I NEVER imagined in my lifetime I would be in the midst of a pandemic in survival mode and hoping that we will get through this madness. Of course, “all things must pass” and it looks like with government efforts, massive and continuous vaccination of the population and strictly enforcing medical protocols, COVID-19 appears to have been contained.
Likewise in my more than six decades of existence I have experienced and lived through probably the strongest typhoon yet, Typhoon Odette (international name: Rai) but we’re not here to talk about the typhoon and the pandemic, rather the politics in the time of a typhoon and a pandemic. And here we go…
Iloilo City has also been hit badly by Typhoon “Odette” but we are not cry babies or whiners. All concerned government agencies have been doing what they’re supposed to do sans fanfare. Our mayor is on top of the situation before, during and after the typhoon. We have power and telecommunications back within 24 hours and nobody’s looking for the president. And we certainly don’t need the “calamity politics” of a publicly-seeking wannabe president who happens to be vice president.
By the way, “calamity politics” is the new necropolics in the playbook of the “devotees to the cult of the yellow ribbon” now dyed pink.
According to Sen. Panfilo Lacson, “’Calamity politics’ is the lowest form of campaigning. In fact I consider it abominable.”
Here’s the epitome of insensitivity, selfishness and bad taste – Leni Robredo’s people in Iloilo are calling for donations to a “Team Leni Robredo” Typhoon “Odette” fund drive or something. So they’re asking money from people so that Leni Robredo can have her photo-ops and promote her presidential ambitions using other people’s misfortune and misery. If you want to help the typhoon victims sincerely, do so without your candidate’s name, no photo-ops or that disgusting color, otherwise you’re just using the calamity for political reasons.
So Leni Robredo went to Bohol supposedly to assess the situation. Why and what for? The government agencies responsible already have their marching orders and are doing just fine with what they’re supposed to do. But of course, it’s election time and she’s a candidate for president – just your usual “calamity politics” with matching photo-ops.
I like Leni Robredo. She’s funny. In fact, ridiculously hilarious. My favorite picture of her is the one where she’s walking in some grassy field with a full entourage and they’re all wearing proper shoes except Leni who’s barefoot, you know, naked feet sans shoes. Perhaps she’s trying to show she’s so poor she can’t afford to buy shoes or she’s just not aware of the risk in catching parasites, worms, etc. while walking barefoot on the soil. Next time maybe she’ll walk on water.
Overhead from “careless whispers” – it seems some groups are seriously considering having Leni Robredo declared a “nuisance candidate” as her videos and pronouncements are nauseating and have been annoying people.
And we segue to the etc.
The usual suspects, the so-called wokes, have absolutely no idea that politics is addition and elections are won by the candidate with most votes, not by filing disqualification complaints or antagonizing other people not in your preferred candidate’s narrative. Doing so just pushes people away from your preferred candidate.
Stop worshipping and defending politicians, rather question them, criticize them, even make fun of them because in doing so you’re just making a fool of yourself.
I find this obsession (bordering on mania) on the color pink hilarious and downright ridiculous. You see, coloring everything pink does not win elections but votes from people who have no fixation on some color shamelessly hijacked from the breast cancer awareness movement do.
These are the colors of the Philippine flag – blue, red, white and yellow – are also our national colors, the only colors we should pledge loyalty to.
Maria Ressa’s so-called Nobel Prize is for the “devotees to the cult of the yellow ribbon” now dyed pink, the three percent, as they’re the only ones gullible enough to believe all the shit she’s peddling (she describes posh Ortigas where she lives and works as a war zone). And of course, her American handlers and financiers. The rest of the country (the 97 percent) don’t care, not even aware of her existence, and don’t believe her nonsense and tantrums.
Finally, human rights –it is mainly a Western invention, an abstract idealization created by people in comfortable societies who might have little or no exposure to what people in societies they see as backward really think, feel and do. (brotherlouie16@gmail.com)/PN
