After Edsa Dos, I expressed the opinion, mainly in private, that having stepped down, and having avoided bloodshed, Joseph Estrada should be left alone in Greenhills and left to wallow in his riches. Ouster, under the circumstances, was enough. When Edsa Dos forces insisted he should be thrown in jail, again, I expressed reservations on the basis of the country remaining deeply divided, and on the principle that you do not kick a man when he is down. When the pressure to charge him and try him proved irresistible, I cautioned that pending the trial, he should still be allowed to stay in Greenhills, as humiliating him would not serve the interest of justice.
What happened of course was that he was clumsily arrested, and treated in such a manner as to provoke the Edsa Tres revolt. A revolt the forces salivating over his humiliation proved powerless to prevent or even counter. The reformist instincts of the President were swiftly abandoned at that point, when it proved her Civil Society allies couldn’t protect her; instead, the military and the operators shielded her and the inevitable slide to 2003 (her decision to run again), 2004 (the manner in which the campaign was conducted), 2005 (the divorce between the President and what remained of the reformists within her government) and 2006 began.
After having gone against her instincts and ordering the arrest of Estrada, the President always proved ambiguous about the trial and a conviction: from day one, she’d preferred exile as a solution. If that proved impossible, she would be persistent in offering a pardon. Meanwhile, she expressed no dissatisfaction with the trial being dragged out, since a quick resolution of the case wouldn’t do her any good (in the absence of a willingness, on Estrada’s part, to recognize her legitimacy by accepting a pardon from her), and while a drawn-out trial also served Estrada’s purposes (either postponing an inevitable conviction or keeping him in the limelight as some sort of self-styled prisoner of conscience), neither side seemed capable of figuring out what a possible compromise could be.
And so, earlier this year I proposed that Estrada cut the Gordian knot and run for office. It offered up a possibility for the public to resolve something the court was proving unable to do. Estrada preferred to continue posturing from his Tanay rest house. After the election, when it became clear Estrada’s endorsement was not as powerful as people had expected, and when the President for her part, saw the public mood (nationally-speaking) was completely against her, the trial began to move toward a resolution. On the day the verdict was handed down, both Estrada and Arroyo loyalists discovered they stood larger in their own minds than in the eyes of a public that shrugged off Estrada’s conviction. Both saw themselves in the mirror, and didn’t like what they saw: they saw themselves as sliding, inexorably, too, into the has-been column of the political divide.
With neither side having shown themselves as particularly devoted to the law, I felt that the whole thing should be done with, and Estrada pardoned. I did end up qualifying that opinion with a further opinion that a pardon shouldn’t include his taking home the loot. The opinion of Prof. Popoy de Vera struck me, which was, that the Filipino concept of justice is restitution and not retribution -as he later told me, besides that was the public view that Estrada shouldn’t keep his loot, and having been disgraced, he should bow out of politics.
The pardon, as it’s emerged, involves exactly that, and suggests at whom the pardon is aimed, in p.r. terms: the Estrada constituency among the masses. The pardon contains a pledge (whether meaningless or not) that Estrada will not seek elective office, and that he forfeits the properties and monies ordered confiscated by the court.
Estrada, for his part, had angled for nothing less than a full, sweeping pardon. the President, on the other hand, anxious as she was to grant that pardon, had to be able to throw some sort of bone to her constituents and so, made a counter-proposal: Estrada should accept a conditional pardon, the only condition being his being unable to keep the loot (which Estrada, after all, had unblinkingly claimed was never his). What seems to have finally clinched the deal was something personal and not political -the widely-held assumption that Estrada’s mother doesn’t have very much longer left to live.
Add to that the unappetizing prospects, for the Estrada, of continued detention (however pleasant it is, but from his perspective still an intolerable situation), his being unsure of whether he would secure the overturning of the verdict on appeal, and the chance that a future government might not be anxious to pander to him the way the President has, and you can well imagine why Estrada would want to settle things now, and forget any chance to achieve a proper vindication. Add to this, finally, the pending transfer of Estrada to New Bilibid prisons: being fingerprinted in an orange jumpsuit, shaved of his Elvis-style pompadour, having to endure a jail cell.
You can imagine, too, that the President, beset on all sides by problems of her own making, and who never wanted things to reach this point, anyway, would want to settle matters, too, and her willingness to take one more gamble by saying she’d allow his being sent to Bilibid.
And so, they sealed the deal.
I am not surprised by the pardon, and I’m generally inclined to look at it the way Torn & Frayed does (he opposed amnesty, though I think amnesty would have been more politically acceptable all around), but I think it does leave a little room for further interpretation.
It tells us that the President has more to gain in terms of good will from the Estrada constituency than she has to lose from Edsa Dos forces who will be angry, upset, and shocked, but who in the end lack what matters most to the President: numbers, in terms of votes, and a willingness to make those numbers count, whether in terms of public protests or going to the polls.That political math has been clear since May, 2001: and the losers here are the Edsa Dos veterans who are shocked and appalled, only now, not least because the folly of their support for the President has been exposed, not to the President but to themselves. As far as Estrada’s supporters are concerned he made the best out of a raw deal.
But it also tells us that Estrada is permanently incapable of saving anything beyond his own hide. In the end he had to kneel and beg for mercy from a President he’d never recognized as legitimate; he would not risk vindicating himself in the courts, the ultimate demonstration of his disbelieving his own rhetoric. He can always say what does it profit a man, if he is unable to bury his mother as a free man? As far as that goes, he’s right; but he would have been allowed to bury her anyway, but he could not allow himself to endure the prospects of the Supreme Court upholding his conviction, or worse, his being hauled off to Muntinlupa to endure the kind of imprisonment regularly endured by his constituents.
In the strange, because almost mystical, way our society manages to see rays of sunshine, public opinion had finally welcomed Estrada’s conviction as closure to the great divisions of 2001. His supporters could proclaim him a willing martyr; his critics could view it as vindication. Estrada and Arroyo both managed to deny that closure to both, and that’s the reason there’s public dissatisfaction. at least withing Edsa Dos and some Edsa Tres circles, with the deal.
One comment I heard, from some Edsa Dos veterans, was, “and he didn’t even spend a single day in jail.” I understand some Estrada supporters were upset, too, because their idol caved in and left them twisting in the wind, proclaiming the illegitimacy of an administration from which Estrada himself decided to seek a pardon only a legitimate president can grant.
What this has achieved is that it has simply reshuffled the deck chairs on the Titanic. The President removed the chains keeping steerage from joining the First Class passengers on the deck of the sinking ship. Those astute enough to realize the ship’s doomed long ago fired the distress rockets and clambered into lifeboats.
In a nation where symbolism trumps substance, Estrada never had to suffer for his rhetoric, the President never gave the legal process to reach its final conclusion; there wasn’t even a token effort at proving justice could be tempered with mercy; instead, mercenary calculations were passed off as executive mercy. But, as Amang Rodriguez so famously said, “in the long of time, we shall success.”
Much as everyone saw the pardon coming, what I don’t think anyone outside of official circles expected was for it to be used so crudely, so patently politically: a historic verdict required a historic demonstration of presidential statesmanship; instead, it was a tool used to blunt the effects of embarrassing headlines resulting from the Senate hearing; and it was a brusque dismissal of those who, all these eventful years, stubbornly insisted on giving the President the benefit of the doubt because she had to be, somehow, better than her predecessor.
What happens next? It remains to be seen whether Estrada will be grateful to Arroyo, and whether a new Arroyo-Estrada alliance is in the making. I can only hope so. It relieves the opposition of the burden of having to maintain an uneasy peace with the Estrada forces, and finally offers up the prospects for the veterans of Edsa 1 and 2 to reunite.
Then again, it may also give Estrada a new lease on political life. But the damage has been done; a free man, Estrada is free to return to engaging in his vices in full public view, and to prove himself ungrateful and incapable of doing anything for those who loyally stood by his side since his fall from power.
If Estrada were to run for the presidency again, he would lose. But he can begin investing, quite heavily, in the political futures of his sons. What that future is, remains to be seen. now he is just another ex-president. He has achieved his aims, and how minimal they turned out to be. There is nothing left for him to do, not least because who, now, will follow him after his kneeling before the President?
And as for the President, it’s back to the War Room because so many other fights still need to be fought, and any relief she obtains always proves increasingly temporary. Tuesday and Wednesday night, apparently, neophyte congressmen were brought to the Palace for their egos to be stroked. Last night, a larger meeting of all non-opposition congressmen was held at the Palace, ostensibly to survey the political situation, but possibly to consider the party line concerning the President’s cash gifts, since the governors already came up with their own excuse.
Jove Francisco chronicles how reporters found out about the pardon, which wasn’t expected to be announced until Friday. Reporters apparently take their cue from how the President color-codes her dresses: if she’s in blue, you know she’s in crisis mode. Also, Jove mentions a gathering of the Cabalens in the Palace, which made for a surreal scene:
I heard some people who witnessed the event comment that the event was a bad idea. That it won’t help their cabalen-PGMA any bit. Imagine, here’s a President who has been distancing herself from the payola issue, and then here are Mayors saying stuff like “they need the controversial cash gifts” … inside the palace mismo. In bad taste, at sino man daw nag isip, – malamang di nag iisip. Ill advised, ika nga.
As for the goings on in the Palace bunker, word is that Sec. Bunye’s assumption of the role of Acting Executive Secretary is in preparation for his assuming the role in a more permanent capacity, which is why two deputy presidential spokesmen have been appointed; Sec. Ermita, according to scuttlebutt has been given a one-way ticket to America, and before he left, he told his people to start packing their things.
The reason the announcement of the pardon was moved to Thursday, instead of Friday, when the Palace prefers to make big announcements so it has the weekend to survey the scene and gage public reaction, is chronicled in turn by Uniffors. It’s a great read. And explains why the Palace dispensed with its only make breaking news as the weekend starts rule of thumb.
For a roundup of blogger’s reactions to the pardon, see tonyocruz.com.
Technorati Tags: Edsa, philippines, politics, president
Oo nga naman, there is just so much hypocrisy here. Bakit nga ba si Bencard lang ang nag iingay noon na wag eh pardon si Erap. Nang nangayari na , biglang andami rin palang ayaw sa pardon? A little too late though. Hindi naman pwedeng bawiin ang pardon. Eh di smells blood nga! hmmmm
equalizer, guess another “fodder for your cannon”, huh? my capampangan friend was dictating it to me and i thought it was “f” instead of “p” (lovl). seriously, it was my typo (again). thanks.
bencard: just wanted to make you laugh! have nice weekend!
Nabuhayan ulit si Bencard. Recovered from the shock of bribes in Malacanan and the ZTE kickbacks.
Now he has an issue – “where were all of you when pardon for erap was just being proposed?”
Naknampucha naman Bencard,
Kung nagprotesta ang BW nung pinopropose pa lang ang pardon sasabihin mo wala pang nangyayari galit na kayo.
Hindi ba yan din ang linya ng mga maka-Gloria about ZTE, “nacancel na nga bakit gusto pa ninyo imbestigahan?”
Sala sa init sala sa lamig.
Instead of attacking BW for acting when the pardon was granted, why don’t you defend the pardon?
Why don’t you justify prosecuting Erap for plunder if there was no intention to punish him for it pala? Six years in detention during trial and then after a guilty verdict the felon is pardoned even before he serves a day of his sentence.
Wadapak is going on man? Hindi mo ba kaya panindigan ang kabalastugan ng pardon?
“”Salamat kay Pangulong Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo sa pagbigay ng executive clemency at kung hindi niya ako binigyan ng executive clemency ay hindi niyo ako kaharap ngayong gabi. Kaya pasalamatan natin siya. Palakpakan natin siya (Thanks to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo for giving me executive clemency because without it, I would not be with you here tonight. So let’s thank her. Let’s applaud her),” he said.INQUIRER”
Erap is certainly no Nelson Mandela! He should resume his acting career.
“Oppositon”Senators Villar and Escudero praised GMA for the Erap pardon.
“Administration” Senators Gordon and Arroyo used strong words in airing their opposition to the move.
What’s happening?
Thank you for the pardon.
I promised you I would recognize you as president and I would reconcile with you if you pardoned me….
Ngunit naalala mo ba yun deal ni Ninoy kay Imelda kung papayagan siya magpaopera sa America?
Kung nakalimutan mo na yun, eh don’t worry, papaalala ko sa iyo sa mga susunod na araw…..
Ano kaya? Abangan….
buencamino, please read my posts in the preceding thread and the ones cited by your friends concerning my puny (almost lonely) advocacy against the pardon. maybe a protest march after the conviction, and when pardon was being “negotiated”, was too much to ask. but you know, as well as i, that there was hardly an expression of opposition against it either in this blog or in the holier-than-thou media. i can name a few brave souls expressing disgust over the idea, eg., the C’at, Rego, Rom, Geo, etc., etc., but i don’t remember if you ever did.
i was hoping that there would be a firestorm of indignation when puno went to erap’s camp to “negotiate” the proposed pardon, then came out with the announcement that deal was already “plantsado”, and erap would be “home” before christmas. but there was none.
now, just look at you and the people around you. you guys make me sick!
Tsokolet on, “In other words, with the fact that they won’t serve their sentence, our fight for graft and corruption will go useless….so where should we proceed from here if that will be the case? I guess the Judicial branch should intervene and give a fair and acceptable judgment.”
Judicial intervention is not possible. Judiciary is bound by constitution that the President can pardon.
Apparently, we have 2 brands of justice. The first one is the natural course of law that rightfully convicted Estrada on plunder. The second one is political dispensation given to the President by the Constitution in pardon or commutation.
If there is anything to be changed, it is the constitutional provision giving the President the political pardon. Justice should stay at Judiciary, not the Executive branch.
This is more of a reason to change the constitution and discard political dispensation or pardon.
I am still waiting.
Errr
In order to have another edsa 2 make it a one big party. I went there nung edsa 2 dahil madaming libre at merong party atmosphere talaga. Pero pag yung talagang rally para sa prinsipyo huwag na natin bolahin pa ang ating mga sarili.
Nadala lang naman tayo ng kung ano ano nung andun na tayo sa edsa pero makikipag pustahan ako kung hindi lang dahil sa mga forwarded na text at kung ano anong balita na pare libre beer sa edsa! at libre din goldilocks e baka wala talagang pumunta. Sabihin na natin sinuportahan ng simbahan pero sigurado ba kayong dahil sa lakas ng appeal ni cardinal sin kaya me pumunta dun? Simple utos lang ng simbahan hindi pa natin masunod minsan yun pa kayang baka pupunta ka sa edsa para samahan si padre damaso?
Pasalamat tayo at medyo matatapos na ang erap saga. Sabihin nyo na ang lahat ng pwede nyong sabihin pero erap is the better man than most of us. Kung gago ba talaga sya e di dapat madugo sana ang edsa dos dahil meron ng rebellion, mutiny at treason na nangyayare. Isama mo pa ang mga kumunista na kala mo kung gaano kalinis. Baket walang dugong naganap kung talagang gago yung tao? kita mo ngayon ASAN KAYO NUNG NARINIG NYO NA ANG MGA PANDARAYA AT KUNG ANO ANONG KAGAGUHAN? puro dakdak ng dakdak sa mga blogs.
Magising kayo sa katotohanan. Andaming pagkakataon para matanggal si ginang arroyo pero asan kayo nung kailangan ng mga kung sino sino ng suporta?
Ang pardon ay nararapat lamang para sa isang tao na talaga naman pinag tulungan lamang ng mga matataas na tao at ng mga college graduate dahil hindi matanggap na ang isang hindi nakapagtapos ay pwedeng maging pangulo ng bansa. Ang pardon ay kabayaran lamang sa pagiging nde mainitin ng ulo ng isang makapangyarihan na tao para mag deklara ng pagdanak ng dugo. at isa pa, mga pinoy tayo. Madali lang naman tayo makalimot eh.
“Honestly speaking, I admire Erap for standing up and facing the truth for all its worth he’s one helluva brave person
yet…
I do not agree with Erap’s pardon If justice is to be served righteously and equally to each and everyone…” . Floyd Buenavente.
if an intelligent creature from mars stumbled upon these god-forsaken islands of ours, it would be amazed at how people, especially in this blog, could talk from both sides of their mouth.
I think Bencard, one thing you ought to consider seriously before you start galloping away with wild suggestions and counter punches, the reason why people weren’t really reacting to Gloria’s threat of pardon for Erap which I know was such a let down for lot of people especially you who have showed her unflinching support (but honestly, t’was no let down for me because I’ve always known Gloria was and can not be trusted with anything) was that few believed that Gloria would do it or be able to do it so quickly and be able to present it as a fait accomplit to the unsuspecting publifc — all in the midst of a plate of scandals including a blast that people thougt was a terrorist act. And as if by magic, it was there — heh!
Sure, I will agree that your favourite Gloria Macapagal has done it again, put one over everyone when everybody least suspected it, and as I once quipped, wonder if she had built in distress sensors… but doesn’t make her any more trustworthy or more honest than you would like and have always liked to give her credit for.
Having said that, there is really nothing to comment about the ‘pardon’; as far as I’m concerned, Erap and Gloria belong to the same mould, the deceitful, shameless, lying trapo mould, the same dirty, despicable breed of political despots. They deserve both to be kicked out of the political stage together — their political melodramas are ugly and quite honestly, their political acting is simply revolting.
Although I must say, I should be less harsh with Erap because I heard that he’s gonna use his free time now doing a remake of “Lintik lang ang walang ganti” (that Manuel Buencamino perhaps might be alluding to in his comment?) that would make contravida Gloria Arroyo swoon to destruction. But even the prospect of seeing a Gloria completely dumped at the till for a low class act, it’s the sheer principle! I don’t like watching political has beens continuing to make fun of and insisting on poking their lil dirty fingers in honest people’s lives…
Those two despots should just get lost…
They both make me sick! Yuck!
Meawhile, cheers to you Bencard, I sincerely suggest that you not take all these political melodramas involving megastars Gloria and Erap seriously.
To one and all — Advance Happy Halloween!
folks, save all your energies till 2010. that’s were the big battle is. the erap pardon is not the spark that everyone’s been waiting for.
grd on, “folks, save all your energies till 2010. that’s were the big battle is. the erap pardon is not the spark that everyone’s been waiting for.”
Exactly!
I may add watch out for military factor, they are out there wielding their famous withdrawal of support to get large share of the budget. Think of the 2008 P30 billion pension of nonperforming retired generals while everybody fighting for budget leftovers.
“proclaiming the illegitimacy of an administration from which Estrada himself decided to seek a pardon only a legitimate president can grant.”
President Arroyo must be SMILING even when she sleeps.
What can you offer after EDSA whatever number it may be ?
When you go to war, you should have a game plan. Eh ang sainyo, sugod lang. Sus, makatulog na lang. O eto ang dollar, mag-isip ka muna kung may sasama sainyo.
speaking of corruption, read this news item…
this only shows, these days, corruption exists even in america. but the big difference is how america confronts the perpetrators. sabi nga ni erap, ‘walang kama-kamag-anak, walang kai-kaibigan!’. pero sa pinas, basta kakosa, okey lang. at kung marami ka nang pera, kaya mo nang bilhin ang mga kalaban mo. sa tamang presyo, tameme na agad. kaya ayun, puro balimbing na politicians ang bunga ng hinayupak na sistema sa pinas.
“GMA said she knew her decision “will be debated, welcomed and criticized,” but said “now, we all have to move on.”
“I believe that history will vindicate not only this executive act but also my innocence,” ERAP said.”
Here we come again, mmmm-mm-mm
Catch us if you can, mmmm-mm-mm
Timefor us to move on, mmmm-mm-mm
We will yell with all of our might
Catch us if you can
Catch us if you can
Catch us if you can
Catch us if you can
Now we gotta run, mmmm-mm-mm
No more time for fun, mmmm-mm-mm
When you’re getting angry, mmmm-mm-mm
We will yell with all of our might
Catch us if you can
Catch us if you can
Catch us if you can
“Then again, it may also give Estrada a new lease on political life.”
mlq3, there are actually two conditions, the other being Erap cannot engage in politics again. This condition is in this: “WHEREAS, Joseph Ejercito Estrada has publicly committed to no longer seek any elective position or office”
As Fr. Bernas pointed out in his column today, the accepted jurisprudence is that violation of the condition of pardon forfeits the benefits of the pardon. And the interpretation of whether the condition of the pardon has been violated belongs solely to the President.
So, Erap can enter politics again only at the risk of forfeiting his pardon. Looks like GMA still holds a gun to his temple.
Dave Clark Five
by proxy, nandyan si jinggoy, jude, loi, etc. hawak nila ang san juan. ganyan lang yan. kanya-kanyang teritoryo. ang mga binay, ayaw na ring pakawalan ang makati. di ba sabi ni erap, campaign leader pa rin siya? hindi naman elective position iyan di ba?
Profile of Two Leaders:
Joseph Estrada(Philippines)
Estrada has served more than six years in detention — six years and six months to be exact, as Estrada himself has pointed out. But where was he detained? First in an air-conditioned suite at the Veterans Memorial Medical Center in Quezon City, and then at his own well-appointed rest house in Tanay town, outside Manila — both hardly anyone’s idea of a prison.
Nelson Mandela(South Africa)
Nelson Mandela was imprisoned on Robben Island where he remained for the next eighteen of his twenty-seven years in prison. On the island, he and others performed hard labour in a lime quarry. Prison conditions were very basic. Prisoners were segregated by race, with black prisoners receiving the fewest rations.
Only if society pay attention to the writing on the wall.
Bencard, I made my stand agst Erap’s pardon a long time ago. even b4 the idea was floated in the media.
at GMA’s speech in front of businessmen where she justified Erap’s pardon, she emphasized 70 y/o and a dying mother as reasons for the pardon.
with those reasons, she should’ve included the soldiers convicted of Ninoy’s assassination. im sure all of them are past 70 y/o and have even outlived most of their loved ones.
in fact, if those were the only qualifications to getting pardon, all 70 yr olds can have a crime spree and expect pardon. then they can have their mothers poisoned to fulfill the next qualification.
dpat wala na akong makita pang past 70 y/0 sa kulungan.
The Probe Team or iWitness can both make documentaries of convicts more deserving of pardon than Erap and let’s see how GMA justifies their stay in prison. prolly something like this: but what can I get from them? you see, in everything the Mole do, the Mole only asks one question: what’s in it for the Mole?
ambabaw ng pucha talaga! the only way i can even contemplate pardon for Erap is if he even remotely shows remorse and ask for forgiveness. eh kahit yon wala eh! proud to the end ang gago. ang sarap saksakin habang nagtatalumpati kagabi.
These are the worst of times, but alas, these are the best of times.
Goodnight ladies and gentlemen for now I go and lay myself to sleep and in the cool wintery bliss I tonight will dream about the NBN deals, the Latest Bribery Scandals under the noses of the Guardians of thy Kingdom, the pardon of the Plunderer for the reason known only to the Queen, the unresolved Fertilizer Scams, the still ongoing “ helloGarci†and all who disappeared and not to be seen again and in the Morning I will awake and thanks myself and all mankind, all was just a Bad Dream.
“if an intelligent creature from mars stumbled upon these god-forsaken islands of ours, it would be amazed at how people, especially in this blog, could talk from both sides of their mouth.”
Bencard
one word. “PRAGMATIC” deal with it hehehe
siguro nga may pagka pantas itong si Manolo sa mga blogpost title nya. una yung kinaumagahan sumambulat na yung pagsabog sa G2. sumunod naman etong The Gathering Storm. And sure enough, me bagyong papalapit nga sa Pilipinas. lols.
“These are the worst of times, but alas, these are the best of times.Brian”
true!Desperate housewife clinging to power BUT days are numbered.End stage now.
siguro nga may pagka pantas itong si Manolo sa mga blogpost title nya. una yung COA Audit Bombshell, kinaumagahan sumambulat na yung pagsabog sa G2. sumunod naman etong The Gathering Storm. And sure enough, me bagyong papalapit nga sa Pilipinas. lols.
i doubt that will happen.
The Dots are getting connected very FAST…
-Jarius writes expose…
-Mike goes abroad(day before Senate hearing on ZTE)…
-Joey DV reveals details of ZTE mega scandal…
-Neri confirms Abalos bribe attempt…
-Abalos resigns…
-Impeach me filed…
-ZTE deal suspended/junked…
-Congressmen received bribes…
-Governors received bribes…
-GMA immunized…
-JDV under ouster threat…
-Ayala mall “big fartâ€Â…
-Erap pardoned …
What’s NEXT to divert our attention from HER scandals(note:one headline-grabbing event per week now!)
Gloria can use all the diversionary tactics. But still its up to the people if they want to be diverted or not.
ikaw ba na divert ka ?
FOCUS!
Yep, the Ayala bomb wasn’t meant to kill as massively as it did. I’m fairly convinced. MRT stations are far better targets, if your intention is to manufacture dead bodies, though I assume there are plainclothes officers there.
Bencard,
There’s a firestorm of indignation now. Kaya nga sinabi ko sa iyo na to you anything the anti-Gloria forces do is sala sa init, sala sa lamig.
I ignored the pre-pardon events because I believed the ZTE scandal and the Palace cash gifts should be our main focus, then and now.
I was not going to allow Erap to distract me from the real task of fighting ongoing corruption to focus corruption that occured in the past. Why ignore the thief who is in the process of robbing your house to go after someone who can’t rob you anymore? Everything at its proper time dude.
Yes, that’s one of those contingencies.
the resignation of erap was based on angara’s account. the pardon of erap was based on his lawyer’s appeal, not his. welcome to the way philippine justice is dispensed–decision by substitution.
for the record bencard, my stand has always been consistent: edsa2 was a texter’s party. i can’t be had in all this moro-moro.
pardon or no pardon, am with mb. “Why ignore the thief who is in the process of robbing your house to go after someone who can’t rob you anymore?”. somewhere in this chase, someone is deliberately trying to ignore the thief by the bedside. guezz whoooooo?
pandering to what is perceived to be estrada’s still potent political clout is like surrendering to political blackmail. it is an act of cowardice. pgma should be mindful of history. his great father was much-criticized for allowing the deportation of harry stonehill before the government had a chance to convict him of massive corruption. she should avoid the same harsh judgment of history. – Bencard at October 23rd, 2007 at 9:57 am in “Evidence (Updated) entry
i really don’t know why erap [was pardoned.] i guess it was kind of like paying a ransom when your most beloved son’s life is at stake. whatever pgma’s real reason is, we probably will never know. it’s in her conscience and she will live and die with it. as i commented a few posts ago, one of her biggest failure is the inability to win over her enemies’ supporters to her side, or at least cooperate with her. maybe, just maybe, this will do the trick, for the general good. in such a case, the end justifies the means, i think. – Bencard at October 25th, 2007 at 11:06 pm in “The Gathering Storm†entry
if an intelligent creature from mars stumbled upon these god-forsaken islands of ours, it would be amazed at how people, especially in this blog, could talk from both sides of their mouth. (copy-pasted from, who else, Bencard, October 27th, 2007 at 3:03 am)
President Arroyo doesn’t need to win her enemies’ supporters to her side, but prove to them that they are on the wrong side..but was she able to do it? No. Instead she compounded her troubles by proving otherwise and her enemies multiply, yet she was able to survive for the remaining “loyalists” are paid with handsome ransoms of silver and gold, mostly in U.S. dollars…very hard to launder the pesos and they will remain loyal as long as the ransom keep pouring like honey from the skies or from the Treasury or from Loans..
“What was done to us last night by GMA was a humungous insult. What she did last night was indefensible. And downright paranoid. We mourn with all of you who are just as hurt and revolted.
And yes, we are proud that Manolo is a co-convenor of Black & White. Helga
mlq3,
just for the record, are you hurt and insulted with what GMA did re pardon of estrada?
ay_naku, who would have figured that Bencard would be our very own Hamlet… 😀
grd. me? personally? no. why should i be hurt and insulted, when she’s being true to form?
what is happening is that things are getting clearer, and what may have been clear to a few in the past is clear to more, now.
Well, we are overdue for a big earthquake.
manolo:Hi! do you think the Palace gang can sustain its diversionary tactics to draw away public attention from the ZTE deal?
“i really don’t know why erap [was pardoned.] i guess it was kind of like paying a ransom when your most beloved son’s life is at stake. whatever pgma’s real reason is, we probably will never know.”
maybe bencard will never know because he’s been living in his alternate universe.
ang linaw-linaw ng reasons e… unless you have a business interest in government and a relative whose job depends on the survival of the Arroyo regime. Talagang malabo nga kung ganun.
But how clear is it?
1. Gloria Arroyo could not make the ‘Hello Garci’ issue go away. It has been a festering wound that continues to emit its stink and undermine her claims at legitimacy. Gloria has to placate Erap and his loyalists by granting a swift pardon, para naman mabawasan ang mga kalaban, parami kasi nang parami e. The idiot that Erap is, he now calls Gloria his President after calling her a usurper and ‘de facto President’ during his six-year detention. Get the point?
2. The ZTE scandal is pushing her administration closer to the precipice. Kitang-kita na ang pagkagahaman nila ng kanyang asawa and now that the scandal has exploded, they need something, anything – even an ‘accidental’ explosion in some posh mall – to take the heat off of them. Estrada’s pardon was a ‘masterful stroke’ in diversion especially if the whole idea of the plan is to buy time, which of course is the only plan that Gloria has.
To those people crying for proof that Gloria has a hand in the ZTE scandal, what do you think was Neri’s reason for invoking executive privilege?
If hindi niya alam ang overpricing at diskarte sa kickback ng asawa niya, why wont she allow Neri to talk? She ordered Neri to refuse Abalos’ bribe but allowed the deal to push through anyway (you can’t deny this because your president herself confirmed this while she was in India). At the very least, she is culpable here of abetting bribery. She’s indirectly pushing an onerous deal which is grossly disadvantageous to the government, so you have to ask yourself ala Manuel Buencamino
“Wadapak is my President doing?”
Ang malinaw sa akin, nagmamadali nang mangurakot si Mike at Gloria dahil they know the end is near. E ang kaso, nabulilyaso pa dahil meron na namang whistleblower at ang masakit pa e galing sa kanila mismong ‘inner circle’. Hassle si JDV3, dumulas pa ang $70M ni Mike. Tsk, tsk, tsk…pera na, natanso pa. buking!
If that still isn’t clear to you, you have to ask yourself: “Wadapak is da matter wit me?”
Will we get used to this Asiatic yin-yang morality where every action has its good and bad side?
buencamino, nice try. the way i see it, you SECRETLY wished erap to be pardoned, but could not go public about it because of your ostentatious “outrage” regarding gma’s conjectural and speculative “corruption. now that the pardon has been done, you can shout from the highest mountain that you oppose the pardon. ain’t it so, dude?