hidden Life of Amargo Raz, his maiden international socio-political novel on the fight between good and evil. In Admana’s capital city of Esperanza, a group of young illegals lives a hidden existence under a doctor-priest named Fr. Eleazar Pascal. They call themselves Brothers and practice a new form of non-violence.
They attack state targets without inflcting violence, just to show they could have killed or maimed, but chose not to, out of a higher principle. They are led by the young Amargo Raz and Jasper Tzu and three other young chiefs from the five different sections of the city. Raz begins his story as a state infant abandoned by a half-crazed state driver on a beach and grows up in the care of the priest. They are eventually joined by the leader of an armed band,Tonio, whom they help dodge state troops in hot pursuit.
Away from Esperanza, the Commonwealth of Islamic States has banned all terrorist activities by Moslems and called for strict adherence to the rule of law in settling grievances and disputes. At the same time, it now calls on the apostates through the United Nations to stop the killing of the unborn and the elderly, or else face an Islamic-led multinational force to compel them to do so. Russia, China and India, the Club’s breakaway members, support this call. But the expanded Security Council rejects it, and mobilization instantly begins.
The apostate countries are tired of war, and their governments’ refusal to heed the Islamic call triggers massive protests and finally revolution in the apostate capitals. The Empressident, however, offers to fight on the side of the apostates in exhange for oil, arms and food for her troops. Tonio and the chiefs sense the danger and decide to strike first. But their fight becomes merely a byplay in the global confrontation between the apostates and the Islamic-led forces. As the revolutionary tide sweeps the apostate capitals and the Islamic armies prepare to strike, the major tv networks begin a countdown on the end of the world. The only hope for peace appears to be the intervention of the Pope.
Amid such high international drama, several lives intersect in their individual search for meaning: The Empressident who will do anything to please the Club of Twenty-One and keep herself in power; Tonio, whose consuming passion is to kill the tyrant, and find Felicity, who has borne him a state child, which had been abducted from camp at birth and is now believed to be a grownup rebel; Felicity, who serves the tyrant faithfully until she gets arrested on suspicion of hiding Tonio and the missing state child; Ahimsya, who bolts out of camp to escape a sexually deranged governess and falls into the company of the Brothers; Tzu, a tough young illegal who has a solution for everything but tries to kill himself when he loses Ahimsya to Amar; Archbishop Sylvan Diaz whose search for martyrdom ends up in a Curial post at the Vatican; Amar, whose painful search for his roots throws him into a role he had not sought and ends up protecting the tyrant from his own men; Fr. Eleazar, who has seen everything from the very beginning.
Although set in the future, where the American president is a black woman, the British lady prime minister Chinese looking, and the German lady chancellor of Jewish descent, The Hidden Life of Amargo Raz could be the first novel to confront head-on the recent decision of the first African-American president of the United States to export support for abortion to the developing world. It is serious literary stuff with the excitement of a modern thriller.
This was first introduced in this blog under the working title, Sinners of the Earth. Arrangements for the publication of the novel are underway, and updates will be posted on this blog as appropriate.
http//:franciscotatad.blogspot.com
Updated 12 February 2009
(A synopsis)
The future has arrived. A neat line is drawn between the apostate countries and those that have kept the faith. China has become a world power, and America, although diminished, leads the Club of Twenty-One. The apostate population has aged and shrunk, replaced by machines here and there, but abortion and euthanasia have become the law and custom all over the apostate world.
In the Republic of Admana Arch, the Empressident rules without a constitution and a parliament. She speaks to the public through state media, and has blocked all other information networks, including the Internet. She is the toast of the Club of Twenty-One.
In thirty years, she has rid the country of unwanted children and seniors, closed the sexual divide between men and women, put men and machines on equal status on the shop-floor. She has outlawed marriage among the poor, except those of the same sex, and heterosexuals who are completely sterile or past childbearing.
Unauthorized pregnancies are automatically aborted, and everyone is put to sleep at seventy-five, with some notable exceptions. To ensure controlled growth of the population, a number of pre-selected eighteen year-old virgins are annually sent to fertility camps to mate in darkness for the purpose of producing state children. They are quickly segregated and sterilized thereafter. If the mating is fruitful, the woman reports back to camp during her pregnancy until she gives birth. Upon birth, the child is taken to a special camp to be raised by the state. The state child is sterilized upon reaching puberty, unless preselected for mating duties later.
In this post-New Age world, where the culture of death appears to have won, Filipino Catholic writer Francisco Tatad sets The Hidden Life of Amargo Raz, his maiden international socio-political novel on the fight between good and evil. In Admana’s capital city of Esperanza, a group of young illegals lives a hidden existence under a doctor-priest named Fr. Eleazar Pascal. They call themselves Brothers and practice a new form of non-violence.
They attack state targets without inflcting violence, just to show they could have killed or maimed, but chose not to, out of a higher principle. They are led by the young Amargo Raz and Jasper Tzu and three other young chiefs from the five different sections of the city. Raz begins his story as a state infant abandoned by a half-crazed state driver on a beach and grows up in the care of the priest. They are eventually joined by the leader of an armed band,Tonio, whom they help dodge state troops in hot pursuit.
Away from Esperanza, the Commonwealth of Islamic States has banned all terrorist activities by Moslems and called for strict adherence to the rule of law in settling grievances and disputes. At the same time, it now calls on the apostates through the United Nations to stop the killing of the unborn and the elderly, or else face an Islamic-led multinational force to compel them to do so. Russia, China and India, the Club’s breakaway members, support this call. But the expanded Security Council rejects it, and mobilization instantly begins.
The apostate countries are tired of war, and their governments’ refusal to heed the Islamic call triggers massive protests and finally revolution in the apostate capitals. The Empressident, however, offers to fight on the side of the apostates in exhange for oil, arms and food for her troops. Tonio and the chiefs sense the danger and decide to strike first. But their fight becomes merely a byplay in the global confrontation between the apostates and the Islamic-led forces. As the revolutionary tide sweeps the apostate capitals and the Islamic armies prepare to strike, the major tv networks begin a countdown on the end of the world. The only hope for peace appears to be the intervention of the Pope.
Amid such high international drama, several lives intersect in their individual search for meaning: The Empressident who will do anything to please the Club of Twenty-One and keep herself in power; Tonio, whose consuming passion is to kill the tyrant, and find Felicity, who has borne him a state child, which had been abducted from camp at birth and is now believed to be a grownup rebel; Felicity, who serves the tyrant faithfully until she gets arrested on suspicion of hiding Tonio and the missing state child; Ahimsya, who bolts out of camp to escape a sexually deranged governess and falls into the company of the Brothers; Tzu, a tough young illegal who has a solution for everything but tries to kill himself when he loses Ahimsya to Amar; Archbishop Sylvan Diaz whose search for martyrdom ends up in a Curial post at the Vatican; Amar, whose painful search for his roots throws him into a role he had not sought and ends up protecting the tyrant from his own men; Fr. Eleazar, who has seen everything from the very beginning.
Although set in the future, where the American president is a black woman, the British lady prime minister Chinese looking, and the German lady chancellor of Jewish descent, The Hidden Life of Amargo Raz could be the first novel to confront head-on the recent decision of the first African-American president of the United States to export support for abortion to the developing world. It is serious literary stuff with the excitement of a modern thriller.
This was first introduced in this blog under the working title, Sinners of the Earth. Arrangements for the publication of the novel are underway, and updates will be posted on this blog as appropriate.
http//:franciscotatad.blogspot.com
Updated 12 February 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
A YAWNING POLITICAL DESERT – II
(updated 6 Feb 2009)
Despite the number of presidential aspirants trying to defy the ban on premature campaigning, not one of them has captured the imagination. While only a few seem ill-prepared to see President Arroyo finally go, not too many seem eager to welcome any of the advertised aspirants either. They have nothing to say to our people, and our people have nothing to say to them in turn.
Amid the global moral and economic distress, our people need to hear some words from their leaders on how to ride out the storm. But none of them seem prepared to say anything. Greed has been cited as a major cause of the distress – even US President Obama says so – but none of the pretenders seem prepared to say they would stamp out corruption, if they become president.
Is it because none of them have truly clean hands? Or because all they really want to see is a change of players, not a change of game?
Eventually, every aspirant will have to say something about corruption. But that would need more than a mere declaration of intent or even a proposed program of government. It would need a morally upright private life and a transparent public record to back it up.
That cannot possibly come from those who have used public funds as their own, and used public office to mulct private investors, get highly favored bank loans and tainted government deals for themselves or their friends. Or have rented armed bands and cheating syndicates to steal elections, and since been collecting rent from gambling, narcotics and smuggling lords while trying to appear clean. Or have failed to oppose anti-poor programs coming from questionable foreign donors.
Save one or two, the declared aspirants seem to have more money than they could possibly explain, and ready to spend even more, for a job whose salary the Constitution has fixed at P300,000 per annum. How could they possibly talk of rooting out corruption when their very pursuit of the presidency is already an exercise in corruption?
There are various forms of corruption. Each one involves a moral and intellectual swindle. The biggest swindle right now is for some of the aspirants to proclaim they belong to the opposition while keeping an open line to Malacanang, and long after they had erased the distinction between the administration and the opposition.
That distinction was abolished in the 2007 senatorial election. In that election, the NPC ran Tito Sotto and Tessie Oreta in the administration, and Loren Legarda, Chiz Escudero, Sonny Osmena and Nikki Coseteng in the “opposition.” The NP ran Ralph Recto in the administration and Manny Villar and Alan Peter Cayetano in the “opposition.” The LP ran Mike Defensor in the administration and Noynoy Aquino and (initially) Kiko Pangilinan in the “opposition.” Joseph Estrada’s PMP, the party with the biggest mass base, did not have a single senatorial candidate in that election.
The “opposition” won more seats than the administration. But Villar promptly confected an alliance with administration senators to become Senate president, thereby reducting the numerically superior “opposition” into a minority position. Villar had since lost the Senate presidency poetically to Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, an administration ally supported by “opposition” senators.
These developments have made it abundantly clear that the conflict is no longer between the administration and the “opposition,” but rather between our opportunistic politicians and the people. This paradigm shift has rendered the Senate unfit to provide the next president. The next president should now come from the ranks of the people.
To avoid becoming totally irrelevant, the Senate should now enact reforms to make sure the 2010 election would be less farcical than the last ones. Aside from computerization and cleaning up of all election data, these could include:
1) A law requiring senators to resign their seat upon filing their certificate of candidacy for any other position;
2) A law limiting a candidate’s authorized expenses to the full amount of his legal emoluments from the office he seeks;
3) A law that automatically disqualifies candidates who purchase so-called “permits” to campaign and to win from certain armed groups who claim to be in control of certain areas during elections;
4) A law that bans all political advertising during the election period, and instead requires the State to provide non-discriminatory information on all candidates in any election;
5) Such ban should empower the Commission on Election to disqualify candidates who try to circumvent it by engaging in massive propaganda campaign prior to the start of the legal campaign period. If the Comelec fails to disqualify such a candidate, it should charge the total cost of the candidate’s propaganda campaign within one year before the campaign period against his total authorized expense, subject to a surcharge of at least 200 percent.
The aspiring senators should lead these reforms. Even if they fail to enact the appropriate law, they should all resign their seats upon filing their candidacy for president or vice president.
If cost has put a presidential run permanently beyond the reach of the honest and the poor, then the senators should now lead in proposing a shift to the parliamentary system where no one has to spend billions to become a Member of Parliament, and eventually Prime Minister, by the grace of God and Parliament.
We need creativity and courage to overcome the yawning political desert and the permanent grip of corruption upon our electoral system.
(My next piece will take an objective look at the parliamentary system.)
http//:franciscotatad.blogspot.com
1 February 2009
Despite the number of presidential aspirants trying to defy the ban on premature campaigning, not one of them has captured the imagination. While only a few seem ill-prepared to see President Arroyo finally go, not too many seem eager to welcome any of the advertised aspirants either. They have nothing to say to our people, and our people have nothing to say to them in turn.
Amid the global moral and economic distress, our people need to hear some words from their leaders on how to ride out the storm. But none of them seem prepared to say anything. Greed has been cited as a major cause of the distress – even US President Obama says so – but none of the pretenders seem prepared to say they would stamp out corruption, if they become president.
Is it because none of them have truly clean hands? Or because all they really want to see is a change of players, not a change of game?
Eventually, every aspirant will have to say something about corruption. But that would need more than a mere declaration of intent or even a proposed program of government. It would need a morally upright private life and a transparent public record to back it up.
That cannot possibly come from those who have used public funds as their own, and used public office to mulct private investors, get highly favored bank loans and tainted government deals for themselves or their friends. Or have rented armed bands and cheating syndicates to steal elections, and since been collecting rent from gambling, narcotics and smuggling lords while trying to appear clean. Or have failed to oppose anti-poor programs coming from questionable foreign donors.
Save one or two, the declared aspirants seem to have more money than they could possibly explain, and ready to spend even more, for a job whose salary the Constitution has fixed at P300,000 per annum. How could they possibly talk of rooting out corruption when their very pursuit of the presidency is already an exercise in corruption?
There are various forms of corruption. Each one involves a moral and intellectual swindle. The biggest swindle right now is for some of the aspirants to proclaim they belong to the opposition while keeping an open line to Malacanang, and long after they had erased the distinction between the administration and the opposition.
That distinction was abolished in the 2007 senatorial election. In that election, the NPC ran Tito Sotto and Tessie Oreta in the administration, and Loren Legarda, Chiz Escudero, Sonny Osmena and Nikki Coseteng in the “opposition.” The NP ran Ralph Recto in the administration and Manny Villar and Alan Peter Cayetano in the “opposition.” The LP ran Mike Defensor in the administration and Noynoy Aquino and (initially) Kiko Pangilinan in the “opposition.” Joseph Estrada’s PMP, the party with the biggest mass base, did not have a single senatorial candidate in that election.
The “opposition” won more seats than the administration. But Villar promptly confected an alliance with administration senators to become Senate president, thereby reducting the numerically superior “opposition” into a minority position. Villar had since lost the Senate presidency poetically to Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, an administration ally supported by “opposition” senators.
These developments have made it abundantly clear that the conflict is no longer between the administration and the “opposition,” but rather between our opportunistic politicians and the people. This paradigm shift has rendered the Senate unfit to provide the next president. The next president should now come from the ranks of the people.
To avoid becoming totally irrelevant, the Senate should now enact reforms to make sure the 2010 election would be less farcical than the last ones. Aside from computerization and cleaning up of all election data, these could include:
1) A law requiring senators to resign their seat upon filing their certificate of candidacy for any other position;
2) A law limiting a candidate’s authorized expenses to the full amount of his legal emoluments from the office he seeks;
3) A law that automatically disqualifies candidates who purchase so-called “permits” to campaign and to win from certain armed groups who claim to be in control of certain areas during elections;
4) A law that bans all political advertising during the election period, and instead requires the State to provide non-discriminatory information on all candidates in any election;
5) Such ban should empower the Commission on Election to disqualify candidates who try to circumvent it by engaging in massive propaganda campaign prior to the start of the legal campaign period. If the Comelec fails to disqualify such a candidate, it should charge the total cost of the candidate’s propaganda campaign within one year before the campaign period against his total authorized expense, subject to a surcharge of at least 200 percent.
The aspiring senators should lead these reforms. Even if they fail to enact the appropriate law, they should all resign their seats upon filing their candidacy for president or vice president.
If cost has put a presidential run permanently beyond the reach of the honest and the poor, then the senators should now lead in proposing a shift to the parliamentary system where no one has to spend billions to become a Member of Parliament, and eventually Prime Minister, by the grace of God and Parliament.
We need creativity and courage to overcome the yawning political desert and the permanent grip of corruption upon our electoral system.
(My next piece will take an objective look at the parliamentary system.)
http//:franciscotatad.blogspot.com
1 February 2009
Friday, January 30, 2009
The Remaking of America
There was universal praise for President Barack Obama’s inaugural address as the 44th president of the United States. It may not have soared to the full height of Abraham Lincoln’s first or second inaugural address, or that of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s or John F. Kennedy’s, but it was a moving and memorable address that said eloquently what needed to be said to a wounded American people.
Like millions who listened to that speech on television, I was moved by the grace of Obama’s effort to assure peoples around the world that he was determined to lead in the remaking of America into a truer, kinder, gentler and less dangerous nation.
“America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears and true to our founding documents,” Obama said.
This evoked the immortal words of the American Declaration of Independence of 1776: “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”
Whatever injury others before him had done to those words, Obama would set it right.
“The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry foreward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation, the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness,” Obama said.
This made you hope that, regardless of what you had heard during the pre-election debates, Obama would exert every effort to make sure every unborn American child would have the chance to join the human race.
“And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: Know that America is a friend to each nation and every man, woman and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.” Obama said.
More reason to hope. Henceforth, poor countries like ours will have to worry only about their real or imagined enemies, no longer about the United States.
“ This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed – why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent Mall, and why a man whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath,” Obama said.
Indeed, it has taken the negro several lifetimes to be called black (which is beautiful) and finally African American, which is politically correct. But the point might have been stronger if the journey had been reckoned from 1857 when the U.S. Supreme Court denied Dred Scott, the negro slave, the right to sue because he was—in the words of Chief Justice Roger Taney-- no more than an “article of merchandise.”
Having rejected as false “the choice between our safety and our ideals,” Obama promptly ordered the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison and the end of torture of captured terrorists. Blessed are the terrorists for they will now have due process. Not so blessed are the unborn children of the developing countries.
On the third day of his avowed remaking of America, Obama reversed Ronald Reagan’s 1984 Mexico City policy which withholds funding from NGOs that promote abortion in developing countries. This had been reversed once by Clinton in 1993, then reinstated by George W. Bush in 2001. Upon its latest reversal, the words of the Declaration of Independence came crashing down, and in their place rose those of Chief Justice Taney declaring Dred Scott a mere article of commerce and Justice Blackmun’s words in Roe v. Wade (1973) declaring that “the fetus is not a person within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment.”
In the flash of an eye, Obama seems to have given lodgings to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde at the White House. Dr. Jekyll ends the torture of terrorists; Mr. Hyde pronounces the death sentence on the unborn children of the poor in developing countries. Dr. Jekyll talks of “responsibly leaving Iraq to its people,” and forging the peace in Afghanistan; Mr. Hyde declares all-out war against the unborn.
This can’t possibly remake America into a truer, kinder, gentler and less dangerous nation, a friend to every man, woman and child, One can only hope and pray it does not qualify America for genocide. For under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted on Dec. 9, 1948, one day before the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the killing of members of any national, ethnical, racial or religious group, and the imposition of measures intended to prevent births within any such group are classified as genocide.
Like millions who listened to that speech on television, I was moved by the grace of Obama’s effort to assure peoples around the world that he was determined to lead in the remaking of America into a truer, kinder, gentler and less dangerous nation.
“America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbears and true to our founding documents,” Obama said.
This evoked the immortal words of the American Declaration of Independence of 1776: “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”
Whatever injury others before him had done to those words, Obama would set it right.
“The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry foreward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation, the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness,” Obama said.
This made you hope that, regardless of what you had heard during the pre-election debates, Obama would exert every effort to make sure every unborn American child would have the chance to join the human race.
“And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: Know that America is a friend to each nation and every man, woman and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.” Obama said.
More reason to hope. Henceforth, poor countries like ours will have to worry only about their real or imagined enemies, no longer about the United States.
“ This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed – why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent Mall, and why a man whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath,” Obama said.
Indeed, it has taken the negro several lifetimes to be called black (which is beautiful) and finally African American, which is politically correct. But the point might have been stronger if the journey had been reckoned from 1857 when the U.S. Supreme Court denied Dred Scott, the negro slave, the right to sue because he was—in the words of Chief Justice Roger Taney-- no more than an “article of merchandise.”
Having rejected as false “the choice between our safety and our ideals,” Obama promptly ordered the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison and the end of torture of captured terrorists. Blessed are the terrorists for they will now have due process. Not so blessed are the unborn children of the developing countries.
On the third day of his avowed remaking of America, Obama reversed Ronald Reagan’s 1984 Mexico City policy which withholds funding from NGOs that promote abortion in developing countries. This had been reversed once by Clinton in 1993, then reinstated by George W. Bush in 2001. Upon its latest reversal, the words of the Declaration of Independence came crashing down, and in their place rose those of Chief Justice Taney declaring Dred Scott a mere article of commerce and Justice Blackmun’s words in Roe v. Wade (1973) declaring that “the fetus is not a person within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment.”
In the flash of an eye, Obama seems to have given lodgings to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde at the White House. Dr. Jekyll ends the torture of terrorists; Mr. Hyde pronounces the death sentence on the unborn children of the poor in developing countries. Dr. Jekyll talks of “responsibly leaving Iraq to its people,” and forging the peace in Afghanistan; Mr. Hyde declares all-out war against the unborn.
This can’t possibly remake America into a truer, kinder, gentler and less dangerous nation, a friend to every man, woman and child, One can only hope and pray it does not qualify America for genocide. For under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted on Dec. 9, 1948, one day before the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the killing of members of any national, ethnical, racial or religious group, and the imposition of measures intended to prevent births within any such group are classified as genocide.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Sins of the Earth
TO THE READER:
I wish to apologize to my readers for my long absence from this blog. I needed to take a little time to work on a novel that had been writing itself inside my head for sometime now. I have finally finished the writing, and arrangements are being made for its earliest publication here and abroad. The novel is called Sins of the Earth; socio-political, Catholic. A synopsis here follows.
This done, I should be able to resume my periodic commentaries on the burning issues of the day. God bless.
SINS OF THE EARTH
A novel by Francisco Tatad
(A synopsis)
The future has arrived. A neat line is drawn between the apostate countries and those that have kept the faith. China has become a world power, and America, although diminished, leads the Club of Twenty-One. The apostate population has aged and shrunk, replaced by machines here and there, but abortion and euthanasia have become the law and custom all over the apostate world.
In the Republic of Admana Arch, the Empressident rules without a constitution and a parliament. She speaks to the public through state media, and has blocked all other information networks, including the Internet. She is the toast of the Club of Twenty-One.
In thirty years, she has rid the country of unwanted children and seniors, closed the sexual divide between men and women, put men and machines on equal status on the shop-floor. She has outlawed marriage among the poor, except those of the same sex, and heterosexuals who are completely sterile or past childbearing.
Unauthorized pregnancies are automatically aborted, and everyone is put to sleep at seventy-five, with some notable exceptions. To ensure controlled growth of the population, a number of pre-selected eighteen year-old virgins are annually sent to fertility camps to mate in darkness for the purpose of producing state children. They are quickly segregated and sterilized thereafter. If the mating is fruitful, the woman reports back to camp during her pregnancy until she gives birth. Upon birth, the child is taken to a special camp to be raised by the state. The state child is sterilized upon reaching puberty, unless preselected for mating duties later.
In this post-New Age world, where the culture of death appears to have won, Filipino Catholic writer Francisco Tatad sets SINS OF THE EARTH, his maiden international socio-political novel on the fight between good and evil. In Admana’s capital city of Esperanza, a group of young illegals lives a hidden existence under a doctor-priest named Fr. Eleazar Pascal. They call themselves Brothers and practice a new form of non-violence.
They attack state targets without inflcting violence, just to show they could have killed or maimed, but chose not to, out of a higher principle. They are led by the young Amargo Raz and Jasper Tzu and three other young chiefs from the five different sections of the city. Raz begins his story as a state infant abandoned by a half-crazed state driver on a beach and grows up in the care of the priest. They are eventually joined by the leader of an armed band,Tonio, whom they help dodge state troops in hot pursuit.
Away from Esperanza, the Commonwealth of Islamic States has banned all terrorist activities by Moslems and called for strict adherence to the rule of law in settling grievances and disputes. At the same time, it now calls on the apostates through the United Nations to stop the killing of the unborn and the elderly, or else face an Islamic-led multinational force to compel them to do so. Russia, China and India, the Club’s breakaway members, support this call. But the expanded Security Council rejects it, and mobilization instantly begins.
The apostate countries are tired of war, and their governments’ refusal to heed the Islamic call triggers massive protests and finally revolution in the apostate capitals. The Empressident, however, offers to fight on the side of the apostates in exhange for oil, arms and food for her troops. Tonio and the chiefs sense the danger and decide to strike first. But their fight becomes merely a byplay in the global confrontation between the apostates and the Islamic-led forces. As the revolutionary tide sweeps the apostate capitals and the Islamic armies prepare to strike, the major tv networks begin a countdown on the end of the world. The only hope for peace appears to be the intervention of the Pope.
Amid such high international drama, several lives intersect in their individual search for meaning: The Empressident who will do anything to please the Club of Twenty-One and keep herself in power; Tonio, whose consuming passion is to kill the tyrant, and find Felicity, who has borne him a state child, which had been abducted from camp at birth and is now believed to be a grownup rebel; Felicity, who serves the tyrant faithfully until she gets arrested on suspicion of hiding Tonio and the missing state child; Ahimsya, who bolts out of camp to escape a sexually deranged governess and falls into the company of the Brothers; Tzu, a tough young illegal who has a solution for everything but tries to kill himself when he loses Ahimsya to Amar; Archbishop Sylvan Diaz whose search for martyrdom ends up in a Curial post at the Vatican; Armar, whose painful search for his roots throws into a role he has not sought and ends up protecting the tyrant from his own men; Fr. Eleazar, who has seen everything from the very beginning.
Although set in the future, where the American president is a black woman, the British lady prime minister Chinese looking, and the German lady chancellor of Jewish descent, SINS OF THE EARTH could be the first novel to confront head-on the recent decision of the first African-American president of the United States to export support for abortion to the developing world.
Arrangements for the publication of the novel are underway, and appropriate announcements will be posted on this blog.
28 January 2009
I wish to apologize to my readers for my long absence from this blog. I needed to take a little time to work on a novel that had been writing itself inside my head for sometime now. I have finally finished the writing, and arrangements are being made for its earliest publication here and abroad. The novel is called Sins of the Earth; socio-political, Catholic. A synopsis here follows.
This done, I should be able to resume my periodic commentaries on the burning issues of the day. God bless.
SINS OF THE EARTH
A novel by Francisco Tatad
(A synopsis)
The future has arrived. A neat line is drawn between the apostate countries and those that have kept the faith. China has become a world power, and America, although diminished, leads the Club of Twenty-One. The apostate population has aged and shrunk, replaced by machines here and there, but abortion and euthanasia have become the law and custom all over the apostate world.
In the Republic of Admana Arch, the Empressident rules without a constitution and a parliament. She speaks to the public through state media, and has blocked all other information networks, including the Internet. She is the toast of the Club of Twenty-One.
In thirty years, she has rid the country of unwanted children and seniors, closed the sexual divide between men and women, put men and machines on equal status on the shop-floor. She has outlawed marriage among the poor, except those of the same sex, and heterosexuals who are completely sterile or past childbearing.
Unauthorized pregnancies are automatically aborted, and everyone is put to sleep at seventy-five, with some notable exceptions. To ensure controlled growth of the population, a number of pre-selected eighteen year-old virgins are annually sent to fertility camps to mate in darkness for the purpose of producing state children. They are quickly segregated and sterilized thereafter. If the mating is fruitful, the woman reports back to camp during her pregnancy until she gives birth. Upon birth, the child is taken to a special camp to be raised by the state. The state child is sterilized upon reaching puberty, unless preselected for mating duties later.
In this post-New Age world, where the culture of death appears to have won, Filipino Catholic writer Francisco Tatad sets SINS OF THE EARTH, his maiden international socio-political novel on the fight between good and evil. In Admana’s capital city of Esperanza, a group of young illegals lives a hidden existence under a doctor-priest named Fr. Eleazar Pascal. They call themselves Brothers and practice a new form of non-violence.
They attack state targets without inflcting violence, just to show they could have killed or maimed, but chose not to, out of a higher principle. They are led by the young Amargo Raz and Jasper Tzu and three other young chiefs from the five different sections of the city. Raz begins his story as a state infant abandoned by a half-crazed state driver on a beach and grows up in the care of the priest. They are eventually joined by the leader of an armed band,Tonio, whom they help dodge state troops in hot pursuit.
Away from Esperanza, the Commonwealth of Islamic States has banned all terrorist activities by Moslems and called for strict adherence to the rule of law in settling grievances and disputes. At the same time, it now calls on the apostates through the United Nations to stop the killing of the unborn and the elderly, or else face an Islamic-led multinational force to compel them to do so. Russia, China and India, the Club’s breakaway members, support this call. But the expanded Security Council rejects it, and mobilization instantly begins.
The apostate countries are tired of war, and their governments’ refusal to heed the Islamic call triggers massive protests and finally revolution in the apostate capitals. The Empressident, however, offers to fight on the side of the apostates in exhange for oil, arms and food for her troops. Tonio and the chiefs sense the danger and decide to strike first. But their fight becomes merely a byplay in the global confrontation between the apostates and the Islamic-led forces. As the revolutionary tide sweeps the apostate capitals and the Islamic armies prepare to strike, the major tv networks begin a countdown on the end of the world. The only hope for peace appears to be the intervention of the Pope.
Amid such high international drama, several lives intersect in their individual search for meaning: The Empressident who will do anything to please the Club of Twenty-One and keep herself in power; Tonio, whose consuming passion is to kill the tyrant, and find Felicity, who has borne him a state child, which had been abducted from camp at birth and is now believed to be a grownup rebel; Felicity, who serves the tyrant faithfully until she gets arrested on suspicion of hiding Tonio and the missing state child; Ahimsya, who bolts out of camp to escape a sexually deranged governess and falls into the company of the Brothers; Tzu, a tough young illegal who has a solution for everything but tries to kill himself when he loses Ahimsya to Amar; Archbishop Sylvan Diaz whose search for martyrdom ends up in a Curial post at the Vatican; Armar, whose painful search for his roots throws into a role he has not sought and ends up protecting the tyrant from his own men; Fr. Eleazar, who has seen everything from the very beginning.
Although set in the future, where the American president is a black woman, the British lady prime minister Chinese looking, and the German lady chancellor of Jewish descent, SINS OF THE EARTH could be the first novel to confront head-on the recent decision of the first African-American president of the United States to export support for abortion to the developing world.
Arrangements for the publication of the novel are underway, and appropriate announcements will be posted on this blog.
28 January 2009
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