Labels and Lackeys, Leftists and Land Mines

LABELS Should leftist front organizations of the See-Pee-Pee-En-Pee-Ay be labelled as "communist" for the purposes of the party-list elections in 2007, as National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales suggests? Call a spade a spade as it were?

PDI's Wednesday Editorial thinks that "communist" is a Deadly Label and shrieks "McCarthyism!" even though membership in the Party-That-Must-Not-Be-Named is not even illegal anymore. But they are worried about the following fine distinctions and careful definitions upon which the legitimacy of their own editorial policy often depends--

The terms Left and Right were first used in France during the French Revolution when the aristocrats sat on the right side of the assembly and the commoners sat on the left. From that time on the Right has been associated with ideology that favors an elite social group and the Left has been associated with ideology that favors “the masses.”

Today, “Left” refers to the complex of individuals or organizations that advocate liberal, often radical, measures to bring about change in the established order, especially in politics, to achieve equality, freedom and well-being for the masses. A leftist is a person or group that adheres to the left wing on political issues. A communist is one who believes in a social and economic formation based on a classless social system and public ownership of the means of production.

The point of this is that there ARE no communists really, just "leftists" or "activists" or "militants" or "progressives" who don't have anything at all to do with the "communists" and who don't deserve to smeared as such and thus set up for assassination or liquidation by "death squads." But look what headline and label we find tucked away in the PDI's own Metro Regions section today--

BISHOP HITS COMMUNIST REBELS USE OF LANDMINES

SAN FRANCISCO, Agusan del Sur -- Butuan Bishop Juan de dios Pueblos criticized the New People's Army (NPA) for using landmines, as these could easily kill or maim innocent bystanders.

"I strongly condemn killings using this kind of instrument," Pueblos told reporters here.

Pueblos said the NPA's continued use of landmine had become a "cause of concern" for the Church.

He said he would ask the communist insurgents to stop using the device if he could establish contacts with them. "But the problem now is that I don't know whom to talk to," Pueblos, a member of the Melo Commission, said.

The landmine that exploded and killed the San Luis town police chief and his deputy on Wednesday afternoon was so powerful that it charred the victims' bodies and threw it 45 meters away, police authorities said Thursday.

Somehow, the Bishop and the News Dept has it over PDI Editorial about what the COMMUNISTS really are. Seems like they at least got the deadly label right. It would be a whopper to believe that the communist murderers of the town's police chief and deputy were doing so because they believe in a classless society and were working on the ownership of the means of production! Where do these mysterious communist rebels get their funding to BUY those landmines (they are supposed to be remote controlled for premeditation and button-pushing ease of murder)? Who supports them, defends them propagandizes for them, makes press releases and editorials for them, gives them food, money, ammo, and moral and political support?

The Inquirer editorial contains the kind of insipid reasoning that will be echoed by Leftists who ARE part of the communist insurgency trying violently to overthrow the Constitutional democracy that we have today, and that vast demagagosphere of the media that relies on PDI for toxic things to spew into the air waves. You see, as long as you are not openly calling for a classless society, you are not technically a communist and should not be "smeared" as such by the "McCarthyists."

LACKEYS, the title of PDI's editorial today, is also the LABEL they apply to Justice Sec. Raul Gonzalez, and all the Filipino officials, who, unlike the heroic Judge Benjamin Pozon, are allegedly working as lackeys for US Ambassador Kirstie Kenney in order to possibly free the convicted rapist of Suzette Nicolas, Lance Cpl Daniel Smith. Previously they've labelled Sec. Gonzalez Little Brown Brother to Uncle Sam and other officials Eager Beavers. The paper is now trying to start "a tug of war" between the Philippine Government and the Makati Court over custody of Smith over the VFA. But all that is in process and should be properly adjudicated by the Courts.

On a social and cultural note, regarding lackeys, I'm willing to bet you that Ambassador Kirstie Kenney always did her own laundry before she stepped into the Philippine archipelago, did her own groceries and cared directly for her own children (I am assuming she has some.) But I seriously doubt that Isagani Yambot (Publisher), Letty Magsanoc (editor in chief) or any of the Prieto clan (like the outrageous exhibitionist Tessa Prieto!) that own the Philippine Daily Inquirer have EVER done anything without the use of personal lackeys themselves... dozens of live-in maids, laundresses, household helpers, yayas, chauffers, gardeners, beauticians, etc., and that's only when they are in Manila and not the hacienda! What a friggin' laugh.

If only the ongoing killings were not such a grim and serious business. There IS, after all, a real violent revolution being conducted. PDI has, wittingly or unwittingly, been party to an ongoing deception that these awful deaths and murders among leftist activists and militants are the only ones happening. It is the fallacy of selective attention accomplished by a deliberate campaign to portray the government as murderers of leftists, while the latter and the communists are just trying to make progress for "the masses" against "the class enemy."

Even the Catholic Church has pointed out that it maintains a list not only of "leftist" deaths and disappearances but has collected from local dioceses the reports of the communists depredations and killings, their raids and extortions, their own "killing fields" of comrades suspected of being disloyal to far Utrecht.

We have no use for, or need of, a McCarthyist campaign on the leftists and communists. The people already know who they are. What we really need is more candor from the Left. WHY do they deny they ARE communists or sympathizers? Is it because they know they would then be totally discredited with the People?

UPDATES:

I've added a number of new links to my blogroll here at Philippine Commentary.

Rachel Khan, chair of the UP Journalism Dept. writes Khanterbury Tales in which she has been addressing the Subic Rape Case and various media related ethics questions, such as anonymity of rape victims (and those found innocent of such charges). I think she is a "thoughtful" writer, but that of course remains to be seen.

Marichu Lambino writes Notes with a chaotic but strangely endearing style. She is a lawyer and often appears on ABSCBN News programs as a legal analyst.

Promdi Dot Net is also on the Blogroll. I suspect the writer is actually the International Herald Tribune's Carlo H. Conde, but that is just a guess. Anybody know? Today Promdi says that at midnight, the New York Times will be publishing an article on the Subic Rape Case and US-RP relations.

Comelec's James Jimenez has also been on TV recently and writes a blog, naturally about issues involving the Comission, the elections and poll automation.


Well, and to add some gravitasse Stephen Hawking is linked here too (black holes, general relativity, cosmology, Lou Gehrig's disease).

UPDATE (1500)As predicted earlier today by Promdi there is an article on the Subic Rape case in the New York Times today: Tensions Flare in Philippines Rape Case (bylined Tom Shanker.) It reports as follows--

The commander of American forces in the Pacific announced Thursday that he had canceled a huge annual military exercise with the Philippines in a dispute over custody of a marine lance corporal convicted of raping a local woman.

The commander, Adm. William J. Fallon, said he also would halt aid and reconstruction programs carried out by the American military in the Philippines until he was confident that the troops’ legal rights would be protected under bilateral agreements governing visiting United States forces.

Hmmm...the Subic Rape Case is almost 14 months old, and thus far, there has been NO sign of flagging US support for its programs of training, cooperation, medical and civil reconstruction, education and anti-terrorism activities. The medical ship mission of the USS Mercy to Basilan and other parts of Mindanao has done more to destroy the myths and propaganda of the Islamist terror groups than anything else that has been done thus far. The New York Times, perhaps relying mainly on reading certain local newspapers, may be doing a great disservice to both nations with this article, which, in my opinion, wrongly portrays and grossly exaggerates the actual level of "TENSION". I am not aware of any widespread tension over this issue among the people. It is only with the local Left and their media comrades that this tension appears, in their pickets of judicial proceedings, in their demonstrations and rallies against things that bear little relation to the criminal case at hand, but are only aimed at degrading the relationship between America and the Philippines. The tension is being created by propagandists with an ideological and political agenda.

Filipinos and Americans are entirely united in their condemnation of rape and violence against women and children, but neither nation can claim complete innocence in these regards. Yet there are those that dwell upon in order to exarcerbate those things that divide the two nations, which are indeed, puny and inconsequential compared to the overall relationship between them, to grand and sublime things that actually unite them.

So whatever you are trying to do NY Times:: HO HUM!

What TENSION? Of the 3,000 Filipinas that have been raped by Filipinos since November 1, 2005, (according to National Statistical Board) when the Subic Rape allegedly happened, perhaps not a single one of them will get the justice the "Nicole" has already gotten, precisely because of the Visiting Forces Agreement. People see that, and believe that justice will be done. They are not "tense" over this case.

But no matter what happens in this case, the Left and its media comrades will never let Daniel Smith and Nicole go free. They will always be a battering ram against an historic relationship that has not always been easy or just, but which lought not be bothered by invented "tensions" intended to foment trouble.