I DO not like writing about or even spending much time thinking about politics. I do occasionally get into the subject, but usually under circumstances that I regret later: Either I am completely at a loss for a more productive topic and need to come up with something quickly, as happens from time to time here in these pages; or I’ve had an irresponsible number of evening drinks and have lost all inhibition, as happens probably more times than I’d like to admit in my own blog.
Sometimes, however, avoiding the subject is simply impossible, because something so incredible has happened, and has so completely captured the public’s attention, that ignoring it would create a poor impression. I think the “opéra bouffe” presented by the Senate this past Monday evening is one such unavoidable occasion.
It is not that I do not have political opinions; I do, and some very strong ones at that. But, as I’ve gotten older and understand the world a little better, I’ve come to realize that the reason I find discussing politics frustrating and futile is that politics, no matter what form of government is involved, are fundamentally based on people and not systems. There are those who vehemently argue against that notion, but I stand by it; even in countries that have what most people would consider to be well-organized systems of governance, they are still driven by personalities. For example, we don’t talk about what the Chinese government does as a monolithic entity, we talk about what President Xi Jinping does or says, knowing that the Chinese government had a somewhat different character before him, and will after him. Even some governments that do appear to be monoliths — in our own neighborhood, Singapore, Vietnam and Myanmar may be good examples — turn out to be just as personality-driven if you look a little bit below the surface of the headlines.
Systems, even bad ones, are orderly and predictable. People are disorderly and unpredictable, driven by variables of personality and relationships that are impossible to define. That makes any attempt at analysis inherently uncertain; from my perspective, uncertain enough that my conclusions and opinions will never be reliable enough to confidently share — things like, “who will win the next election?” or “how will the Senate vote on Duterte’s impeachment?” And what would be the point of sharing those opinions, anyway? There have been actual studies that have reliably demonstrated that, in a democracy at any given time, 80 to 90 percent of the people have firmly made up their minds, one way or another, and will not be swayed by any argument; one might as well try to convince people to change their religion.
However, when the personality side of politics has a significant impact — usually a bad one — on the systems created by politics, there may be some productive value in assessing and drawing conclusions about the situation. That is what happened on Monday here, and it was serious enough that it might seriously damage the country.
To recall, several things happened in quick succession on Monday. First, the House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly — 106 votes were required, but 257 were registered — to send the articles of impeachment against Vice President Sara Duterte to the Senate, which is constitutionally bound in that case to convene as an impeachment court and conduct a trial. Next, Duterte’s backers in the Senate hastily convened — Sen. Imee Marcos apparently had to rush over so quickly that she showed up in her pajamas, unless I am more ignorant about fashion than I realize, and that was an actual outfit considered appropriate for business in the Senate of the Republic of the Philippines — to eject Senate President Vicente Sotto III from his post and replace him with Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, in order to prevent the Senate from actually staging the impeachment trial.
And then while that was happening, Sen. Ronald Dela Rosa, who has been in hiding for several months due to being the subject of an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court, appeared to first cast his vote for Cayetano, and then to tearfully beg his colleagues to give him sanctuary from the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) officials who had arrived to serve that warrant. Before reaching the Senate chamber, Dela Rosa and his aides led the NBI officers on a comical chase through the hallways of the Senate building, an event captured on CCTV cameras and not only spread across social media in dozens of hilarious memes, but also broadcast to the world by numerous global news organizations such as The New York Times, Reuters, the Associated Press, Al Jazeera and CNN.
There are two very troubling problems that arise from all of this. The more immediate one is that none of what happened on Monday in any way addresses any of the critical concerns of the country — the tenuous energy situation, a faltering economy, the need to clean up the mess of massive systemic corruption, or the need for vital structural reforms. Monday was a circus to entertain the masses, but without the bread this time.
The second troubling problem is that Monday’s shenanigans simply reinforced the conviction of any rational person inside or outside the country that such systems that do exist here are wholly unreliable, and can be broken at a moment’s notice by political caprice. Yes, impeaching the vice president may not be a good look to the outside world, but breaking the constitutionally established process to avoid impeaching her leaves an even worse impression, because it signals that the country on the whole has no respect for its own rules and procedures. Harboring the fugitive Dela Rosa is even more egregious, because it demonstrates that the Philippines has no respect for anyone else’s rules, and that its prior acceptance of them was utterly faithless.
The worst result of these kinds of things is that they trickle down; if the leadership cannot abide by procedures, rules and the very law of the land, there is no perceived obligation for anyone else to do so, either, if they find them inconvenient. The biggest killer of development and growth is inconsistency, and as the Philippines demonstrated Monday night, the country is still very, very far away from grasping “that lesson.”
ben.kritz@manilatimes.net
Bluesky: @benkritz.bsky.social
Website: www.badmannersgunclub.com
