Nalito Atienza; Watchful nuns
“Hello, M’am?”; Romeo Macalintal settles in
Razon’s bravado; Razon’s pensiveness
The aggrieved Senate sergeant-at-arms; Razon seeks comfort from the lawyers
Madrigal schmoozes; Razon betrays lack of confidence
Lights, camera, action; Mascarinas the admin’s muscle
Mike Defensor does his job; Bautista the Hutt arrives
Actor Pen Medina; the admin lineup
Gloria’s Dragon arrives; Bautista the Hutt in admin huddle
Hutt ogles Loren; Loren pose part 2
“We swear to tell lies and only lies, so help us M’am”; La Salle brother
“Are we still on script?”; Bautista the Hutt naps
Bautista the Hutt; Gloria’s Dragon huddles with the Hutt
Mike D’s wife after bringing back the cash; Hutt and Gaite huddle: Mike D. reports to M’am?
The Palace was certainly between a rock and a hard place going into yesterday’s Senate hearing. If it stonewalled, it could deny its critics evidence and at least prevent its factotums from further incriminating the administration. But it would leave the public with no other story but Lozada’s. Or, the Palace could come out swinging in the hope that it would thereby fortify the determination of its allies to stand by the President, and possibly confuse things enough to prevent a total collapse in public confidence.
The Palace decided to come out swinging but got a beating. That’s because it has mastered situations it can totally control, but has never quite figured out how to handle situations where the advantages enjoyed by officials end up stripped away by public interest and some common sense questioning.
A former member of the cabinet, and as shrewd an observer of our politico-human condition as any I’ve ever met, once told me there is a very simple line that separates the haves from the have-nots in Philippine society. That line, he said, is transparent spontaneity.
The middle and upper classes instinctively wall themselves off from the rest of society, and have an innate sense of privacy that is impossible and even unimaginable for the majority of our population. The ordinary Filipino has little to no privacy, knows instantly what the rest of the family is doing, and what the neighbors are up to, from defecating to love making to quarreling and gossiping.
And so, they are keenly aware of anything that smacks of posturing when, for the walled-off minority, what is ingrained in them is a strong and unshakeable belief in certain things being for public consumption while other things are not. And so, when someone displays emotion, runs the whole gamut of emotions from terror to anger, it resonates; when someone confesses to a reality that most everyone is aware of (though posturing politicians pretend ignorance and then shock), it resonates and adds to credibility.
Maintaining a stiff upper lip in the face of pressure is an alien concept except to those who uphold the values of the upper class.
There is another line that separates the haves from the have nots, not in the sense of those who lack and have money but rather, political power (besides the other kinds of power that exist, such as economic power): and it is, having experienced intimidation.
I’m willing to bet that those who remain skeptical of Jun Lozada’s motives and statements have never experienced the full panoply of official and social intimidation that comprises life for most of our countrymen. This is because the skeptics have always been in the position of being immune to intimidation or who blithely take it for granted as a kind of necessity to keep uppity underlings in line. Or who have lived such insulated lives that it frankly amazes them when someone claims they didn’t have options to explore in their self-defense.
In other words, their inability to fully grasp what Lozada’s gone through is a failure of the imagination. Of empathy.
But it is a situation most Filipinos can appreciate, because they have encountered it on some level at some part of their lives. Whether a slum dweller at the mercy of urban gangs, predatory police, bodyguard-protected officials, or Chinese Filipinos subjected to the BIR, PNP indifference to kidnapping and extortion, the middle class person subjected to mulcting cops, bureaucrats on the take, judges for sale, the appreciation of official intimidation is something that crosses ethnic and economic lines.
But it can also be something that varies in degree and method, and so for some, being subjected to the combined squeeze of the executive and legislative branches as described by Lozada -and floundering in it- seems inconceivable and thus, unbelievable. But for the rest, they know first hand how official intimidation takes on many forms, not all of it overt, most of it calculated on the premise that a reminder of the resources officialdom can mobilize in its own interests and defense is enough -and much more than any one person or family can, or should, resist.
We are a story-telling culture, an aural and oral culture, sensitive to the nuances betrayed by one’s conversational style, constantly trying to situate people in our society’s landscape: we look for what a person’s accent betrays in terms of background, what one’s storytelling style tells about them, constantly forming and reforming a mental image of the story being told and whether it makes sense. Gut feel becomes a sort of scientific method. And in a society that profoundly distrusts all institutions, the arena in which contending forces clash, and public opinion is formed, and where the advantages of the powerful are blunted, is an instinctive form of checks-and-balances the public craves.
Even the best-honed script, by its very nature manufactured, can be torn to shred and wily lawyers, for example, foiled in the face of hammering away at testimony yet failing to get a witness to recant or contradict previous testimony. Which is why these hearings tend to take a tremendous amount of time and why appeals to leave things to the courts leaves the public cold.
Oh. And in case you missed it, Unseating of Panlilio as governor starts.
i think the general rule should be: when you make a stupid comment, someone could point out to you why it is stupid (the comment, not you). if you feel insulted, or hurt, or take it personally, that is entirely your problem. when you make a comment, you are fair game, and i know mlq3 understands that, for which reason this is a free-wheeling and well-read blog, with minimal restrictions, if any. but i think this is not a “bastusan” blog, where obscene, harassing and threatening remarks against any commenter are tolerated. stupidity, yes, but bastusan, no.
Bencard,
Are you talking to me?
I still believe in what the golden rule says, not any kind of rule that anyone defines to suit his/her own standard.
If you think your general rule is superior to the golden rule, I don’t question you. I wouldn’t even insist the other way around.
And please, don’t split hairs, ok?
i don’t get this: lozada’s office was raided by nbi. how come they are so quick to gather the dirt of those who make the accusation rather than the accused? was abalos’ office given the same treatment? or neri’s?
ok correction: lozada was accused by brenda of graft.but why would nbi be so quick to take the word of brenda, who is a liar [damn! you should have jumped off the plane a long time ago.]
@hawaiianguy
“Despite the anonymity and facelessness that most of us have as bloggers, we feel hurt by insinuations, direct assaults, throwing craps, flamings, etc. hurled to us by those who don’t subscribe to our position. Don’t we?”
I can only speak for myself and would say that I don’t feel that way after an insult mainly because it is JUST a blog comments box. Kantiyawan lang naman yan.
cheers
@inidoro,
parang pelikula diba. huli lagi ang pulis, incompetent pa. sa pagkaka-alam ko to be an nbi agent you need to be lawyer…
inodoro ni emelie,
Evidence, evidence, evidence. That’s what it amounts to, my friend. That’s legalese at its finest, under this hopeless regime operated, among others, by those with less than “moderate greed.”
They want to prove that this “probinsiyanong intsik” is a liar. He’d better go to prison, not the bigtime corrupt, greedy officials who defraud govt. and make it dysfunctional.
It really sucks. The accuser is now becoming the accused. As usual, it’s blaming the victim syndrome.
Btw, have you come across Salonga’s take on this hearing? Ssomeone mentioned it earlier.
Nash: “I can only speak for myself and would say that I don’t feel that way after an insult mainly because it is JUST a blog comments box. Kantiyawan lang naman yan.”
Ok, gotcha! But didn’t you notice how many are reacting to insults (maybe not you or me) but others in this thread or previous ones. If only words can kill, many bloggers would have been erased, hehehehe! (Bato-bato sa langit, ang tamaan ay huwag lang po magagalit. Pero kelangan din siguro malaman ang puno’t dulo, hindi ang dulo o kapiraso lang.)
hawaiianguy, who’s splitting hairs? the golden rule it will be, but i reserve the right to show why a comment is stupid when i see one.
btw, re lozada, that’s what happens when a cooking pot calls a kettle black, or when a hideous face calls another “ugly”. golden rule, right?
with all due respect to former senator salonga, the senate witnesses, though under oath, did not undergo cross examination by the adverse party against whom it is intended to be used. their testimony are still hearsay for the purpose of proving the truth of such allegations. while it may be admitted as exception to the hearsay rule, it suffers from unreliability because of lozada’s admitted wrongdoings and criminal participation, not to mention that most of his testimony are not based on personal knowledge but are speculations and conjectures. i doubt any prosecutor could build a “winning” case based on that.
Bencard, how are you going to defend Lozada if for instance he hires you to take up his cause? As intelligent as LOzada is, he’ll probably tell you at the start that his testimony is corroborated by at least two other credible witnesses . . . Neri and JDV III. Ngayon, as good a lawyer as you are, how are you going to build your case on such a claim?
Mr. Bencard, former Senator Salonga is a very good lawyer, having taught law and even written books on that very subject.
Moreover, he has rendered public service with great distinction, retiring with an “unblemished” record.
If there is anyone who can make both an expert and a moral judgment about this issue, it’s probably only him.
JMCastro, (on Salonga)
I salute Salonga more than any of those brilliant lawyers who even barter their souls for some silver. It’s too bad that PCGG went awry and steered towards the path that it has started denouncing. The “graft buster” has become a “graft busted,” or so it is claimed. (Don’t ask me why.)
But he has nothing to do with that.
Oh, and on a side note — did a search on Google using the terms:
“only evidence” testimony philippines
Short answer: if a judge believes the witness, he/she can convict solely on witness testimony.
Bencard, I think the lack of anything in the way of clarity coming out of these committee hearings is that they were never intended to be an exercise that would yield any actual useful outcome.
They’re just venues for all our moron politicians to grandstand and get airtime (which the Media, true to form, seems quite happy to indulge).
If all this was done in a proper court of law and subject to proper due process (where said processes were designed around a specific resolution or outcome, by the way), then at least we’d see some semblance of a ROADMAP of where all this is leading.
At the moment it is no different from any other spectacle that politicians stage, which Media in turn disseminates, and which Pinoys in turn happily lap up and “discuss”.
Typical.
benign0:
If this was handled “quietly”, it’s very possible that Lozada would be dead by now. That’s one of the points that homed in on me when I pondered on Monday’s testimony.
While I agree that the Senate inquiry last Monday was mostly grandstanding, and really it is interesting to watch and fun to talk about, don’t you think that preventing Lozada to be 6 feet under the ground is “a useful outcome”?
@bencard,
I think Jovito Salonga is not yet senile, so pardon me if I put more weight to his legal opinion.
The following poem is composed entirely of actual quotes:
“THERE IS ENOUGH EVIDENCE”
(Noli De Castro)
Nobody is above the law
Lahat ng sangkot
From Top To Bottom
Dapat makasuhan!
(Jovito Salonga)
There is enough evidence
Chair Abalos is heavily involved
The FG is also involved
She was … directly involved in ZTE contract
(Joey De Venecia)
As a Filipino citizen
I’m now asking Gloria to resign
She cannot stop corruption
And all the lies from Malacañang!
(Ermita)
We stand by our President
She is our legitimate President.
Everything is under control
The situation is normal!
(AFP Spokesman)
AFP on red alert
NPA will infiltrate rally
Create confusion
And other destabilizations!
My understanding is that it is the elitist French and Spaniards (and elitist Filipinos 😀 ) who do not believe in the jury system. [This must have come from their religious upbringing.]
The premise (to my understanding) is that “regular citizens” do not have enough sophistication, much less the legal background, to discern truth from the obfuscation and half- and total-lies that lawyers and interested parties can enunciate, so it is foolish 😥 to allow regular citizens to make court decisions.
In non-jury countries, the underlying premise is that only the elite — the judge — have “what it takes”.
Tortuously looking at all the posts here, I am most inclined to agree with hvrds (February 13th, 2008 at 7:47 am), left and right of center will have to figure out how to chart a course towards what he calls “cleaning house” — getting rid of high government-sponsored coercion and corruption.
Years before, I used to work in the private sector. We won small government bids which, from where I stood, had no corruption. What I inferred from the testimonies of Lozada, JDV Jr. and Neri is that a government deal will have to be of a certain size so that it can be “corruptible”. The procurement system of the government requires a Bids and Awards Committee (BAC) to award the best bid, and the Commission on Audit (COA) to audit the aftermath. It would theoretically take a great deal of coercion and bribes to corrupt the whole process.
Isn’t that what we are witnessing right now, as a result of the Senate and media circus happening right before our eyes?
And by the way, it is allowed in many countries for the government prosecution to stretch the truth 😉 , the whole stretchy truth, and nothing but the stretchy truth, in order to convict. The defense lawyer is also allowed to do likewise — stretch the truth — to defend the client. But ‘perjury’ is that rule which says lying among friends — 👿 NOT ALLOWED.
Another NOT ALLOWED is trial via the media. 😆
And did anyone influence peddling, bribery, thuggery?
“While I agree that the Senate inquiry last Monday was mostly grandstanding, and really it is interesting to watch and fun to talk about, don’t you think that preventing Lozada to be 6 feet under the ground is “a useful outcomeâ€Â?” – JMCastro
Yes, absolutely. In fact he’s one of the best things to happen to the Philippines in recent memory.
But we all know that at some point, like anything that needs to be investigated and resolved, the proper PROCEDURE needs to be applied. Resolution is a very slippery and elusive fish to reel in. And as history will tell, we Filipinos aren’t exactly world-renowned for our ability to get things resolved.
This whole Lozada thing is clearly headed down that path. The longer it takes to get this ‘whole thing’ down the right channel, the more successful bozos like Enrile and Joker Arroyo get at muddying the water around it.
It’s simple, really.
And a key intent of RULE OF LAW is to provide a body of procedures — a lot of them written down — that prevents mayhem given this scenario that truth gets stretched (even by well-intentioned eyewitness or passionately truth-seeking priests, nuns and Evangelicals who know in their hearts (and damn the evidence, this is TRUTH!!! 😉 ) that the house of GMA is corrupt).
As the boxing referee says each time, “Protect yourself at all times!”…. and watch your wallet.
jmcastro, i have very high respect for sen. salonga and i recognize him as a great lawyer, law professor and politician. but i was not talking about him, rather i was talking about the possible use of the senate blue ribbon transcript as evidence for impeachment or prosecution. the problem is that you look at the person, not the idea.
i have argued cases in the u.s. 2d circuit court of appeals against eminent authorities in the particular branch of the law involved. if i were awed by their stature to the point of giving up my position, i would have given up representing my client.
expert opinion? no question. moral judgment? i don’t think any man (including the pope) has that authority.
benigno, i cannot disagree with all that you said. i think lozada would be good as an actor in a teleserye. his ability to cry on cue rivals the current crop of crying “stars” at abs-cbn. btw, how do like seeing grown up men crying like babies? only in the philippines’ world of make believe!
sorry folks. the last post under titanium’s handle (who is another lawyer in my office) is supposed to be mine. i used titanium’s desktop and forgot to change the handle.
benign0:
“… we Filipinos aren’t exactly world-renowned for our ability to get things resolved. …”
You’re right. I just can’t accept that a court of law can resolve this, since applying the same amount of coercion on the judge that they applied on Lozada will kill the process of finding the truth.
Political venues such as Senate hearings are the proper forums for testimonies such as Lozada’s, since I feel that, even as we speak, political pressure is building up in the executive branch to come up with a substantive response against coercion and corruption in government. In short, we are in the middle of “historical forces” which has every possibility of effecting a great deal of change.
It’s up to the Senators whether we’re looking at substantial reforms, or *gasp* a revolution (peaceful or otherwise).
nash, but salonga is 25 years older than me (lol). oh yeah, i forget things sometimes. see my preceding post.
Bencard:
As “UP n student” pointed out to me, I can only argue from my gut. I don’t know enough to appreciate the finer legal points you raise vis-a-vis Mr. Salonga’s.
One question I honestly want to know is this — is there any court in the Philippines which can handle this case?
Update from the Chief
FROM: The Grand Pooh-Bah Luli A.
TO: The Luli Arroyo Internet Brigade
RE: The Fulfillment of Our Grand Plan
I think it’s time we took a breather and looked back on what we’ve accomplished in the past twelve months.
When I conceived the Luli Arroyo Internet Brigade, I saw a long fight ahead. I pictured sleepless nights replying point by point to every destabilizer-with-an-internet-connection. I looked at the task ahead, and despaired.
However, it’s taken surprisingly little effort to achieve our intended goals. Why? Because our enemies have been doing our job for us.
To wit:
The partnership between the Communists, the Cory faction, and the Erap/FPJ faction: a master-stroke in undermining credibility. I wish I could take credit for it, and I commend you, my agents, for keeping a straight face as Jinggoy and Cory stood together in solidarity against my mom. I wish I’d thought of putting Guingona and Erap back together, as if the impeachment never happened. They shot themselves in the foot – we didn’t even need to pull the trigger!
OK, so I thought we still had the Church to contend with – but my worries vanished when that Bishop fulsomely apologized to Erap for that little misunderstanding called Edsa II. Problem solved – and we didn’t even lift a finger!
Credibility-reducing hyperbole. And I thought I’d seen it all when Imee Marcos all but accused my mom of being a “liar and thiefâ€Â. But when the destabilizers began to bandy around words like “worse than Martial Law†to refer to my mom’s presidency, I knew the movement had jumped the shark!
Mission accomplished? Hell no! There’s quite a ways to go. But it looks like they’re saving us the trouble: the more our opponents come out looking like they’ve forgotten to take their Tourette’s medication, the more their media sympathizers cry wolf, the more they substitute wacky conspiracy theories for astute analysis – all the more they defeat themselves!
Cringeworthy public appearances. We’ve already talked about the strange bedfellows of the Left and Right uniting against the government. Scratch that. I’m talking about the Black and White Movement’s regular Friday tea parties-cum-public protests. I’m talking about Maria Theresa Pangilinan throwing a tantrum at her own graduation. I’m talking about every single instance where the destabilizers get together to wave flags and choke traffic, and piss off the undecided who would otherwise be attracted to their cause.
The reactions to the people’s overwhelming non-reaction have come in two flavors – “Gloria’s people are working against us to keep us downâ€Â, or “Fuck the middle class, they can’t take a hint.†Neither of which are even close to the truth. But, brigadiers, we want them to keep believing this. We want them to keep believing that the Luli Arroyo Internet Brigade has been largely responsible for the utter silence that greets them every time they enter a Starbucks in a black shirt. We want them to believe they can “rearrange the furniture†around an apathetic middle class. The greater the gulf between the opposition and reality, the more successful we shall become!
Stay vigilant, my agents – in time, the opposition, for all intents and purposes, will BE the Luli Arroyo Internet Brigade!
Love and kisses,
LULI A. (My Mommy right or wrong!)
gee, there goes the boogie man theory being circulated again. in the past, right on this blog, i’ve been accused of being a “brigadier” and i didn’t even know what it was…
it’s juvenile to say the least. and it doesn’t help anyone because YOU who make the accusations lose out by blinding yourself to another person’s opinion. if you view everyone with an opposing view as “the enemy” wouldn’t you want to know what they were thinking.
in warfare, battles were lost because the enemy’s actions were not accurately predicted. how better to predict what the enemy will do but to get inside his head? how better to conquer the “brigadiers”…
chew on that.
jmcastro, since you asked me, if there’s no case, there’s no case. it’s as simple us that. unless there is enough admissible and credible evidence that a crime has been committed and the accused perpetrated it, no prosecutor worth his salt will file a case knowing he will lose. that would be a waste of public funds and resources.
if no case is filed, courts cannot try and adjudicate.
“benigno, i cannot disagree with all that you said. i think lozada would be good as an actor in a teleserye. his ability to cry on cue rivals the current crop of crying “stars†at abs-cbn. btw, how do like seeing grown up men crying like babies? only in the philippines’ world of make believe!”
Actually on that note, I do cringe seeing him on TV. Considering that he’s lost a brother and is in the middle of quite a pickle, it boggles the mind how he is able to go around with that stupid grin on his face on one hand and then at another moment would be crying like a baby in public.
Panay pa ang patol sa Media.
I don’t know how the Law works (or non-works) in the Philippines but the simple thing to do (based on what I think my rights would be if I were in his shoes) is to engage a lawyer, invoke his right to remain silent, PENDING the time this whole thing gets channeled through the proper judicial process.
For now, all he is doing is dancing to the agendas of the usual people — as Pinoys tend to do. 😉
” but i was not talking about him, rather i was talking about the possible use of the senate blue ribbon transcript as evidence for impeachment or prosecution. the problem is that you look at the person, not the idea.”- Bencard
_________________________
I think there’s a strategy behind the idea…
Re: anonymity and pikunan
I am one of those who use their real names,but what the F! We are still semi-anonymous as one puts it(with exception to public figures).
As to pansinan ng comment ng iba…..
siguro tama yung sinabi nung isang commenter,na kantyawan lang naman ito,so as the old saying goes na: take things with a grain of salt like Tequilla!
let us not forget to repect each other,so hindi na aabot sa bastusan.
By the way,Good day to everyone!
“you took the words right out of my mouth, titanium. thanks.” – Bencard
You’re just playing tag-team. Di ba magkasama lang kayo sa opisina?
†but i was not talking about him, rather i was talking about the possible use of the senate blue ribbon transcript as evidence for impeachment or prosecution. the problem is that you look at the person, not the idea.â€Â- Bencard
Maybe he suspects there’s a motive behind the idea, kung baga, agenda, heheh.
hi, Shaman, are you from Malilipot, adjacent to Bacacay?
at ako naman si mang_kiko, pag mahuli yung ibang handle ko, sabihing kong sa partner kong doctor yon kasama sa clinica..
“Or, shall our host leave them there, as we are all global posters anyway, not governed by, nor subscribing to, some set of norms whatsoever?”
hawaiianguy, our host has limited power. He can delete, alright, but he won’t do that because he is a firm believer in the democratic freedoms so his action is bound by his resolve, as can be gleaned from his writings. That’s the way I see it, and that’s pretty admirable to me. In a crunch, our host can ban the IP address, but that won’t work since, if it’s true there really are trolls, the troll operator, assuming that the Equalizer is correct (2008 at 10:03 am), has unlimited logistics.
shaman, halata. look at the time stamps.
bencard, please don’t resort to this trickery. it makes you a schizo.
crap. you said you’re retired.
bencard,
looks like you and titanium do not verbally speak to one another, eh? so do you two text messages when eating in the same dining table? or email each other when conversing even if you “two” are seated next to one another?
stylometrically, it’s poorly done.
suit yourselves, inodoro n.e. and shaman. have a feast on it, for all i care. titanium is my partner managing our manhattan office which i was visiting this week. i take care of our boston branch. btw, i said i am semi-retired at age 63. titanium is very busy but once in a while, he manages to post a comment or two. yes, we sometimes talk about politics, including philippine politics.
don’t do a gloria: huli na, ayaw pang aminin. look, the time stamp says 1 am, which means 11 pm, ny time, or wherever. you two must be working big case. hello, titanium.
ah, lawyers. daming palusot.
inodoro ni emilie,
marunong ka palang manghuli ng isda, hehehehe!
Inodoro ni Emille,
I noticed it once before. The ventriloquist and the dummy made a terrible slip then, but I thought it was just a regular act here.
Check this out:
(www.quezon.ph/?p=1637#comment-686242)
(I Omitted 3 paragraphs)
This was the dummy’s reply:
(www.quezon.ph/?p=1637#comment-686353)
That seemed normal. But the next post was what got my attention, look at the blogger’s nick and that whom he addressed it to:
(www.quezon.ph/?p=1637#comment-686378)
Ventriloquist played patay-malisya and this time used the correct character.
(www.quezon.ph/?p=1637#comment-686428)
Hahaha! Gloriang-gloria! Buking na ayaw pang umamin.
Next witness, pls.
must be a lonely life out there. two computers, one revolving chair. or one computer, two revolving personalities.
TonGuE-tWisTeD, Inodoro ni Emilie
hahahahaha! huling huli ang isda, hindi sa bibig kundi sa pagmamadali sa keyboard. Meron tuloy nalimutan.
Talaga naman.
thanks guys for thoroughly dissecting my posts and that of titanium. is this an “investigation” in aid of tsismisan? why don’t you report it to cayetano’s committee? maybe they could make a “scandal” out of it and force “gloria” to resign because of it, huh?
bencard aka titanium,
now we know whereof you speak.