[OPINION] Demigods and superheroes we don’t need
The Senior Desk Editor of cRappler has been churning out praise pieces for the opposition. It is funny how before Salud crossed over, his mentor, Inday Espina Varona, wished him good luck. As it turns out, she got him a job where she moved to after ABS-CBN and Licas News. Salud was retrenched as Editor In-Chief of the Philippine Graphic. Since he is part of the Manang Inday’s core group, she got him a spot at Licas News and eventually, a contributor’s role at the Philippine Star.
It is true that imagery is an important part of the packaging of politicians. In the case of Ferdinand and Imelda, it was overkill. You can attribute that to Madame. Royalty absolutely fascinates her and it is evident with her “acquisitions” so to speak. Imeldific is nothing like Marie Antoinette. She is more like Jackie Kennedy if you ask me.
I’m sure the Vice President has nothing to do with it, but it disturbs me that Leni Robredo is depicted in some images as a powerful fairy queen possessed of magical powers, or some supernatural being whose dreamlike charms can save us from the rut we are in. Enviable as this may seem in terms of how artists summoned their talents to represent their beloved candidate, it reveals our partiality for heroes instead of leaders, demigods instead of public servants.
Isn’t this country already gagging from lime-lit superstardoms? The fame and notoriety of superstars? No, we don’t need magic or enchantment to solve the many-sided problems this benighted nation is facing.
Leni Robredo is also a product of packaging. What is true about her is her limited intellectual capacity. She is also inarticulate. But her handlers would like us to believe that she is just an ordinary politician’s wife plucked from obscurity after her husband died. Yeah right.
Most people do not see the dual personality lurking in Robredo. Her eyes have it. There are several candid shots which her other side shows through. It is bad enough to be at the Jekyll and Hyde level. You can see the evil in her eyes.
It is easy to detect her insincerity when she speaks. I do not know where or how she got it but that Taglish colegiala pa-cute effect really grates on me. Even her voice at times sounds like chalk screeching at a blackboard. I have no clue if this is cognitive bias or what but there has never been a time when I thought of her as being sincere. You immediately get a sense of her fakery.
Salud questions Rodrigo Duterte’s packaging. Terming it as burlesque is wrong. The better word is bombastic. Salud alludes to this as fake as well. If there is one thing you will notice that does not jive with the Duterte’s image is his fondness for expensive collectible timepieces. Every man has his weakness. In his case, could very well be women and watches.
Duterte has been deemed not fit for the Presidency by the elite. He would rather be in a t-shirt with collar, jeans and casual footwear. He can carry a barong well enough but never a suit. He is not like Ramos who would wear a Brioni on his foreign trips. Duterte is more of the neighborhood favorite sastre type. Sal Panelo has better sartorial sense than he does. He is your typical Bisdak who follows what he wants and not what the people around him think. Most of his detractors look at him as dumb because of his appearance and thick Bisaya accent but he is not. Duterte was a lazy student but he is a wide reader. You notice it with his vocabulary and in his interviews with foreign media outlets. The 75% academic average Bisaya is what he sells to the typical Pinoy and it has been successful.
What Salud will not tell you is why there is that dysfunctional relationship between the laylayan Robredo claims to serve and why her supporters are the first to call them out as bobotantes each time they lose in an election which has been the case in 2016 and 2019.
ABS-CBN turned the laylayan into bobotantes with their inane shows. The Catholic Church opposes birth control so the laylayan’s population exploded. The result is a society with the entitled rich and the entitled poor serving each other’s interests. It is the the middle and lower middle class which bears the burden of being the economic bracket which drives the consumption-driven economy.
The opposition still does not have a clue what it is doing. They continue to wonder why Marcos is still leading in the surveys despite their throwing everything at him including the proverbial kitchen sink. They question his competency for the Presidency because he failed at Oxford and only obtained a special diploma. He did not finish his Master’s at Wharton. Even Apo Lakay was disappointed in him in a diary entry because he was lazy and carefree as a teen.
In contrast, Robredo is an economics major and a lawyer. She has not completed any post-graduate studies. She flunked the bar on her first try. Whenever she speaks, she hardly makes any sense. She is always nervous when she answers questions during debates. Long story short, no lawyerly demeanor which leads one to question why the disconnect between qualifications and the actual product?
Marcos’ appeal is not just because he is the son of Apo Lakay. For one, Filipinos have come to realize that they are better off with a Marcos as President instead of one from the Liberal Party or whatever the Yellows/Pinks are calling themselves these days. Marcos’ twenty years in power had tangible results which proved essential when the pandemic broke out with NCR as the epicenter. The Heart, Kidney and Lung centers and the Philippine Childrens Medical Center bore the brunt of the case load for Covid patients. The Research Institute for Tropical Medicine was also an Imelda project. The CCP Complex bears mute testimony to why Imelda had the structures built as they proved useful when the Philippines hosted the APEC and the ASEAN Summits.
What the public is thinking is even if the Marcos’ stole, the Filipino got something out of it. Contrast this with thirty years in power for the Yellowidiots and the Filipino did not get as much considering there was more to steal.
Support for Marcos is palpable whenever he goes on a motorcade. The people come out to greet or catch a glimpse of him or simply shout “Marcos pa rin.” This is both evident and consistent since last year. Marcos was absent in the Presidential debate last Saturday because in his mind, he is better off campaigning with the people rather than being the object of attrition by his rivals. His Marikina rally drew a huge crowd despite the fact that it rained prior to his and Sara Duterte’s arrival. But the people stayed on.
Contrast this with the Robredo’s grand Pasig rally at Emerald Avenue right smack in the Ortigas Central Business district. 170,000 was their final attendance count. Attendees were hanging out at Podium before it began. Supporters even posted on social media of how they were not paid and having snacks at Wildflour or had dinner at Wolfgang Steak House after the event. The opposition has been touting record attendance at Robredo’s “rally’s” which seem more like free concerts given the bands they have performing and entertainment celebrities as guests. The attendees are not from the D and E. They are mostly ABC.
It would have been different if the rally were held in the heart of Pasig’s slums in Pinagbuhatan. That would have been the best benchmark of support for Robredo.
In contrast, Marcos’ Mandaluyong motorcade passed through 9 de Febrero St. That is the stretch of road which begins at Shaw Boulevard and goes all the way to the Mandaluyong Circle in Boni Avenue where the city hall is. That is mostly D and E.
When will the Yellowidiots ever learn?
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