Skip to main content

Tatay Erap's Choices

I re-posted the Inquirer exclusive report on the eight senatorial candidates of the Opposition that President Erap Estrada announced today.

I am happy to see that my friends are there -- broadcast journalist and former Leyte Rep. Ted Failon, Bukidnon Rep. TG Guingona, Genuine Opposition spokesman and PLM President Atty Adel Tamano, and San Juan Mayor JV Ejercito.

I am also glad to note that their candidacies are very strong. Both sons of President Erap were named, although I think Sen. Jinggoy is the one running for re-election while Mayor JV will run as Congressman of San Juan. Either way, both sons are sure to win their respective seats. There are still five-six slots vacant in this 12-person slate of the Opposition. I hope they fill it with people who are not trapos, who are not between 70 and death, whose names are cleaner than Joy dishwashing liquid, because the list they just released is a damned good one.

Compare this strong list with that of the Lakas-CMD, and you could feel it in your bones that 2010 would really be a banner year for the Opposition. As I have said earlier, only Kumareng Miriam Defensor Santiago and Mr. Vilma Santos (Ralph Recto) will win. Even Bong Revilla will have a difficult time squeezing himself in the magic 12. As for Lito Lapid. Forget na 'yan.

But the word "Opposition" still has to be analyzed, a job I am sure our political pundits are up to doing. I just know that the Nacionalista Party (NP) is also fielding its own list of 12 senators. Of that, only my friend Cavite Rep. Gilbert Remulla is the one I know. Sen. Pia Cayetano might leave Lakas (she should, Downey ad or no Downey ad) and join the NP where her brother, Alan, ran in the last elections. So dalawa pa lang ang knows ko dito sa grupong ito.

And how about the Liberal Party?

Hmmmmm.

Kris Aquino said she would run in 2007, but gave way to her brother Noynoy. I helped distribute the campaign paraphernalia of Noynoy last May, and the ones snapped up in the depressed areas where the ones showing the radiant, white face of Kris. So if our English major at the Ateneo does indeed run, I am sure she will top the elections miles and miles away from the rest of the candidates.

And since Noynoy is with LP, of course Kris will run in that party. Who else? Of course, Manong Frank Drilon will surely run. Manong Frank is quietly doing the rounds all over the country. Who else? My friend Korina Sanchez is doing very very very well in the in-house surveys. If she runs, dalawang K na ito -- Kris and Korina. Erin Tanada might run, along with Cory Quirino. For Sister Cory, I propose a winning platform -- eternal youth.

Who could say no that?

I am sure even the deathless characters in the novels of Anne Rice would agree that this is the most powerful platform of all.

Comments

cesario minor, jr. said…
sir, i love the term "deathless." :)
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Five Poems by Danton Remoto

In the Graveyard Danton Remoto The walls round the graveyard Are ancient and cracked. The moss is too thick they look dark. The paint on my grandfather’s tomb Has the color of bone. Two yellow candles we lighted, Then we uttered our prayers. On my left, somebody’s skull Stares back at me: a black Nothingness in the eyes. The graveyard smells of dust Finer than the pore of one’s skin— Dust mixed with milk gone sour. We are about to depart When a black cat darts Across our path, quickly, With a rat still quivering In its mouth. * Immigration Border Crossing (From Sadao, Thailand to Bukit Changloon, Malaysia) Danton Remoto On their faces that betray No emotion You can read the unspoken Questions: Are you really A Filipino? Why is your skin Not the color of padi ? Your eyes, Why are they slanted Like the ones Who eat babi ? And your palms, Why are there no callouses Layered like th...
Post a Comment
Read more

A mansion of many languages

BY DANTON REMOTO, abs-sbnNEWS.com/Newsbreak | 10/16/2008 1:00 AM REMOTE CONTROL In 1977, my mentor, the National Artist for Literature and Theater Rolando S. Tinio, said: “It is too simple-minded to suppose that enthusiasm for Filipino as lingua franca and national language of the country necessarily involves the elimination of English usage or training for it in schools. Proficiency in English provides us with all the advantages that champions of English say it does – access to the vast fund of culture expressed in it, mobility in various spheres of the international scene, especially those dominated by the English-speaking Americans, participation in a quality of modern life of which some features may be assimilated by us with great advantage. Linguistic nationalism does not imply cultural chauvinism. Nobody wants to go back to the mountains. The essential Filipino is not the center of an onion one gets at by peeling off layer after layer of vegetable skin. One’s experience with onio...
1 comment
Read more

Taboan: Philippine Writers' Festival 2009

By John Iremil E. Teodoro, Contributor The Daily Tribune 02/26/2009 A happy and historical gathering of wordsmiths with phallocentric and Manila-centric overtones *** This is from my friend, the excellent poet and critic John Iremil Teodoro, who writes from the magical island of Panay. I wish I have his energy, his passion and his time to write. Writing needs necessary leisure. But this budding, bading politician has shifted his directions. On this day alone, I have to attend not one, not two, but three political meetings. And there goes that new poem out of the window. Sigh. *** According to Ricardo de Ungria, a poet of the first magnitude and the director of Taboan: The Philippine International Writers Festival 2009, “the original idea was for a simple get together of writers from all over the country who have been recipients, directly or indirectly, of grants and awards from the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA). What happened last Feb. 11 to 13 was far from being ...
2 comments
Read more