DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
7/25/2011
While the country gets increasingly distracted by the “Hello Garci” and Lintang Bedol dramas, the many Gloria Arroyo plunder cases that seem to have a number of legal loopholes, as well as today’s worn-out “anti-corruption” State of the Nation Address (Sona), the real game in the system — the financial mafia’s blood-sucking of the people — continues to intensify.
The Supreme Court (SC)’s approval over the weekend of the 12-percent Value Added Tax (VAT) on toll fees by the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), affecting among others, the North and South expressways, is just the latest in a string of backbreaking tax burdens and price hikes. What this SC decision also makes clear is that nothing can stop the toll operators from passing it on to commuters.
Perhaps to soften the impact of its decision, the SC ponente resorted to some semantic play. It claimed that while “the seller (of the toll service) remains directly and legally liable for payment of the VAT... the buyer bears the burden since the amount of VAT paid by the former is added to the selling price,” arguing that “Once shifted, the VAT ceases to be a tax and simply becomes part of the cost that the buyer must pay in order to purchase the good, property, or service,” thereby declaring that the “VAT on tollway operations cannot be a tax on tax even if toll is deemed as a ‘user’s tax’… since VAT is assessed against the tollway operator’s gross receipts and not necessarily on the toll fees.”
But is there really a difference if VAT were to be based on the operator’s receipts since all of it will be taken from commuters’ pockets anyway?
The problem with this new, additional expanded VAT (eVAT) in the life of Filipinos is the eVAT law itself — a law that has opened the floodgates to endless regressive taxes. A little history of the tax system in RP would thus be helpful.
Before Edsa I, the country had progressive taxation based on income tax where those who can afford paid more while those who earned less paid less. The VAT law that came with the Cory Aquino regime changed all that. It introduced the VAT system, which is based on taxing consumption, with the end-users shouldering much of the burden. It is regressive since it taxes the poor more than the rich.
A tax on toll fees, for example, would be the same for a brand new Mercedes Benz and a 20-year-old dilapidated Toyota Corolla whenever such vehicles pass through the toll booth.
Early on, when the VAT was made part of the Comprehensive Tax Reform Program (CTRP), it was touted as the last time any new tax would have to be raised. But, as we all know, the VAT was immediately expanded under Fidel Ramos. Of course, it was the IMF-WB that lobbied for all of it; but since it was our Congress that capitulated (as usual), it only exemplified the idiocy of our politicians for crafting such a law.
One such fellow, Nueva Ecija Rep. Renato V. Diaz, is now ironically one of two petitioners at the SC, challenging the Department of Finance (DoF) and the BIR’s imposition of the toll eVAT (the other being former Trade Assistant Secretary Aurora Timbol).
Since the high court in its decision was able to state, “The VAT on franchise grantees has been in the statute books since 1994 when Republic Act 7716 or the Expanded Value Added Tax law was passed. It is only now, however, that the executive has earnestly pursued the VAT imposition against toll way operators,” clearly, Diaz has been ignorant of the full meaning and impact of the law he co-authored all along.
That said, the imposition of the tax is still a political as well as an ideological issue. Even as Gloria Arroyo’s supporters say that she stalled on the VAT on toll ways throughout her nine years in office (as opposed to Aquino III, who only put the brakes because it was challenged before the SC), the truth is, she only withheld its implementation because of political expedience, whereas Aquino III, without a similar sense of the limits of his “political capital,” merely allowed his BIR appointee and Finance Secretary, both IMF assets, to get the better of him.
The case brought before the SC actually saved Aquino III for a while. Now that he has to face the music and decide on whether to impose or not, his campaign promise of “no new taxes” will surely be tested. Still, given his administration’s financial and economic thrust, there isn’t any hope for an ideological shift to progressive taxation, which is our only liberation from the continued tax exploitation and extraction.
But as bad as this recent development already is, the pressure to raise the eVAT from 12 to 15 percent is still on, as reflected in the official pronouncements of the DoF, Neda (National Economic Development Authority), BSP (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas), and the BIR.
Consumers and commuters desiring to stop the VAT’s march to more perilous heights, though, do not have the law on their side. As in the VAT on toll ways, they are only limited to making appeals for the Chief Executive’s better sense (if that’s even possible at all).
However, since Malacañang is still in the mode of fending off pressure to hike the eVAT to 15 percent, it is more than likely to give in to the temptation of the green-lighted VAT on toll ways.
As such, Filipino consumers and commuters will never have a permanent respite from increasing regressive taxes unless the country returns to progressive taxation — which will only happen after a genuine popular revolution.
(Tune in to Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m., and Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; Talk News TV with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “DoST Expo 2011: IGNITE THE FILIPINO MIND”; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com and http://hermantiulaurel.blogspot.com for our articles plus TV and radio archives)
Monday, July 25, 2011
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Crimes of political vandalism, swindling
BACKBENCHER
Rod Kapunan
7/23-24/2011
The threshold limit that could effectively destroy what the people say as their “cherished democracy” is when the leader would openly violate the fundamental processes of how that democracy is supposed to work in a given society. That process, enshrined in the constitution, is either drafted directly by the people or through their representatives. It is through that process where our idealism is concretized in what French political thinker Jean Jacques Rousseau would call “social contract.”
Observance of that contract is imperative that anybody who would transgress that agreement is in effect seeking to destroy the very process upon which the social order in civil society is anchored. It is for this reason why states, no matter how liberally they may try to stretch the limits of freedom, would not think twice to sternly deal with political vandals by charging them either of treason, coup d’ etat, rebellion, subversion or sedition. These classes of crimes are of the highest level for they rob the soul of our democracy that as such would often exact from the perpetrators the supreme penalty of death or life imprisonment.
This is why crimes that tend to weaken or destroy the political and social order of society are met with sharp reaction. Such is the case for often the defensive state is compelled to exercise counter violence just to curtail the provocative violence unleashed by political vandals disguising themselves as messiahs, but whose principal objective is to plainly capture political power. They are far more dangerous than those criminals accused of murder, robbery, rape or graft because the consequence of the crime they commit create a deep wedge in our society, or could even plunge the state into a civil war that would cost the lives of innocent civilians.
We are compelled to explain the nature of this crime because it seems we continue to treat and pamper a person on the misguided notion that she once served as this country’s President. She continues to waddle around with arrogance unmindful that she stands as the country’s most notorious political vandal. The feat of political ignominy she committed in 2001, 2004 and 2007 has seemingly made her confident as some suspect she is behind the current rumblings to destabilize the Aquino administration in a bid to pre-empt any investigation against her for graft and corruption and prevent the possibility of her being pointed to as the mastermind behind the massive electoral fraud committed in 2004 and 2007. Some of her former henchmen are now pointing at her as the brains behind those acts of political swindling resulting in her having to remain in power beyond the term provided for in the Constitution.
On this score any attempt to vindicate the Constitution should begin on that blatant act of political vandalism she committed in 2001 where she ousted an overwhelmingly elected President. Maybe power grab is an extraordinary political process that could make the de facto status of her regime ripen to one of de jure as soon as she succeeds in imposing political stability. But some political scientists and legal luminaries doubt that kind of fictionalized political transition because Mrs. Arroyo did not declare a revolutionary government to officially scrap the constitution she vandalized. Rather, as usurper she used the very constitution to legitimize her illegal acts, which reason why she could be held wholly accountable and liable for her acts under the very Constitution she mangled and threw into the waste basket.
Worse, Mrs. Arroyo acted not only with calibrated malice, but sought in no uncertain terms to oust the duly elected President. Not satisfied, she orchestrated the filing of criminal charges against the ousted President despite the failure by her henchmen in the Senate to get the necessary vote to convict him. The conviction of the ousted President by the Kangaroo Court was therefore forthcoming, and that ugly episode now stands as legacy of that most despicable act of political vandalism. In fact, the justification made by the Supreme Court reduced the magistrates to nothing more but a bunch of political bootlicking clowns haggling to please Mrs. Arroyo, unmindful that their decision caused many constitutionalists to lose their mind.
Despite that blatant political transgression, Mrs. Arroyo again dared to cross the threshold; this time by committing massive electoral fraud to premeditatedly deprive presidential candidate Fernando Poe, Jr. of his sweet victory. The factual truth of that political swindling committed by her is now being concretized by an avalanche of evidence - although evidence before that were more than enough to haul her to court had it not been for the fact that she was still in power. The revelations made by former ARMM governor Zaldy Ampatuan and by that wanted Comelec election supervisor Lintang Bedol pointing to Mrs. Arroyo as the mastermind both in the 2004 and 2007 elections fraud only supplemented rather than reinforced the “Hello Garci” tapes and of her subsequent public confession of having committed that criminal act.
The prosecution of Mrs. Arroyo and her operatives should be President Aquino’s top priority. PNoy’s success in bagging the perpetrators who made a mockery of our democracy is the only way by which the Constitution could be vindicated. This task is Pnoy’s greatest challenge because democracy is not without its own political redemption. At the bottom are the people who were deprived of their right to vote on who should govern them. Failure to do it could boomerang on his leadership as utterly inept.
Worse, such ineptitude could even develop into a suspicion of collaboration for as successor, President Aquino could be mistaken as coddler and protector of the country’s most incorrigible political vandal. Paradoxically, while PNoy mulls on how he would decide on his own historical fate, the unrepentant operators are seemingly up at their bad habit of steering public disenchantment. This President Aquino much act decisively as the outcome sine qua non could prove all those charges against her for graft and corruption and plunder as rooted on the illegality of her coming to power.
(rodkap@yahoo.com.ph)
Rod Kapunan
7/23-24/2011
The threshold limit that could effectively destroy what the people say as their “cherished democracy” is when the leader would openly violate the fundamental processes of how that democracy is supposed to work in a given society. That process, enshrined in the constitution, is either drafted directly by the people or through their representatives. It is through that process where our idealism is concretized in what French political thinker Jean Jacques Rousseau would call “social contract.”
Observance of that contract is imperative that anybody who would transgress that agreement is in effect seeking to destroy the very process upon which the social order in civil society is anchored. It is for this reason why states, no matter how liberally they may try to stretch the limits of freedom, would not think twice to sternly deal with political vandals by charging them either of treason, coup d’ etat, rebellion, subversion or sedition. These classes of crimes are of the highest level for they rob the soul of our democracy that as such would often exact from the perpetrators the supreme penalty of death or life imprisonment.
This is why crimes that tend to weaken or destroy the political and social order of society are met with sharp reaction. Such is the case for often the defensive state is compelled to exercise counter violence just to curtail the provocative violence unleashed by political vandals disguising themselves as messiahs, but whose principal objective is to plainly capture political power. They are far more dangerous than those criminals accused of murder, robbery, rape or graft because the consequence of the crime they commit create a deep wedge in our society, or could even plunge the state into a civil war that would cost the lives of innocent civilians.
We are compelled to explain the nature of this crime because it seems we continue to treat and pamper a person on the misguided notion that she once served as this country’s President. She continues to waddle around with arrogance unmindful that she stands as the country’s most notorious political vandal. The feat of political ignominy she committed in 2001, 2004 and 2007 has seemingly made her confident as some suspect she is behind the current rumblings to destabilize the Aquino administration in a bid to pre-empt any investigation against her for graft and corruption and prevent the possibility of her being pointed to as the mastermind behind the massive electoral fraud committed in 2004 and 2007. Some of her former henchmen are now pointing at her as the brains behind those acts of political swindling resulting in her having to remain in power beyond the term provided for in the Constitution.
On this score any attempt to vindicate the Constitution should begin on that blatant act of political vandalism she committed in 2001 where she ousted an overwhelmingly elected President. Maybe power grab is an extraordinary political process that could make the de facto status of her regime ripen to one of de jure as soon as she succeeds in imposing political stability. But some political scientists and legal luminaries doubt that kind of fictionalized political transition because Mrs. Arroyo did not declare a revolutionary government to officially scrap the constitution she vandalized. Rather, as usurper she used the very constitution to legitimize her illegal acts, which reason why she could be held wholly accountable and liable for her acts under the very Constitution she mangled and threw into the waste basket.
Worse, Mrs. Arroyo acted not only with calibrated malice, but sought in no uncertain terms to oust the duly elected President. Not satisfied, she orchestrated the filing of criminal charges against the ousted President despite the failure by her henchmen in the Senate to get the necessary vote to convict him. The conviction of the ousted President by the Kangaroo Court was therefore forthcoming, and that ugly episode now stands as legacy of that most despicable act of political vandalism. In fact, the justification made by the Supreme Court reduced the magistrates to nothing more but a bunch of political bootlicking clowns haggling to please Mrs. Arroyo, unmindful that their decision caused many constitutionalists to lose their mind.
Despite that blatant political transgression, Mrs. Arroyo again dared to cross the threshold; this time by committing massive electoral fraud to premeditatedly deprive presidential candidate Fernando Poe, Jr. of his sweet victory. The factual truth of that political swindling committed by her is now being concretized by an avalanche of evidence - although evidence before that were more than enough to haul her to court had it not been for the fact that she was still in power. The revelations made by former ARMM governor Zaldy Ampatuan and by that wanted Comelec election supervisor Lintang Bedol pointing to Mrs. Arroyo as the mastermind both in the 2004 and 2007 elections fraud only supplemented rather than reinforced the “Hello Garci” tapes and of her subsequent public confession of having committed that criminal act.
The prosecution of Mrs. Arroyo and her operatives should be President Aquino’s top priority. PNoy’s success in bagging the perpetrators who made a mockery of our democracy is the only way by which the Constitution could be vindicated. This task is Pnoy’s greatest challenge because democracy is not without its own political redemption. At the bottom are the people who were deprived of their right to vote on who should govern them. Failure to do it could boomerang on his leadership as utterly inept.
Worse, such ineptitude could even develop into a suspicion of collaboration for as successor, President Aquino could be mistaken as coddler and protector of the country’s most incorrigible political vandal. Paradoxically, while PNoy mulls on how he would decide on his own historical fate, the unrepentant operators are seemingly up at their bad habit of steering public disenchantment. This President Aquino much act decisively as the outcome sine qua non could prove all those charges against her for graft and corruption and plunder as rooted on the illegality of her coming to power.
(rodkap@yahoo.com.ph)
Friday, July 22, 2011
FPJ supporters' vindication
DIE HARD III
Herman Tiu Laurel
7/22/2011
“First they ignore it, then they laugh at it, then they say they knew it all along.” — Alexander Humbold
Such was what the Edsa III masa and their populist supporters witnessed when they said that cheating in the 2004 elections was massive and incontrovertible. They were ignored. They were taunted. Rival candidate Sen. Panfilo Lacson, in trying to paint FPJ and his supporters as sour-grapes, even said, “Those who can’t protect their votes don’t have the right to run,” while others such as Akbayan’s Etta Rosales stood idly by to acclaim Gloria Arroyo’s stealth congressional proclamation in the dark, wee hours before dawn of June 23, 2004, as the nation slumbered.
FPJ supporters rallied and demonstrated. A memorable one was at the Welcome Rotonda in Quezon City, where we were dispersed after being cornered at the nearby McDonald’s outlet. A long chase ensued through the evening, ending up at Sto. Domingo Church, without any of us having an inkling that the next time we would converge there was to attend FPJ’s wake and kick-off the longest funeral queue in Philippine history.
Where are the notorious names we exposed in 2004? Where are Generals Esperon, Kyamko, Quevedo, Tolentino, Villanueva, Allaga, Pajarito, Habacon, Garcia; Rear Admiral De Leon; Colonels Ortiz, Baclayon, Gapay, Ardo, Lucero, Lactao, Pangilinan, Segovia, Gupana, Sumaylo, Capuyan; Majors Musngi, Masa, Nicolas, Sison; Garci wiretappers Col. Sumalo and Capuyan; Maj. Teofilo; SG Sage; and, of course, former Defense Secretaries (and retired generals) Hermogenes Ebdane and Eduardo Ermita, who went around military camps while using the military’s resources in campaigning against FPJ, telling soldiers, “Of course you will not vote for an actor… we should vote for the candidate who has the experience, appropriate academic background… etc.” in support of their patron Gloria?
At the same time, we also remember those servicemen with conscience who kept their integrity whole, such as Gen. Frank Gudani who faced court martial for being a so-called “erring personnel” as well as Col. Alex Balutan.
We also remember with disdain those civilians and politicians who were involved directly or indirectly, overtly or tacitly, in that dark episode by their silence. People should be reminded of the complicity of both the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) and National Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel), which didn’t do anything but cover-up for the massive electoral fraud. Same goes for others such as “Mr. Noted” Kiko Pangilinan, Cory Aquino, Frank Drilon, “Hyatt 10,” and other participants.
The cheating in 2004 didn’t just include the so-called “Arroyo Generals” but the whole system that was established in Edsa II to ensure the continuity of what was started in 2001, which was to keep President Estrada in continued detention while averting the scuttling of a fast-tracked era of globalization, privatization and the corporatization of the Philippines, as well as the consolidation of Epira and the privatization of TransCo, etc., with an FPJ sitting in Malacañang.
After all, they must have known that FPJ’s first act in signaling his candidacy was to attend the anti-globalization conference of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) in UP.
But even as things didn’t go the nation’s way, FPJ supporters, including the most prominent of them all, President Joseph Estrada, who was working behind the scenes despite his incarceration at Tanay, still did not rest in their campaign to expose the truth.
Then, “Hello Garci” emerged.
The link to the sources back then was not yet timely to reveal, as security implications outweighed other considerations; but Samuel Ong and Sgt. Vidal Doble finally surfaced the tapes that provided incontrovertible proof of Arroyo’s direct hand in cheating operations. Subsequently, cellphone videos of some of the military’s cheating operations also emerged.
Scrambling to control the damage, GMA spokesman Ignacio Bunye obfuscated by producing a fake version of the tapes, before the issue went to Congress where, most significantly, then Rep. Noynoy Aquino voted not to play the real tapes.
The involvement of the military led to the Mayuga Commission which, to this day, has not been allowed to release its full report to the public (perhaps to allow Garcillano a chance to still preempt the Mayuga report?).
The Comelec at that time was perceive to be among the most guilty; and that was the root of the megalomania of Ben Abalos who allegedly said to the Chinese ZTE officials, “I am the most powerful man in the Philippines,” knowing that he could expose everything Gloria anytime did if he didn’t get his way.
How correct Greek dramatist Euripides was when he said, “Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad.” It was a mad era. The post-2001 Edsa II power grab and the 2004 election cheating age was one when those in power believed they could manipulate everything and get away with it forever. It was a time when black became white, good became bad, and the cheats ruled the law. But one-by-one, the Mad Hatters fell… (who next after Angie Reyes?)
A history of the Mad Era of the Arroyo government obviously can’t be chronicled here in full. We don’t even have enough space for the complicity of mainstream media, including the iconic columnists of some major newspapers.
But as this is only a gist, we will cap it off by acknowledging those who fought for FPJ’s vindication when certain quarters ignored and taunted them: The FPJ movements that are too many to mention; the FPJ voters; President Estrada; the Bagong Katipuneros (Magdalos) and the Para sa Bayan military groups; as well as those who still suffer injustice for standing up against Edsa II, such as lawyer Alan Paguia, still suspended by the Supreme Court when all that he stood up for are now being vindicated. While we are sad about FPJ’s daughter who apparently loves those who tormented her father more than those who supported him, we finally have to acknowledge the late FPJ’s courageous wife, Susan Roces, for continuing this fight, too.
(Tune in to Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m., and Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; Talk News TV with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “DoST Expo 2011: Ignite the Mind”; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com and http://hermantiulaurel.blogspot.com for our articles plus TV and radio)
Herman Tiu Laurel
7/22/2011
“First they ignore it, then they laugh at it, then they say they knew it all along.” — Alexander Humbold
Such was what the Edsa III masa and their populist supporters witnessed when they said that cheating in the 2004 elections was massive and incontrovertible. They were ignored. They were taunted. Rival candidate Sen. Panfilo Lacson, in trying to paint FPJ and his supporters as sour-grapes, even said, “Those who can’t protect their votes don’t have the right to run,” while others such as Akbayan’s Etta Rosales stood idly by to acclaim Gloria Arroyo’s stealth congressional proclamation in the dark, wee hours before dawn of June 23, 2004, as the nation slumbered.
FPJ supporters rallied and demonstrated. A memorable one was at the Welcome Rotonda in Quezon City, where we were dispersed after being cornered at the nearby McDonald’s outlet. A long chase ensued through the evening, ending up at Sto. Domingo Church, without any of us having an inkling that the next time we would converge there was to attend FPJ’s wake and kick-off the longest funeral queue in Philippine history.
Where are the notorious names we exposed in 2004? Where are Generals Esperon, Kyamko, Quevedo, Tolentino, Villanueva, Allaga, Pajarito, Habacon, Garcia; Rear Admiral De Leon; Colonels Ortiz, Baclayon, Gapay, Ardo, Lucero, Lactao, Pangilinan, Segovia, Gupana, Sumaylo, Capuyan; Majors Musngi, Masa, Nicolas, Sison; Garci wiretappers Col. Sumalo and Capuyan; Maj. Teofilo; SG Sage; and, of course, former Defense Secretaries (and retired generals) Hermogenes Ebdane and Eduardo Ermita, who went around military camps while using the military’s resources in campaigning against FPJ, telling soldiers, “Of course you will not vote for an actor… we should vote for the candidate who has the experience, appropriate academic background… etc.” in support of their patron Gloria?
At the same time, we also remember those servicemen with conscience who kept their integrity whole, such as Gen. Frank Gudani who faced court martial for being a so-called “erring personnel” as well as Col. Alex Balutan.
We also remember with disdain those civilians and politicians who were involved directly or indirectly, overtly or tacitly, in that dark episode by their silence. People should be reminded of the complicity of both the Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) and National Movement for Free Elections (Namfrel), which didn’t do anything but cover-up for the massive electoral fraud. Same goes for others such as “Mr. Noted” Kiko Pangilinan, Cory Aquino, Frank Drilon, “Hyatt 10,” and other participants.
The cheating in 2004 didn’t just include the so-called “Arroyo Generals” but the whole system that was established in Edsa II to ensure the continuity of what was started in 2001, which was to keep President Estrada in continued detention while averting the scuttling of a fast-tracked era of globalization, privatization and the corporatization of the Philippines, as well as the consolidation of Epira and the privatization of TransCo, etc., with an FPJ sitting in Malacañang.
After all, they must have known that FPJ’s first act in signaling his candidacy was to attend the anti-globalization conference of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) in UP.
But even as things didn’t go the nation’s way, FPJ supporters, including the most prominent of them all, President Joseph Estrada, who was working behind the scenes despite his incarceration at Tanay, still did not rest in their campaign to expose the truth.
Then, “Hello Garci” emerged.
The link to the sources back then was not yet timely to reveal, as security implications outweighed other considerations; but Samuel Ong and Sgt. Vidal Doble finally surfaced the tapes that provided incontrovertible proof of Arroyo’s direct hand in cheating operations. Subsequently, cellphone videos of some of the military’s cheating operations also emerged.
Scrambling to control the damage, GMA spokesman Ignacio Bunye obfuscated by producing a fake version of the tapes, before the issue went to Congress where, most significantly, then Rep. Noynoy Aquino voted not to play the real tapes.
The involvement of the military led to the Mayuga Commission which, to this day, has not been allowed to release its full report to the public (perhaps to allow Garcillano a chance to still preempt the Mayuga report?).
The Comelec at that time was perceive to be among the most guilty; and that was the root of the megalomania of Ben Abalos who allegedly said to the Chinese ZTE officials, “I am the most powerful man in the Philippines,” knowing that he could expose everything Gloria anytime did if he didn’t get his way.
How correct Greek dramatist Euripides was when he said, “Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad.” It was a mad era. The post-2001 Edsa II power grab and the 2004 election cheating age was one when those in power believed they could manipulate everything and get away with it forever. It was a time when black became white, good became bad, and the cheats ruled the law. But one-by-one, the Mad Hatters fell… (who next after Angie Reyes?)
A history of the Mad Era of the Arroyo government obviously can’t be chronicled here in full. We don’t even have enough space for the complicity of mainstream media, including the iconic columnists of some major newspapers.
But as this is only a gist, we will cap it off by acknowledging those who fought for FPJ’s vindication when certain quarters ignored and taunted them: The FPJ movements that are too many to mention; the FPJ voters; President Estrada; the Bagong Katipuneros (Magdalos) and the Para sa Bayan military groups; as well as those who still suffer injustice for standing up against Edsa II, such as lawyer Alan Paguia, still suspended by the Supreme Court when all that he stood up for are now being vindicated. While we are sad about FPJ’s daughter who apparently loves those who tormented her father more than those who supported him, we finally have to acknowledge the late FPJ’s courageous wife, Susan Roces, for continuing this fight, too.
(Tune in to Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m., and Sulo ng Pilipino, Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 6 to 7 p.m. on 1098AM; Talk News TV with HTL, Tuesday, 8 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11 p.m., on GNN, Destiny Cable Channel 8, on “DoST Expo 2011: Ignite the Mind”; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com and http://hermantiulaurel.blogspot.com for our articles plus TV and radio)
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