Our problems are definitely mental!The Philippine Right took a page out of the book written by the Philippine Left on the Blame Game in which even our own self-inflicted scourges are made to appear to be the fault of greedy foreigners and capitalists. In both cases it is a matter of deflecting blame where the blame belongs (mainly to themselves, really). I refer to the JPE-Miriam Santiago-Joker Arroyo Comedy Session last week with the Joint Foreign Chambers of Commerce on the subject of a letter written by the latter to the President. In it several thousand local and foreign companies opined that amending the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA), in midflight as it were, would send absolutely the wrong signals to international investment community. JPE's browbeating and bullying of poor Mssr. Hubert d'Aboville (representative of the European Chamber of Commerce) culminated with JPE's triumphal declaration that "You see, you cannot OUT-THINK a Filipino." To which Mssr. d'Aboville agreed with understated elegance by saying, "Yes, I know, since I am married to a Filipina." (This really jammed the avuncular former martial law administrator's truly insincere populist ranting upon the realization that he may be talking to someone who actually loves the Philippines more than anyone else in that room.) Miriam Santiago, thankfully didn't flip her wig this time, or make racist remarks, or some other outrageous declaration. Boy, she better not make it to that International Court of Justice, or we shall never be able to hold our heads up high where decent human beings might take us for her countrymen and women. It does not occur to these geniuses of course, that it is precisely this behavior and attitude that has resulted in the Philippines perpetually dead last in foreign direct investments. Just as an illustrative example, take Vietnam which got 15 billion dollars last year and compare that to the Philippines' measly 2 billion dollar inflow.
This incident proves once more the hypothesis that the canonical nationalist explanation for the failures of successive Philippine leaders, major institutions, and perhaps nationalism itself most often comes in the form of someone's else's faults and actions. It is an indispensable grievance. An interesting reflection on this is The End of Empire written by Englishman Denis W. Brogan in 1960. I recorded it for the Internet Archive:
MP3s: FM CD
This incident proves once more the hypothesis that the canonical nationalist explanation for the failures of successive Philippine leaders, major institutions, and perhaps nationalism itself most often comes in the form of someone's else's faults and actions. It is an indispensable grievance. An interesting reflection on this is The End of Empire written by Englishman Denis W. Brogan in 1960. I recorded it for the Internet Archive:
MP3s: FM CD
6 comments:
ahahahah! the three stooges no less! that really says it all ;)
The communists Vietnamese can out-think the Filipino rightists.
Can someone please explain why writing a letter deserves senate scrutiny?
I write letters all the time to "my" local MP here and I'm not even a citizen...even they reply courteously. Even the Queen, (ok, her secretary) replies.
I thought the Philippines is a democracy.
This is really a good one DJ, but guess what I think this kind of bruha errr brouhaha is what they get for getting former leftist turned extreme materialist like Alex Magno thus the perverted leftist stance when they thought it will serve their purpose, hahaha.
so now you hating on enrile again, djb?
one day you love him, the next day you hate him.
John,
In 1972, when Ferdinand Marcos arrested me on the first day of martial law, JPE was my official jailor, and FVR, the custodian.
And in the oceans there are sharks,
while in the air, are birds of prey.
When you blog, is it really all a matter of love and hate with you?
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