The Filipino people have rendered their judgment

t’s obvious that the well-funded campaign to revise the history of martial law is anchored on one strategy that is actually prohibited in a court of law—which is, relitigating a point after the court has ruled against it.

Of course, this is an analogy. The “court” are the Filipino people and the litigant is that camp that is trying to deodorize martial law and exorcise it of its legacy of atrocities.

I’ve watched a number of videos on YouTube, packaged as “archival footages” of interviews with former President Ferdinand Marcos, filmed mostly in the dying days of his 20-year dictatorship.

In them, the former president extemporizes on his justifications for declaring martial law in 1972. I noted that in many of these videos, he is still trying to rationalize a draconian act he did twenty years earlier, like people are not yet convinced despite the lapse of that much time. In fact, in those videos shot after January 1981, he would be justifying having declared martial law AFTER he had already officially lifted it.

But to go back to my point, explaining the reasons for declaring martial law, as late as in the 1980s already, mirrors the socio-political atmosphere of the day. There was heightened opposition not just to martial law but to his administration itself. All these resurrected videos were part and parcel of an earnest, if desperate effort to prolong his hold on power. He was making an argument before the transcendent court of public opinion, trying to cajole the rising Parliament of the Streets into capitulation--but to no avail.

All those videos—lengthy interviews with prominent opinion TV talk show hosts of the day—even when combined DID NOT SWAY public opinion in Marcos favor. Still on those four fateful days of the 1986 February EDSA People Power Revolution, they kicked him out of power, sending him into exile in Hawaii where he would die, never obtaining the redemption or absolution he achingly yearned for the remainder of his life.

In other words, the Filipino people judged him—and convicted him. And they executed their judgment comprehensively.

Comes now this revisionism campaign—fueled by archival copies of these videotaped interviews that few eccentric individuals would have actually collected. Mostly these are INSTITUTIONAL copies coming from media libraries, if not coming from the family museum itself.

Exhibited today out of the context of the times in which these were produced, they certainly elicit uninformed curiosity—and with a little more nudge of nostalgia, actually result in “radicalizing” fledgling loyalists.

I’ve been asked many times what I thought of these videos. My answer is I am not competent to evaluate them in light of the fact that history has already passed judgement on them. I’m too steeped in my ways as a lawyer to know better than to reopen an issue where the judge has already made a ruling.

Take any decided court case. Read the final decision. Hypothetically, take up the cudgel for the LOSER in the case, then go back and read the original pleadings, contending with each other back and forth and you will ALWAYS see an alternative view that is contrary to the judgment. But it would be moot and academic because, evidently, the judge still decided one way or the other based on the totality of all arguments and evidences presented--and not just from a unilateral perspective.

This is why in our “system of laws and not of men” our court procedures do not allow unlimited appeal. At some point, judgment must be allowed to settle undisturbed or there will be no peace, no closure. This is the essence of prohibiting parties from relitigating settled points of judgment. Ultimately, every decision must finally be laid to rest. Res judicata.

So the next time you watch one of these pretty videos, especially when you feel yourself swaying to one persuasion or the other, just remember that you are 50 years--half a century--removed from the time context. Even Genghis Khan would seem like an altar boy now.

Time softens all villains. Lee Harvey Oswald, assassinator of John F. Kennedy; Mark David Chapman, shooter of John Lennon; Mehmet Ali Agca, failed would-be assassin of Pope John Paul II—If you watch close-up videos of them in the aftermath, you would give their lives a second glimpse, too, as a disinterested YouTuber in 2022. But ask the whole Roman Catholic faithful in 1981, or the Levis-clad Beatniks of 1980 and you’ll get a fiercely different answer.

But here’s the rub: they are entitled to make that judgment, you are not.

By the same token, was martial law good or bad, and by extension was its inceptor malevolent or benign? Your opinion today, whether you are for or against, DOESN'T count. That judgment has been made by the Filipino people in history and like the names in the epitaphs of their victims, the Marcoses' conviction for their crimes is carved in granite.*

The Filipino People ARE the check-and-balance

he price of democracy is eternal vigilance.

In law classes all across this country, we teach how the framers of the 1987 Philippine Constitution went through a lot of trouble installing guard rails to prevent a repeat of autocratic abuse in government.

We made sure that martial law can never again be declared but under the direst of conditions, and for no longer than sixty days.

ONE citizen is all it takes now to question the propriety of declaring martial law before the Supreme Court, which can take no longer than thirty days to decide.

The Supreme Court, it was assumed, would decide purely on merits and not be influenced by politics. Why? Because the justices, once appointed, need no confirmation from the Commission on Appointments of Congress.

Congress cannot strangulate the Supreme Court into subservience by fiscal means because the Constitution gives it a non-diminutable budget which must be automatically released upon appropriation.

We made sure the President cannot be re-elected. From his term of four years under the 1935 and 1973 Constitutions, with no re-election cap, we fixed his term at six years. Some said four years is too long for a bad president and too short for a good one. So we reckoned six years is long enough for ANY president. We did not contemplate his DESCENDANTS, though.

Local governments were strengthened by giving them wide-ranging autonomy, including the power to generate their own revenues and an assured portion of all national internal revenues generated from their jurisdictions. To prevent the rise of warlordism, we limited the term of office of local officials to three years, and imposed a three-term limit.

Lamest of all its promises, the 1987 Constitution urged Congress to enact a law that would eliminate political dynasties. There is no serious legislative proposal to date, in largest part due to the resistance to doing it by—who else—the political dynasties.

We reinvented the Senate so that even though the senators have a term as long as a president (6 years) HALF of their number of 24 expire every three years. This assures us of a “fresh batch” of 12 senators being elected, mentored in the first three years of their term by the 12 senior senators serving the remaining three years of theirs.

This built-in peer-mentoring system ensured that regardless of political party affiliations, the Senate as a Committee of the Whole would always gravitate to the tendency of “diverse unity.”

This is harder to accomplish in the 250+ seat-House of Representatives. We have abandoned the traditional Two-Party system, there is now in place a multi-party system. If this was not cacophonic enough, these multiple parties are free to form “rainbow coalitions” usually controlled by the leadership of the “ruling party” that invariably, if not obligatorily, includes the sitting President.

Under-representation of people in the “laylayan?” No problem—we instituted the system of “partylist nomination” whereby underprivileged and minority groups that garner the highest number of nationwide votes to fill 20% of the House membership would be able to send their “nominee” as their partylist representative.

Do you know the rationale for this? If partylist representatives control 20% of the House, this means even if there should be a total bi-polarization of the remaining 80%--as when they are divided right down the middle "50-50"--it is the marginalized sector, by adding their 20% to whichever 40% of a divided House, who would determine the legislative direction. For the FIRST TIME in Philippine history, it is the peasantry that will dominate legislation, giving substance to Ramon Magsaysay's mantra, "those who have less in life should have more in law."

The assumption, of course, is that the "partylist system" would not be subverted.

In the beginning, it was meant to afford representation to MARGINALIZED sectors, like farmers, fishermen, laborers, etc.

In time, the definition of “marginalized” diversified, too. Today, it can practically include any exotic grouping, like maybe “marginalized golf players with a 28-plus handicap”, “unemployed owners of Bugati Veyrons” or “Ferrari drivers with Attention Deficit Disorders.” Based on plain observation alone, some of these so-called “partylist representatives” are some of the wealthiest billionaires in the country.

Is the system of “check-and-balance” in government still in place then?

Let’s see. You have a Congress dominated by the “ruling party” at all times, including the reserved representation for the “laylayan.” A Supreme Court with only one (1) justice NOT appointed by the same president. Local government autonomy that has turned into a big joke. "Exhibit A" is a failed autonomous region in the Cordilleras (who, mysteriously reject autonomy THEMSELVES!) and "Exhibit B" an uncontrollable autonomous region in Muslim Mindanao that owes less allegiance to the central government and more to the global Arab nation. Separation of powers among the three branches of government--Executive, Legislative and Judiciary--is now only practically manifested by having different office logos. Lastly, a political party system that has more entities than the United Nations.

It doesn’t look too good. The only consolation you can really have is the First Provision in the Declaration of Principles and State Policies. But WHO even memorized THAT?* 

2028 is the Next Battle

wish I could say I’m surprised, but it’s all par for the course.

As I’m watching the huge thanksgiving rally for Team Leni-Kiko going on in Ateneo, being streamed live on Facebook, my laptop was at the same time going crazy ringing the bell on one “notification” after another from FB pages, blogs and YouTube channels that I’m tracking.

The trolls are back.

And in huge torrents. Scanning the screen for their account names, I noticed these were the familiar fake social media accounts I’ve been seeing all through 2018 up to 2022—although I’m sure they must have been around much longer. It’s just that I only became really active on Facebook during the insanely-boring ECQ lockdowns of 2020 and 2021. I’ve had my blogs (“baguiorewind.blogspot.com” and “theunheardside.blogspot.com”) a bit longer, since 2016.

There’s something different about these accounts today, however. They seem re-energized and have even seen some striking improvements on the technical side—you know, better layouts, cooler graphics, sharper soundtracks and spiffier editing. In short, if you didn’t know better, some of them actually look LESS fake.

Their content is the same—a lot of POV (“point of view”) videos of very recent campaign sorties, some I’m seeing for the first time though. All of them extol the “man of the masses” qualities of the presumptive president, and even of his vice-president—but why release these now? The campaign is over, they have won.

Wrong. The campaign has JUST STARTED—for 2028!

Early in the onset of the 2022 campaign season, Facebook announced that it was deactivating some 300 troll accounts because of various violations of FB Community Guidelines. But the announcement was not accompanied by a list of these accounts. So it became a guessing game of which trolls got struck down. If you didn’t see them again, I guess they were among the unlucky ones.

But some of these material I’m seeing right now seem to have “disappeared” from about that time—only to reappear today. Did FB reactivate these accounts?

There’s a lot of “Golden Age” YouTube videos again, still trafficking in that familiar “Dekada 70’s” nostalgia. Some really overstretch the timeline, masquerading as historic archives, showing heartwarming sepia-toned footages of Manila scenes in the 60’s and even as far back as the Elvis Presley 50’s.

They say life is like a grammar lesson—where you find the PAST PERFECT and the PRESENT TENSE. I think mainly this is the rationale of all this past-looking rhapsodizing—to mentally condition people to accept the premise that nobody has anything to offer today that’s better than how things used to be.

Fifty years from any event or issue, nobody is going to be able to say unchallenged what REALLY happened. There are a few people who know just because they were there when it happened. But what they now will be based of their perception fifty years ago, too.

That’s the tragic part, because someone who misunderstood what was going on fifty years ago is now suddenly an AUTHORITY about his own misunderstanding back then.

The young ones cannot challenge him—at least, not the young ones too lazy to do diligent research.

This is where the silver lining of the cloud runs. I have faith in the “awoke” youth of today—and I saw these whiz kids all through Leni's campaign. They don’t take to spoon-feeding. They nourish their own brains. Once having discovered the truth, they boldly take it up as their burden to communicate what they know. Presumably, this is the role of social media—to be the virtual venue for public education widespreadable at a phenomenally fast rate.

I think the next six years will be very telling, as far as who really knows how to harness the resources of cyberspace. It is anecdotal that the Marcoses commissioned Cambridge Analytica to map out a strategy to mass-indoctrinate Filipinos subliminally into embracing a return to autocracy. Even if it’s true, that is not against the law because the law cannot penetrate the human psyche where this supposed “crime” of subornation occurs.

This is also an important point to ponder: that Filipinos responding to mass stimuli, therefore, cannot know the error of their ways. So the deliverance of a deceived people CANNOT take the same orientation as “awakening” these people, as one would normally suggest.

No, like the tragic example of the Pied Piper of Hamelin—you have to eliminate both the subliminal messaging as well as the harbinger of that message.

Psychology is an ignored science in the Philippines. It will be its undoing to persist in this snubbery.

From where I sit, the Marcoses have AGAIN jumped the gun on everybody for 2028. Their trolling apparatus is at peak operating temperature—they never shut the thing down, really.

But that’s about all the advantage they have this time—a headstart of a few hours, while the pink brigade is out licking its wounds. On the other hand, I saw this pink wave accomplish in six months what the Big Apparatus worked on for six whole years. But if both were on the starting block more or less at the same mark, my money is on the new Filipino youth.*

I support returning to the Two-Party System

ll that this chaotic "multi-party system" has accomplished is dull down the level of political education of many Filipinos.

Many think a political party is nothing but a fans’ club to support a candidate. Too many clowns are able to make a mockery of the electoral process.

With only two parties (which can have as many “wings” or factions as they like) candidates who are virtual clones of each other will be forced to resolve issues of subtle differences in representing party philosophy internally.

At the end of the day, only one of them obtains the party’s nomination. The efficiency of the vetting process and the ultimate quality of each party’s standard bearer would increase exponentially.

On election day itself, the people will have an uncluttered field of only two candidates to choose from. Whoever wins will ALWAYS win by a majority.

Observe that no matter how difficult it is for the loser to accept BBM’s win, it’s not so easy to protest a majority win. A majority win is the ONLY outcome of a “one-on-one” voting contest. So a two-party system is inherently the most stable.

That’s what happened in this election, when the race came down to a virtual “one-on-one” between Leni and BBM. Manny Pacquiao, Isko Moreno and Ping Lacson were just insignificant disruptors. Together with the other forgettable candidates, their combined votes ended up having absolutely no swing potential, anyway. They just added to the campaign noise, that’s all.

The next question is: wouldn’t a return to the Two-Party System require a charter change?

No, neither the 1987 Constitution nor the Omnibus Election Code contains any prohibition against a Two-Party system. So no constitutional or statutory amendment is needed to adopt it.

I am not saying it's an easy transition. The two oldest traditional political parties are the Nacionalista Party (est. 1907) and the Liberal Party (1946).

Three more have been added since: PDP-LABAN (1983), NPC (1992) and LAKAS-CMD (2008).

But then there are several more "minor political parties" mostly built around prominent individual politicians of their time, too many to enumerate here.

I go for revitalizing ONLY the two OLDEST political parties (Nacionalista and Liberal) for no profound philosophical or ideological reason, really, other than it will result in the simplest, most efficient system. As long as nostalgia is in the air, then why not hearken back to the TRUE Golden Age of Philippine history and politics when, by those political institutions, we produced quintessential statesmen like Claro M. Recto, Carlos P. Garcia, Jovito Salonga, Jose Diokno, Lorenzo Tañada, Raul Roco, Marcelo Fernan--the list is long, indeed.

In terms of "party ideology" there is none to speak of with any of these political parties, and no distinction can be drawn between and among them. This is precisely why it's so easy to create a political party. Uniqueness of ideological identity is not a concern. Conversely, you can abolish any of these parties, especially the ones of more recent vintage, without inflicting injury upon the nation.

But when you limit the competition to only two candidates who must appeal to the same electorate, one's natural aversion to be like the other will force them to present contrasting philosophies and platforms of government. Out of this ever widening difference, complementary party ideologies will naturally evolve.

But, like I said, erasing the blackboard to leave only two major parties is easier imagined. It just happens to be the compelling need of the times.*

We created a digital vote-counting monster and it ate us

\

ould I support a recount? No. One wrong count is enough for any election. A recount is totally useless if we don’t understand how the original count was

done in the first place.

We have created a monster in digitizing our vote counting and that monster ate us. We plunged into a computerized system of voting before we have obtained enough expertise in the technology.

Worse, not only do we generally not understand about computers—except on the level of touchscreen-clicking casual users—we don’t even listen to the people who DO.

For months, computer techies have been shouting themselves hoarse, “Check the source code! Check the source code!” but their voices fell on deaf ears.

What’s a “source code” anyway?

It is the list of instructions given to a computer to execute. It is written in human-readable language, meaning WORDS and NUMERICAL VALUES assigned to constants and variables, and FLOW PATTERNS controlling the sequence in which these instructions are carried out, repeated and terminated.

Together, these human-like commands comprise that computer’s operating software—before those instructions are crunched into machine language code written in 1’s and 0’s (the terms is “compiled”) and translated into micropulses of voltage which is all a machine understands.

In layman’s terms, the source code is the “script” that the computer follows in carrying out its tasks, such as counting and adding up votes.

Little can go wrong in the actual counting itself, because all that involves is accumulating impulses recorded by sensors, which can be mechanical or optical. Once the count value is stored in a “variable”--which is like a digital container in the program that holds a given number only as long as until the NEXT number comes in to replace it—this is where monkey business can happen.

Loading this “next number” is where the machine can be programmed to “lie.” What is the definition of “NEXT VALUE ”? Normally, the computer must be told that “NEXT VALUE” is “PREVIOUS VALUE PLUS ONE.” But the computer can also be told to divert to a carefully-designed “sub-routine” first.

This subroutine can be any set of decision branches that the program can go through. For instance, I can tell the computer to compare THREE values stored in THREE VARIABLES. The first variable (let’s call it “A”) holds the vote count for “CANDIDATE A”; The second variable (call it “B”) holds the vote count for “CANDIDATE B”; The third variable (call it “C”) can either be a fixed arbitrary value or a formula.

Then I can tell the computer to compare A and B. Let’s say I want to increment A to always remain in greater value than B. Then my instruction would be “If A is greater than B, go back to main routine.”

It means A is leading, no need to panic.

But “if B is greater than A, then replace A with B plus C.” This means if B draws level with A, or even overtakes A, then I would tell the computer NOT to touch the value of B (hence be sustained by a recount of B’s votes later) but to replace A with the value of B (which is higher) and add to that the value of C (which is the fixed “difference” I want to maintain between A and B).

Such a “subroutine” would ensure that at any point in the counting, both values of A and B will increase at different rates, but A will always be more than B by a factor of C.

You will never catch it in a rerun of the program, no matter how often you do it. The result will always be the same.

You can study the program code, observing how it behaves LINE BY LINE by running a “TRON” command—which stands for “TRACER ON.” (Also, it became the title of a sci-fi movie about a rogue computer code that acquired humanoid attributes and started wreaking havoc in the world’s computers. Google it.) The process is called "debugging." If you're lucky or eagle-eyed, or both, you will see abnormal behavior in the program in realtime enough to isolate the malicious code and cut it out.

However, in the time it takes a human to raise his eyebrow about one calculation, the doggone computer would have performed a billion calculations already.

So better yet, you can READ THE SOURCE CODE—the commands written in human language, grammar and syntax—and, as a mental exercise, follow the flow of the commands while tracking the simulated values of the program’s variables by writing them down on a piece of paper.

In layman’s terms, you would take a program that requires a computer mere nanoseconds to execute, and HUMANLY PERFORM its instructions at a glacial pace. This nothing you can do on election day, of course.

The source code can be read by many programmers who understand decision flow and execution logic. If malicious code has been written into it, you can ONLY see it in the source code. You cannot see it by looking at a computer chip under an electron microscope. Programs do not manifest in hardware (except as graphic reports on an output device, like your computer screen or ‘hardcopy’ printout.)

This is why computer pundits were demanding, vainly it turns out, to see the source code. But what did COMELEC do? They bragged that the source code has been secured in an impregnable vault at the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, where it is safe from anybody’s access.

That is the OPPOSITE of how to secure a source code for a software documentation as imbued with public interest as a vote-counting program. You want that source program to be SAFE and SECURE?

EXPOSE IT TO THE ENTIRE COMPUTER COMMUNITY.

Let all programmers see it—not just the so-called “independent” or “third party” programmers—but EVERYBODY. Every person who has any knowledge of programming, which means every I.T. graduate or every post-modern Steve Jobs and Bil Gates, both dropouts from computer institutes who eventually created all of cyberspace as we know it, who are out there.

Next you want the source code (once you’ve determined it is “clean”) to be literally keyed into a computer in plain sight. Then make the computer “compile” the program into an “executable module” which is then “burned in” onto the Vote Counting Machine (VCM) standard density (SD) cards, or memory sticks. Those memory cards, numbering as many as the VCM’s that would use them, are the ones you must keep in the vault.

Why? To prevent them from getting lost, but NOT to discourage “tampering.” No, because once the source code has been compiled into a machine language executable module, IT CAN NO LONGER BE EDITED. In fact, it can no longer be read by any humans, even.

On the other hand, if the source code contains malicious code, it makes no difference even if you keep it in Fort Knox. A bad program will cause a good computer to produce bad output once you load and run that program--even if it spend the last six months sitting in a "high-security vault."

But if locking this "source code" in a vault is your main criteria of confidence, then you don't really understand how computers and computer programs work. Therefore, you lack the competence to run the program, in the first place, let alone to RE-RUN it in a recount later.

We always say in the programming community "garbage in, garbage out." If you do a recount using computers running a program with malicious code in it, you will just end up consolidating its erroneous output.

So what good would a recount do at this point? It's too late in the day to start your digital “due diligence” now. You will just end up shooting yourself in the foot.

It would be a totally different story if you ask me if I would support a REVOTING, using an entirely new set of vote-counting machines and only if we get to inspect the SOURCE CODE, witness its actual encoding into a master processor, have it compiled into an executable module ENCRYPTED and MASS-COPIED onto brand-new and newly-reformatted memory cards, BEFORE these machines and cards are sequestered in a vault in the runup to the actual balloting. Those are the terms--if it's not asking too much. Would COMELEC agree to something like that?

Yeah, right.*

The thrill of victory, the agony of defeat

can’t remember a better time when I felt so good.

That Monday morning, at 7:00 AM, as I stood in line outside Precinct 0047A waiting for my turn to vote, the warmth of the early morning sun bathed me with a soft golden ray of hope, a promise of rosier days ahead.

I remember thinking this was like being in the middle of a beautiful song that I didn’t want to end. Can’t we loop this? Hit “pause,” let it sink in, rewind the tape and play it again from the beginning? And keep stopping it short of the end, so it never ends.

It was an eerie feeling. I know I didn’t want BBM to win. I voted for Leni. But if Leni doesn’t win, I lose THIS feeling too—the feeling I just described—so it left me wondering, did I really want ANYBODY to win?

Of course I did.

I was very animated right from Day 1 of the election period, but did I really contemplate its ending somewhere in time? Or was the journey so epic and worthy in itself, the destination would be more anti-climax than denouement?

I thank Leni from the bottom of my heart because for that brief period she made me try again. Hope again. Believe again. Dream again.

Unfortunately, the only way to make any dream come true is to wake up. To open your eyes, exit the surreal world of possibility and step back into the tangible reality whose harshness you abhor. As Forrest Gump said, “Sometimes in life, there just aren’t enough rocks.”

Reality greeted me when I woke up the next morning and realized that BBM is now “His Excellency President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr.”

I can just imagine the euphoria and the rambunctious celebration in the camps of BBM supporters all across the country.

Am I jealous? Absolutely.

Even defeat will not suddenly make me a liar. I would still uphold all truth—including the truth of this aching envy that I feel. Telling the truth—Leni reinforced that virtue in me without even being so “preachy” about it.

I don’t like losing. Who does? I especially don’t like losing when I have tied to the triumph that eluded me my highest hopes and boldest aspirations.

On the other hand, being firmly in the losing camp drapes you with a strange sensation of horrible relief.

Victory has many fathers, but defeat is an orphan. The cold and empty halls of an orphanage are sometimes just the tranquility your heart longs for in its agony. Quietude is a balm that heals, as do the words “it’s okay to NOT be okay.”

I accept that BBM won. There are bumps and bruises on everyone from a lot of jostling and all manners of foul. I got elbowed as much as I elbowed. The sluggish and cross-eyed referees always never blew the whistle at the right times. But like any rough-and-tumble NBA game, in the end the final score is all that matters.

I kept vigil through the night, waiting to see if Leni would concede. If she did, I would totally support her in THAT, too. At this point, at least, I concede that she knows more than I do to inform any decision that she wants to make.

There will always be a lot of Monday morning quarterbacking after the Sunday football game (okay, in this case, Tuesday morning). I’ve already read a lot of scholarly posts about statistical anomalies and improbabilities. Even I have a few dumbfounding speculations. But I can offer absolutely no proof. At least, nothing that can stand in a court of law. In any case, INTERPRETATIVE statistical improbability is not a ground for an election protest.

From where I sit, Leni lost the election because she got less votes than Bongbong Marcos. That was also how Bongbong lost to her in 2016. That is how elections work. We determine the winner by counting votes in an ever-improving manner. It’s still not perfect, we’re making incremental and fitful progress, but progress nonetheless.

I don’t like Bongbong Marcos one bit. But he is now the president of my country, and I love my country.

The usual obligatory question is “Would you support the new president?”

My answer is, how could I? I am conflicted. I did not vote for him because I did not like him for a president. His winning did not change that. I STILL don’t like him for a president.

“Does that mean you will OPPOSE the new president?”

My answer is exactly the same. How could I? I am conflicted. If his administration fails, MY country—the country that I love more than him—also fails. His winning did not change that. And I boldly rebuke any Filipino today of any political color—yellow, blue, red, pink or polka dots—who would say that just because BBM won, they now hate the Philippines.*

What Would Jesus Do (To help me vote wisely)?

he most relevant election to me is my own.

Out of all the people created by God who have ever lived or will yet be born, God chose me to be among the divinely “elected” who will spend eternity with Him.

He based this election on my attribute: I was a sinner who can do absolutely nothing to ever deserve being in his holy presence. I lacked the only qualification He is looking for: perfect righteousness. That’s a qualification I can never earn, no matter what I do. That’s why God HAD to elect me.

Only God is perfectly righteous.

Because He is God, nothing is impossible for Him. He can do anything He wants to do—including transfer His own righteousness to me, by His grace alone.

There is one thing God cannot do.

God cannot contradict Himself. He cannot do anything that would deny His Godhood. If He says evil cannot stand in His presence, that’s exactly what He meant. For Him (holy) and me (evil) to even be in the same room, I have to be like Him.

He cannot make me God too. But He can make me God-compatible by separating me from my sinfulness. Unfortunately, that separation process is lethal. I will die during that process. Unless Someone dies in my place—which God is willing to do. But God cannot die for me unless He is like me. Only humans can die. God cannot.

Therefore God temporarily assumed human-ness as Jesus. Since Jesus is as big as God, being God Himself, He can die not just for me but for ALL of humanity combined.

His mission on earth accomplished, Jesus is back on His throne for PART TWO of The Plan. After Jesus atoned for my sin, I was no longer evil. But I was still NOT righteous enough for God, either. Evidence is the fact that I still had the ability to disobey.

God now has to ascribe righteousness to me, and that’s a much slower process than death. He has to TRAIN me in this new righteousness, a process called sanctification. It happens after atonement and lasts a lifetime.

For the remainder of my life, God will give me instructions—very subtle proddings, really--through His Holy Spirit, on how to make righteous choices time after time.

On clearcut choices, sometimes it’s easy. Other times, it gets really borderline iffy and I screw up a lot. It’s a good thing God has infinite patience. He keeps reminding me that for every wrong choice I make I alone, mostly, suffer the consequence. Sparing me the consequences of an immoral choice wasn’t part of the deal. Just don’t make immoral choices, that’s all.

And THAT is what informs my decision to vote for Leni. She stands unabashedly pro-morality—she doesn’t justify corruption. Standing up for righteousness is something that is pleasing to God. It’s the very same thing His Holy Spirit instructs me to do. Choosing Leni is the moral choice, which I don’t have to defend. I just have to do it and be happy that this is one of those times when it’s so easy to obey God.*

Freedom must be defended in the First Place it is attacked

ix players of the Far Eastern University (FEU) women’s volleyball team, called the FEU Lady Tamaraws, very recently posted a group picture on the internet.

They were all wearing white T-shirts emblazoned with bold letters that read “BBM-Sara 2022.” The picture went viral.

I don’t really know exactly what it means when a Facebook post goes “viral.” But obviously it has something to do with the picture incurring the ire of enough number of certain people with a loud voice on the internet. Reportedly, there’s been this wave of outrage in reaction to that post. But why?

In damage control mode, the school issued a statement of disclaimer, saying that FEU has no political stand, one way or any other. There's talk of sanctions, or at least some form of censure against the girls for "misrepresenting" FEU, or the team, or both.

The daughter of the head coach (not the coach himself) also made a statement that she believes her Papa would not have approved of the post, ostensibly because the image created the impression that the whole volleyball team was for the BBM-Sara Uniteam.

If she were testifying in court, that would instantly raise the objection, “Speculative...Your Honor, the witness is not competent to read her father’s mind.” Any judge would sustain the objection.

First of all, the photo was not posted on the Lady Tamaraws’ Team Facebook page. It was uploaded on the “official fan page” of the team.

Don’t get confused with that word “official”—all it means is that this popular varsity volleyball team has many fans clubs. One of them must be the most intimate with the players, who then agreed to recognize them as the “primus inter pares”—the foremost among equals—of all these fans clubs. They don’t necessarily reflect team sentiment but, hey, you could say it’s pretty darn close.

I don’t know, either, how many players comprise the FEU Lady Tamaraws' full lineup. But the last time I looked, six players are all you need on the half-court in a volleyball game. So, at the very least, these six pro-Uniteam ladies make up one rotation of players on the team. Whether they are first-stringers or reserves, who knows. To me, it suffices that they ARE Lady Tamaraws, and they endorse Bongbong Marcos and Sara Duterte.

That makes them NOT my new best friends.

But let’s take a brief pause here, and ponder those timeless words of Voltaire, “I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

You might say it’s a predictable learned reflex. Right upon emancipation from a lifetime of bondage, a slave knows only two positions in life: somebody’s foot on his neck or, in vindication, his foot on somebody’s neck.

I totally agree that life under Ferdinand Marcos’ martial law was a taste of enough oppression to inform anyone’s lifetime. But having shed that yoke, must we yield to the sweet vengeance of putting that same yoke upon another?

Not for me. The only thing I really find intolerable is intolerance itself. Let's leave these girls alone.

Put the shoe on the other foot: when people carried out a political stunt like this against Marcos at the height of martial law, they were never heard from again.

Today, we are NOT under martial law, and the persons (presumably Leni and Kiko) prejudiced by these girls’ adverse messaging are not even in power. And yet, certain of their ardent followers are ready to join the pillorying party against these volleyball players who weren’t even BORN yet when you and I were trudging along the valley of death of the Marcosian 1970s.

Marcos repressed me as a journalist, along with countless others. But these young ladies have done nothing to me. If anything, they are unwittingly setting themselves up to possibly go through what we went through. They simply don’t know any better. But if we bash their skulls with a baseball bat and say, “don’t you do that or you will experience unimaginable violence!” Do you think it will be persuasive?

The 1987 Constitution says, in no uncertain terms, that “The right of the people, including those employed in the public and private sectors, to form unions, associations, or societies for purposes not contrary to law shall not be abridged.” (Art III, Section

That is called the “freedom to associate” clause. It is no respecter of elegance of club purpose. This means it would protect both the William Shakespeare Literary Club as well as the Dolphy Forever Slapstick Comedy Club. So why wouldn’t you cloak that same protection to a volleyball fans club?

Give them equal freedom to ASSOCIATE—that is an active verb meaning to engage in common activity--including wearing uniform white T-shirts and offending the sartorial taste of however many millions of NON-MEMBERS.

If you think this might make me unpopular with my own Leni-Kiko ilk, you could be right. After all, if a simple T-shirt with 3 words ruffled feathers, how could a mealy-mouthed article this long not?

But here’s the rub. The price of freedom and democracy is eternal vigilance. And the symbol of accute vision for justice and fairness is the woolen blind strapped over the eyes of Lady Justice.

You cannot choose for whom, or the time and place to defend freedom.

You must defend freedom in the first place it is attacked.*