TODAY marks the 20th day of the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. In the coming days Putin will unveil his endgame. Thousands will be dead and those that fled the cities are the lucky ones. Kyiv, Kharkiv, Lviv and Odessa will be reduced to rubble, proverbially comparable to when Tokyo and Japanese cities were firebombed, systematically killing civilians toward the end of World War 2. More Japanese were killed from the two atomic bombs dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki that ended the war.

These two scenarios are different for both countries — America in 1945 and Ukraine in 2022 — yet paradoxically similar. America didn't want American boys to die in hordes by invading the Japanese homeland. US forces know only too well the resolve of a desperate people when American blood flowed, and precious lives wasted in what was to be considered pyrrhic victories for American forces in Iwo Jima and Okinawa. The iconic image of the Marines raising the American flag in the summit of Mount Suribachi belies the fact that America did not have the stomach for 7,000 Americans dead and another 20,000 wounded out of 70,000 who fought for 36 days. True, the Japanese were annihilated almost to a man with only a handful alive against the 21,000 Japanese dead. But the price of American victories was unacceptable. Thus, the firebombing and the atomic bombs

In contrast, America will not shed blood for Ukraine. No "boots on the ground"! With its NATO allies, the US will simply arm Ukraine, encourage it to resist, and Russian and Ukraine boys will die. Victims all for a surrogate war for democracy. Not a drop of American blood spilled. But this act by America and NATO using Eastern Europeans to butcher each other is pushing Putin into a corner. Putin will not allow Russian boys to die in hordes in a protracted war with Ukraine. Putin has alternatives at his disposal, one of which is almost unthinkable. But as a superb poker player, Putin has gone "all-in" and put his nuclear options in play. But nuclear war will not happen. Putin understands only too well the theory of mutual assured destruction (MAD). American resolve is no match for Putin's when this war is being waged at Russia's borders. Russia will win. America, true to its democratic principles and concepts of freedom, will allow the blood of Ukraine and Russia to flow for the very concepts America holds dear.

Antecedents

John Mearsheimer, an American political scientist, is featured in a widely distributed video clip examining the antecedents of the Ukraine question. He argues that Ukraine was an unmitigated disaster. To understand its nature, it is necessary to examine the facts establishing who were responsible for this debacle. His disturbing but logical conclusions negate the conventional wisdom that Putin and Russia bear primary responsibility. The United States and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) are to blame for this disaster, inferring from a series of moves which the alliance executed from the time the USSR was dissolved in the early 1990s. (Please refer to my TMT column of March 9, 2022.)

The US and NATO's behavior were singularly directed toward winning the Cold War, a period of geopolitical tension after WW2 principally between the United States and the USSR. This era saw the emergence of communism competing with liberal capitalism for world hegemony. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the liberal capitalist Western countries arrogated upon themselves the entitlements of the victors. NATO, formed to provide collective security against the Soviet Union, was free to expand outside its original sphere of influence, encroaching upon the old members of the Warsaw Pact, the military alliance of the USSR and its satellite states which subsequently folded in 1991.

NATO initiatives on Ukraine

But in April 2006, after having successfully recruited some old Warsaw Pact members to NATO, its three-prong approach to expand NATO became very clear. The first was to integrate Ukraine and Georgia into NATO, subsequently into the European Union and eventually converting them to pro-Western liberal democracies, putting in place the effects of the Orange Revolution.

The Orange Revolution was a series of daily protests, strikes and civil disobedience in Ukraine running for three months in the autumn and winter of 2004-2005 following the presidential election marred by massive corruption, voter intimidation and electoral fraud. The votes were rigged by government authorities in favor of Soviet-backed President Viktor Yanukovych. The Supreme Court annulled the election. In a run-off, Viktor Yushchenko, perceived to be sympathetic to the West, won.

Putin's line in the sand

Soviet influence was unraveling. A pro-American Ukraine at Russia's border was unacceptable. Yet the Western alliances proceeded in making Ukraine a de facto NATO member. Putin unequivocally announced that this was a line in the sand that NATO could not cross. Ukraine's membership was an "existential threat" to Russia.

In retaliation, in August of 2008, Russia waged war against Georgia. Upping the ante, in February 2014, a crisis erupted in Ukraine precipitated by a coup, supported by the US and NATO, overthrowing President Yanukovych (who succeeded Yushchenko), replacing him with a pro-American president. This was the Euromaidan Uprising. Putin's response was to invade and annex Crimea while fomenting civil disturbance in its predominantly Russian-speaking Eastern Donbass region.

The second major crisis building up was in 2021 when Ukraine was being treated as a de facto NATO member with US-supplied arms and drones used against the Donbas region rebels; a British warship sailing in the Black Sea — long regarded as a Russian lake; and US bombers flying 14 miles off the Russian coast. These all proved to be the axiomatic last straw that broke the camel's back. Today, we have a real war!

Aggressive policy initiatives

American pundits, the policy elite in Washington D.C. and mainstream media have been selling an alternative narrative that this is not about NATO expansion but Putin recreating the glory days of the USSR or a Greater Russia. American and NATO's role were disguised, elevating instead Putin as the aggressor.

Mearsheimer's contention is that even before the first crisis on Feb. 22, 2014, during the Crimea annexation, nobody was arguing Putin was an aggressor. Putin never said he was bent on recreating the USSR or Greater Russia. He was not out to conquer Ukraine or plan to reattach Ukraine to a Greater Russia. Putin never did want to occupy Ukraine, nor did it want Ukraine to join NATO. It serves the interests of both Russia and Ukraine for the latter to remain pro-Russia — sitting as a buffer at its western boundary.

In fact, "Obama was caught with his pants down because the US didn't think Russia, Putin were aggressive. Putin doesn't have enough military to recreate Russia and economically Russia has a GNP smaller than Texas." Thus, incapable of confronting the full might of America and NATO.

Putin only understood too well the lessons of occupying Eastern European countries as a prescription for trouble during the Cold War: 1953 in East Germany; 1956 in Hungary; 1968 in Czechoslovakia; and problems with border countries Poland, Romania and Albania.

But you don't poke the Russian bear in the eye. The US and NATO did.

And God help Ukraine.

SINCE December when Russian troops were massing at Ukraine's borders, social media was inundated by requests for prayers anointing Zelenskyy as the good guy and Putin, the devil incarnate. These supplications accelerated as Russian troops crossed over.

In the Philippines, half a globe away, our prayer warriors were occupied storming heaven imploring the divine providence to intercede in Ukraine's favor with incantations of Oratio Imperata with the same fervor as Catholics did against Covid. The charming thing about Filipino Catholics, Christians and "born again" is their propensity to "oratio imperata" everything, from natural disasters, floods, earthquakes, tsunamis, and even the 1986 People Power uprising. This one-prayer-fits-all is very convenient for the cultural habits of Pinoys' "bahala na ang Panginoon," implying fatalism, leaving to the almighty the pretext of trusting the Lord to solve all problems.

Prayers will not help Ukraine now. Putin is unfolding his endgame pursuing what to him is in the best interest of Mother Russia — an altogether justifiable response to what America and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies have been doing all along.

Just imagine NATO with its short-range ballistic missiles (SRBM) at the borders of Russia. How was it different when Khrushchev in 1962 stationed missiles in Cuba just outside America's borders? Kennedy drew the line then as Putin similarly has drawn the line now. NATO's overture to Ukraine after the USSR's collapse is tantamount to Putin's Red Line that America and the West have long crossed. Online prayers were never asked when America and NATO in essence actually provided a casus belli for Putin's acts.

Fall of USSR

To put these developments in proper perspective, it is necessary to look back at the recent history of Ukraine and Russia. One could go back centuries to the time from 1187 to the 1600s when Ukraina began to take shape. But the more appropriate time period for our purposes was during the intervening years of 1989-1992 at the dissolution of the USSR. The collapse started on Premier Mikhail Gorbachev's watch when the USSR loosened its grip on the Eastern European countries (Soviets) composing the USSR, allowing them multi-party elections that began a slow process of democratization. This led to destabilization of communist control and the ensuing momentum caused the greatest modern symbol of communist Soviet hegemony to fall — the Berlin Wall. America, the USSR's greatest Cold War rival was not exactly gloating on the sidelines. Nevertheless, this was a humiliating blow to the hardline Russian communist elite — though the Russian people and the freed Soviet republics welcomed Gorbachev's reform agenda and subsequently President Boris Yeltsin's rapid economic reforms.

Rise of a despot

One who witnessed the fall of the Berlin Wall was a KGB apparatchik, an undercover spy in East Germany named Vladimir Putin. The aftermath was chaotic for Russia that lost 15 of its Soviets and 2 million square miles of territory, including the second biggest after Russia itself — Ukraine. This was seen as the century's greatest geopolitical disaster, ushering in political and economic chaos in part caused by unfamiliarity of capitalist concepts introduced after decades of socialism. This tectonic shift in the economic paradigm brought to the surface the shady part of capitalism — graft and corruption, pervading all levels of bureaucracy. Putin came at the right time during Russia's metamorphosis. From a KGB master spy, he entered politics, went up the political ladder in 1991 as deputy mayor of St. Petersburg. Putin only understood too well the private capitalist game and began to create his own network involving his own set of wealthy friends; assigning them lucrative government contracts, unauthorized use of city government coffers; collaborating with various crime organizations purportedly to regulate the gambling industry and accumulating funds overseas through money laundering. It is alleged that Putin's political umbilical cord was intertwined with his old KGB security network of displaced officers, corrupt politicians and even crime syndicates making him the darling of the oligarchy. This cabal propelled him to national politics in 1999 when the politically weak President Yeltsin appointed him prime minister of Russia. This gave Putin, a fierce Russian nationalist, a springboard to regain Russia's glory in the next two decades.

NATO and Warsaw Pact

A predominantly Christian Orthodox non-Islamic country, Ukraine was one of the 15 constituent republics of the Soviet Union from its 1922 founding until its collapse in 1991; whereupon it reverted back to a status as an independent republic. It was the biggest and the most populous after Russia itself and the USSR's westernmost border.

Here the complications begin as it played footsies with the arch enemy of Russia — the US-led NATO. Established in 1949 after WW2 by 12 Western European nations, NATO expanded to 30 allies bolstered by erstwhile members of the USSR's similar alliance — the Warsaw Pact, a collective defense treaty established in May 1955 during the Cold War, composed of seven socialist republics of Central and Eastern Europe. Dominated by Russia, the Warsaw Pact was meant as a balance of power to NATO. But the bloc began to unravel upon the collapse of the USSR. East Germany withdrew upon its reunification with West Germany, followed by the Czech Republic and Slovakia, as did the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Revolution of dignity

Ukraine's relationship with Russia has always been complicated even beyond 1922. In 2013, large-scale protests erupted, known as Euromaidan, against President Victor Yanukovych's refusal to sign a popularly supported political association and free trade agreement with the European Union. These protests turned violent and continued for months, resulting in Yanukovych's ouster, who then fled to his patron, Putin. In response, Putin considered the new interim Ukraine government illegal. The protest turned into a full-scale revolution giving Putin the alibi to annex Ukraine's southern peninsula of Crimea and recognize the Russian-sponsored separatists states of Donetsk and Luhansk, in the southeast collectively known as the Donbas region.

In 2016, the UN General Assembly condemned the annexation, "...the occupation of part of the territory of Ukraine — the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol."

America and its allies countered with wimpish economic sanctions, unwilling to go to war in Ukraine's behalf. NATO's castration set the stage for Putin's second act.

The road to war

For Putin, Ukraine was "...tied to Russia by bonds of faith, family, politics and a millennium of common history." (Simon Shuster, Road to War) Putin's closest Ukrainian friend, Victor Medvedchuk, the leading voice for Russian interests in Ukraine, controls the biggest political party opposition in parliament. Over the past year, that party has come under attack. Medvedchuk was charged with treason and placed under house arrest. Days after President Joe Biden's inauguration, President Zelenskyy took Medvedchuk's TV stations off the air, depriving Russia of its propaganda outlets in the country. His assets were seized, among which was the crown jewel of the Medvedchuk family, the pipeline that brings Russian oil to Europe. The US embassy in Kyiv and America applauded the move. Huge mistake!

Thus, on Feb. 24, 2022, Putin made his move.

TODAY, while Covid-19 may no longer be as lethal compared to the past 25 months or so when the Grim Reaper stalked the land harvesting 6 million souls worldwide, our fear of death has subsided, leaving us simply to mourn our loved ones. In time, that too will fade and only the scars of the healing wounds will remain. But the protocols imposed by Covid will somehow linger, altering our behavior and our "concept of normal" for the foreseeable future.

Back home from my vacation-cum-Omicron exile in America, I am confronted with an issue still relevant, particularly to the presidential elections — referring to the last days of February 1986. Its peculiarity revolves around how people perceive and treat events over time, just like our Covid experience, particularly the propensity of Filipinos to adapt to the changing realities, altering details of their own stories to conform to those changing narratives.

People Power uprising

The same is true when it comes to the changes in our perceptions of the events of February 1986, which for the past three decades many of us have hailed as our narrative and memories of the EDSA People Power Revolution (EDSA1). Thirty-six years is more than a generation and half of the participants on both sides of the divide are gone. It is perhaps better for our society that those partisans are now being replaced — by attrition — by the young who have their own stories to tell. And these young Filipinos who have no intimate connection to EDSA1 will nevertheless have to navigate the political crosscurrents generated by the remnants of EDSA1.

The ghosts of EDSA1 are still alive in those few holdouts who are now back to carve their own little stories from our histories and memories projecting the same as "the truth." The main protagonist of course is the son of the deposed Ferdinand Marcos himself who was ignominiously booted out by the original "yellow forces" in 1986. And I can't blame the son for crafting his own narrative. He may well be in a position to proffer his own version to vindicate the family name if he wins. It is obviously the primary duty of a loyal son. It is not the same, however, for the opportunists who must alter the narratives on the whims of political fortunes.

The opportunists

Juan Ponce Enrile is such a one, now 98 years old, who at 62 deserted his mentor, friend and sponsor Ferdinand, now changing his tune, along with Gringo Honasan vying for another term in the Senate. The actual events at EDSA1 would not have happened on those heady days of February 1986 were it not for their bungling with the help of a cabal of the colonels of the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM). Enrile, Honasan and the RAM provided the trigger.

Were it not also for the call of Cardinal Sin for the people to mass and protect these mutineers, they would have been kaput. And the timely infusion of the Philippine Constabulary (PC) under Gen. Fidel V. Ramos gave a much-needed boost to the mutiny. Cory was not at EDSA during the breakaway on February 22, a Saturday. She was in Cebu for a rally of the original Yellow forces and on her way to Davao the next day. But make no mistake, the EDSA1 phenomenon was a culmination of a cowed people's anger over the injustices and repression of martial law. All these were embodied in a frail woman, a mere housewife who acknowledged she was not meant to lead — but fate and circumstances intervened to elevate Cory as the leader and symbol of a hopeful masses.

Several years after the euphoria of the uprising had subsided and a modicum of normalcy descended upon the people, we had the luxury of introspection. Cory has always maintained that her role was simply to reestablish normalcy upon the "restoration of democracy" ushered in by EDSA1, although many of us in the struggle against the dictatorship, years before the appearance of the Aquinos, had expected more. I wrote then:

Promises unfulfilled

"Many of us in the decades-long struggle for real democracy from the mid 1960s. adherents of the parliamentary-federal structure of government, were enthusiastic in supporting Cory Aquino as she was our symbol against the repressive dictatorship. We understood too that she was from the elite and her values therefore were those of her class, but we were hopeful that she would transcend these with the outpouring of love and adulation shown by the masses — whose values were not congruent to hers.

"A few of us recruited to her administration implored her to continue to rule under the Revolutionary Constitution to give herself more time to dismantle not only the martial law structures but the unitary system of government which we then and still now believe perverted the principles of democratic governance. We were no match for the ruling class. Cory surrendered her prerogatives to real socio-economic-political reforms by rejecting the people's gift — the 1986 Revolutionary Constitution. She then proceeded to embed her dogmas in her 1987 Constitution.

Original Yellows vs Dilawans

"We were all 'Yellows' then, as this was the color we wore after the assassination of Ninoy, symbolizing our protest against this dastardly act, and our struggle to boot out the dictator Marcos from power and institute real reforms. The masses that congregated at EDSA were a motley crowd of Filipinos from all walks of life, from ordinary folks to members of the elite and some of the oligarchic families dispossessed by the Marcos cronies; members of religious groups, Islam and Christians prominently headed by Cardinal Sin and the Catholics. We all had disparate motives but wielded together by pent-up anger against the Marcos family."

"Some of us are no longer Yellows today. Our perception of EDSA1 and our role in it runs counter to what is now being peddled, mostly by those from recent past administrations. For us, EDSA1 is not an Aquino family franchise, nor just a mere booting out of the Marcos family. And it is not a narrative of entitlements of two families.

"For many of us, EDSA1 was a decades-long seething anger against poverty, injustice and the dominance of traditional politicians and their allies in the oligarchy in the economy and throughout the political structures

"The final capture of the color Yellow was consummated upon the serendipitous exquisitely timed demise of the EDSA1 icon when an opportunistic son rode on the people's residual love and nostalgia to win power. Yellow from then on came to symbolize his own vengeful and exclusive 'Daang Matuwid' regime, metamorphosing into Dilawans. PNoy, in his brimming arrogance, tried to exact from the people who once took part in the EDSA revolution, a certain sense of loyalty and adulation similar to that shown his mother. He failed.

"This May, we may have either the Marcos son or the Aquino successor at the helm of power...or another one instead. Poetic justice dictates then that at the very least "vice is punished and virtue rewarded in a manner ironically appropriate."

Choose wisely!

IT is axiomatic that the best part of going away on vacation and leaving home is coming home! In my case, the anticipation and excitement of traveling to America and back to Manila to be with the two halves of my grandchildren — Americans and Filipinos — far exceeds my travel anxieties in this time of Covid.

Unlike during the pre-pandemic days, all you need are your passport, plane tickets, credit cards and some cash and you are good to go. Not this time. To travel to America at the height of the pandemic, you need to be vaccinated — twice within two months, plus a booster shot two weeks prior to boarding time. You need to download into your cellphone a vaccination certificate (VaxCertPH) from the Department of Health proving you're vaccinated. On top of these, a contact tracing application, "Traze," with a quick response code (QR code) is required.

For the illiterate like me, the QR code encodes one's personal data in alphanumeric information downloaded into your phone to be read by a scanner at the airports. This is used widely to help prevent the spread of Covid-19 by making contact tracing better. How this works, I don't know, and I don't really care. Except without it Philippine Airlines will refuse to board me.

Outgoing flight

The hassle doesn't stop at the airport as you are required to wear a mask at the terminal building and inside the plane. It should be noted that only in the Philippines is the wearing of plastic shields on top of your mask compulsory, courtesy of Lo-Liong-Lao-Go, Michael Yang, the Dragon, and their not quite so anonymous sponsor. This refers to the billions of pesos of the corrupt arrangements between the Chinese-controlled Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corp. and our government (see my Manila Times column of Feb 9, 2022). Surprisingly, JFK never bothered with these documents except for your valid B1/B2 visa.

Coming home

A lesser tension pervades the vacationers coming home from America. At this time, the Covid variant Omicron was raging. A more infectious type but less severe. Nevertheless, millions have been infected with it like the ordinary cold. Thus, anxiety still prevailed on our flight to Manila. Remarkably, there was no hustle at Baltimore airport as we boarded our American Airlines (AA) flight to JFK, connecting to Manila.

The inconvenience starts at our side of international travel. The Philippine Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) requires PAL to accept only Covid-negative real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) passengers to Manila within 48 hours of departure instead of 72 hours. We postponed our trip back to Manila twice, as I was found to be Omicron-positive. But the hustle has been reduced somewhat by another IATF ruling that quarantine is no longer imposed in Manila for arriving passengers and that positive cases are allowed provided you present a doctor's medical certificate proving you have quarantined yourself (in America).

I came home after six weeks over our vacation time budget and several thousand US dollar deficits. Consider the following: Although RT-PCR tests are free courtesy of the University of Maryland and US taxpayers, the results are released only after 48 hours, outside of PAL's 48-hour window for RT-PCR submission. To get results in four hours, for our connecting flights from Baltimore to JFK to Manila, we pay a more expensive RT-PCR test of from $275 to $500 each! A lot of moolah went to four tests proving positive on top of the charges for flight cancellations, extra days accommodations and bayad sa kagu-ol (Bisayan for anxiety alleviation). Flight-related postponements plus other sundries doubled our vacation budget.

Lesson learned: Don't go on vacation to America until Covid/Omicron or another variant is controlled and beaten

Presidential debates

Our Manila arrival was uneventful as my GF and my wife (same woman) enjoyed a Valentine's Day breakfast, lunch and dinner — spending the entire day in bed (sleeping off the jet lag). And in time for Manila's presidential debates.

I witnessed similar US and Philippine debates. But this latest was unprecedented in more ways than one. First, it ran for over three hours on SMNI TV owned by "the Son of God" (SOG). Note that Pastor Quiboloy endorsed one of the presidential debaters. The fact that the SOG is FBI's most wanted criminal doesn't really impact on the debate itself but delicadeza should have prevailed. But what the hell! Delicadeza isn't a favored item in Philippine politics.

Second, except for Marcos, the four other participants rate within.09 percent to 2 percent in the latest polls. Leni, Isko, Manny and Ping declined, prompting lead panelist professor Clarita Carlos to praise the four present for "...political commitment and political courage to be part of this conversation."

Third, gorgeous moderator lawyer Karen Jimeno couldn't discipline the partisan crowds rooting for their candidates, whether their replies were correct, inane or simply stupid. And she couldn't cut the minutes allotted to the panelists for questions, particularly professor Carlos.

Fourth, the format was not fashioned for a debate but suited more for a job interview for an applicant to the Philippine presidency. Central to the concept of debates is for the presidential combatants to introduce their platform of government addressing people's concerns. Going "mano a mano," precipitating a clash of ideas is expected for the best ideas to emerge for the benefit not only of the listeners/voters but also for the combatants to learn from each other. There was no such engagement. All were either afraid of confrontations, knew extraordinarily little about the topic, or were simply ignorant.

A foreign policy expert, Carlos began the proceedings with a question on how, if elected, each will handle the QUAD security alliance. Unable to google QUAD on stage, discombobulated but safe answers were crafted belying deep knowledge on the subject. Carlos' deep and substantial questions flummoxed some of the candidates, exposing their unfamiliarity with the subject. Against an exceptionally knowledgeable political science professor of 50 years with a doctorate in defense and security, the presidentiables didn't stand a chance. It was downhill from then on.

The engagement turned into a display of sound bites, cute statements, canned ideas of motherhood statements passing off as ideological perspectives. But the choice of a dominant alpha female panelist in Carlos made the whole "non-debate event" her coming-out party. At every instance, she couldn't leave her classroom, interjecting her own positions at every turn, even announcing the book she is writing on regional fishing agreements, and a paper on the AFP abolition. "On a personal note, I wrote a paper on abolishing the AFP and I'm sure I got so many enemies...but if you're interested to read that paper, I can share it with you..." Marcos graciously replied that he was very, very interested.

This debate/interview/entertainment format left things to be desired. It was forgettable with listeners/voters retaining the same bias they left the hall with as when they entered. They were not uplifted. Methinks if there was a winner in this debate, it was professor Clarita Carlos who in a Jan. 24, 2022, TV interview with "Usapang Bayan" declared: "Maganda 'yang debate, para makita kung sino ang bobo at sinong may kunting talino." Unfair, brutal, but necessary!

Last of 2 parts

FOR lack of a much gentler phrase, I substitute "political miscalculations" for blunder, debacle or catastrophe, contributory to the eventual demise of the President's legacy. My column last week detailed how the 18 hearings of the Sen. Dick Gordon's blue ribbon committee (BRC) left no doubt in our people's mind the extent of plunder precipitated by the "saga of Lao-Lo-Liong-Go" (named after the four stooges of Pharmally, in the first part of this series, February 9), the corruption scandal that obliterated Duterte's image as the nemesis of the corrupt and champion of good governance as he reduced himself to a blubbering despot attacking the BRC investigations while defending the indefensible — this Chinese criminal network headed by his erstwhile "economic adviser," Michael Yang, the Dragon, a suspected drug lord.

Political promises — a travesty

As Davao city mayor for more than two decades, candidate Duterte in 2015 entered national politics already conversant with the inherently defective Philippine system of governance, that the rot in our democracy is systemic. Thus, pragmatic and colorful candidate Duterte ran under a slogan "Pagbabago" — promising political reforms on popular issues reduced to sound bites.

These three pillars of his platform underpinned his legacy. Tokhang (Tok-tok hangyo!), a massive house-to-house campaign principally conducted in the slum areas and poverty-stricken communities purportedly to root out the drug pushers and users arresting the country's slide from becoming a narco-state. Instead, this drastic method experimented locally in Davao with mixed results turned into a human rights fiasco when applied at the national level.

The Duterte doctrine of whiff of corruption, a mockery of an anti-corruption drive in the bureaucracy that replaced the corrupt with sycophants to juicy government sinecures was instituted. Federalism and local autonomy — the linchpin of a structural reform that could have changed positively the dynamics of power between centralized and local governments units granting the masses a modicum of decision-making competences to run their own lives, was introduced. The latter required revisions to the 1986 Constitution. These imperatives for political reforms define the nature of the centralized authority of the presidency itself and how political and economic power are dispersed and dispensed with using the majesty of his office.

But the one factor that now threatens to unhinge this legacy is the Deegong's inability to incorporate these into a vision for the country translated into structures and institutions that must be put in place.

Indubitably he had successes in the economic front, foremost of which is his vaunted Build, Build, Build programs and many great pro-poor initiatives. But many of these liberal populist raids on the public's coffers are stopgap measures to alleviate poverty, a band-aid solution to the ills of society, which by their very nature were merely palliatives with dire consequences long after he leaves office.

Power an evanescent concept

But this slide to the depths needs to be recounted for future presidents to learn from; the concept of political power and the primary responsibility for those elected to seats of power must understand its purpose. That it must be used solely for the betterment of the people. That the task of leadership is to inspire and uplift the Filipino from their current condition to a point beyond where they need not be uplifted. Any deviation from its legitimate use is an abomination, be it in the abuse and misuse of power or even in its non-use. The powerful must understand too that such gifts by the people are ephemeral and may be taken away by the gift-givers themselves. When people's trust is violated, they have recourse to exact retributive justice. In this case such transgressions against the people demand collective vengeance. Corporal punishments are expected but no less painful and traumatic as the judgment of history.

Witness that of the Marcos père punished by history for similar lapses despite his reputation as an intellectual giant, a genius and a political conjurer who survived and flourished for two decades in power. Serendipitously, he left behind a loyal and driven son and a shrewd older daughter who painfully suffered his vilification through the years; to repair whatever legacy the father left behind while attempting to erase the collective memories of a sad epoch by creating an alternative narrative directed toward the restoration of a tattered reputation. This historical revisionism, which involves not only a reinterpretation of events but a reversal of moral judgments of the martial law regime, may succeed if the Marcos fils wins this election. In contrast with the Deegong's plight, despite the many successes of his economic and pro-poor programs, waylaid only by the pandemic, and facing the judgment of history, could Sara, Paolo and Baste, have what it takes to reprise what the Marcos siblings are doing; repair their father's legacy?

Fatal political endgames

What could have helped Duterte perpetuate his legacy was to fulfil all his election promises of political reforms and structuring of government to address the ills of society, stark poverty, injustices, impunity and the erosion of the rule of law with his political party. Although Duterte presided over a byzantine political party system he had at his disposal an ideologically driven party successfully forged in the anvil of desperation and hopelessness of the martial law era.

The PDP-Laban provided the underpinnings for the government platform. This loyal band of original mass-base ideologues and political technocrats, later usurped by opportunists from other political parties, needed only a spark — a serious display of real political will to initiate changes. At the outset, the Deegong's dominance over his political party and influential power brokers was palpable. The sheer force of his personality cowed the political/economic elite, the tradpols, the oligarchy, the Church hierarchy, a substantial number of the populace and even many corrupt bureaucrats.

But he mistook his alpha male demeanor of threats, use of expletives, misogynist language, brute, frontal and iconoclastic attacks as manifestations of political will. It was not. It was merely a façade.

Death throes

Never in the history of Philippine presidential politics was an outgoing president with 80 percent approval rating failed to provide for lasting political contingencies. He allowed this once revered party to split, thus presiding over the demise by his own hand of an emerging institution and the continuity of his program beyond his time. The chairman and party head instead bet on the ascendancy of daughter Sara to assume and perpetuate his legacy — one which she herself negated. An institutional obligation was substituted for a family matter, not a concern that involves the Filipino — but strictly Duterte personal. There is no way now that the PDP-Laban will survive with two factions irreconcilably at odds; Manny Pacquiao, the standard-bearer of one faction, and the Duterte/Cusi faction left in the doldrums playing with irrelevancy as Duterte tied his own hands by attacking the leading candidate, BBM.

He could at this late date endorse BBM. The latter must accept graciously.

But if he does win, Marcos will not forget the insults heaped by the Deegong upon the Marcoses — calling them "mga kawatan."

Thus, the ultimate nail on the coffin of a legacy.

LOOKING back at the early years of the Deegong's rise, from the time he burst into the national consciousness as a maverick, straight-talking, dirty-mouth iconoclast, the promdi has always dominated center stage. He conducted a presidential campaign never before seen in the annals of presidential elections, hewing close to the precepts of the oldest classic campaign primer, "How to Win an Election" written by the first professional campaign manager, Quintus Tullius Cicero, for his brother Marcus, Rome's greatest orator, when he successfully ran for Consul of the Republic in 64 BC. With Duterte's DDS sycophants from Davao, where he ran undefeated in all the elections he participated in, he must have even improved on Cicero with a dash of Machiavelli.

He seduces the crowd with down-to-earth street patois seasoned with expletives never before heard in campaign sorties, nonetheless a language the young and the not-so-old found refreshing, even endearing, for its novelty and uniqueness. Projecting an image of "masa-bred barumbado," he later cashed in on this image as a demonstration of political will — erroneous but effective. Only the polite and well-mannered members of the elite, the oligarchy and the self-declared guardians of people's morals and the Catholic Church hierarchy were appalled and revolted by his actuations. But though powerful and influential, they could not prevent the deluge of perversions that was to sweep away the norms and conventions of good governance as reflected by his remarkably high popularity and acceptance rating sustained over his regime's entirety.

He was not an instant hit, but his alpha male personality gained traction growing into the voters' stream of consciousness. He was an acquired taste, unlike his opponents who never had a chance with recycled complex ideas of governance, tired old promises and platform of government coated in data-filled technocratic jargon; prostitutes proffering their virginity, again and again.

2 programs, 2 doctrines

His approach to problem-solving and conflict resolution is linear and exquisite in their simplicity. One core initiative is his illegal drugs program, preventing the Philippines from becoming a narco state. To stop the proliferation of prohibited drugs — just kill the drug lords!

The other is to eradicate government corruption in six months. He will "not tolerate any corruption in his administration and will dismiss from office any of his people tainted even by a 'whiff of corruption;' and he is ready to sack public officials even on a basis of false allegations of corruption." (Inquirer.net, March 30, 2017.) Thus was born the Duterte Doctrine on corruption.

These two flagship programs, along with a third, federalism and the systemic restructuring of government, constituted the leading edge of his simplified, clear, comprehensive and masa-directed initiatives forming a substantial part of his legacy.

Pharmally

Writers are fond of paraphrasing aphorisms. Relevant to this column is one from ancient China defining danger and opportunity. What transpired in the country these past two years was a time of great peril yet one of terrific opportunity — two faces of the same coin — one Chinese kanji with contrapuntal meanings.

The danger was the Covid-19 pandemic, curiously originating from China. This Chinese peril swept the world's countries bringing the world to its knees.

This was the point at which President Duterte's legacy began to untangle. The 18 Senate blue ribbon committee (BRC) hearings conducted by Sen. Richard "Dick" Gordon spanning over a period of eight months revealed that in the face of peril and danger, an opportunity was deliberately created by the Deegong's men, not coincidentally peopled by his Chinese connection.

The plot was simple as seen in the timelines. Taken from excerpts of my column in September 2021, I rephrase:

"When Covid-19 struck in early 2020, government rushed in to introduce grandiose-sounding laws — the Bayanihan to Heal As One (and Two) — by granting the President emergency powers to combat Covid with humongous funds. These laws were altogether an appropriate and worthy response. But as in any similar bills, the devil is in the details. It allowed the primary tools for graft: negotiated biddings on contrived bidding failures and sleight-of-hand transfers of funds, with leakage somewhere in between; employing obscure patsies "backed by the powerful." To wit:

– August 2019 Christopher Lao, an obscure lawyer, allegedly Sen. Bong Go's stooge (SBG denied this vehemently) was appointed Department of Budget and Management (DBM) undersecretary.

– Jan. 2, 2020, Undersecretary Lao is transferred to the DBM Procurement Service (PS-DBM). (Secretary Wendel Avisado, resigned as DBM head.)

– March 16, 2020, the Government Procurement Policy Board released a resolution incorporating face masks and PPE into common use supplies.

– March 27, 2020, the Department of Health started transferring funds to the PS-DBM, presumably illegally.

– April 16 and 20, 2020, PS-DBM, under Lao, bought overpriced surgical masks from various suppliers.

– April 2020 to June 2020, Lao awarded to undercapitalized Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corp. contracts worth P6 billion plus; the contracts that PS-BDM awarded to Pharmally reached more than P8.7 billion as a result.

– June 2021, Lao resigns. Offices of favored companies closed, addresses unknown.

Tales of Lo-Liong-Lao-Go

But this did not end here. Subsequent hearings disclosed President Duterte himself seeking to derail the hearings advising his people not to appear before the BRC.

– Health Secretary Duque's transfer of P42 billion of his (DoH) budget to PS-DBM could not have occurred without the "Go signal" of the Deegong.

– PS-DBM was at some point headed by a "musical chairs" of three undersecretaries, lawyers Lo, Liong and Lao, 2016 Duterte campaign protegees of Senator Go. These people, although they carry Chinese surnames, are Filipino, and my citing Lo-Liong-Lao-Go in a rhythmic unisyllabic cadence is not meant to disparage the Chinese or their Chinese ancestry.

– These three lawyers, all Lex Talionis fraternity brods of the Deegong, were slated to move to positions at the Ombudsman. A naughty mind may speculate they could cover their tracks by refusing to do what decent real ombudsmen would do — investigate criminal wrongdoing in the bureaucracy.

– The padrino of these people was established to be the shadowy figure Michael Yang, alias the Dragon, a Chinese national, the "pagador," the guarantor of Pharmally and its related companies, and a personal friend of the Deegong. Yang, who has been in Davao since 1999, claimed to speak no word of Bisaya or Tagalog and feigned illiteracy of the English language yet was at one time appointed by the Deegong as his economic adviser, seen to escort him around China on his visits. Such an escort service is known by many labels — consultant, facilitator, bagman, pagador or locally, in local slang, bugaw (pimp), depending on the package offered and bought.

All these brought to light by the BRC hearings were never contradicted except for denials. What should follow is the Senate approval of the BRC report and the subsequent full-scale investigation and filing of cases. So far, the regime's defense was simply ad hominem attacks on Gordon and his team and delaying tactics using the coming elections as an alibi.

But at this point, it seems obvious who the capo di tutti capi is — the Godfather of them all. But didn't we know this from the start?

I CAN almost hear my long-departed friend Rey Teves proclaim from the great beyond in his original Bislish: "I don't afraid!" Translated into the much more colorful Bisayȃ — our common tongue — as "wȃ gyud ko mahadlok!"

Indeed, many global experts have declared that Omicron has mutated into a benign viral infection, roughly equivalent to the common cold prevalent during wintertime in countries such as America where I am now. Although the leading US expert. Dr. Anthony Fauci. says it's too soon to know if enough people build natural immunity to Covid-19 by catching the highly contagious Omicron variant. What the data shows, so far, is the infection rate of the unvaccinated Americans is very much widespread and more severe, clogging some hospitals. CNN reports that case counts in the US have dipped from 800,000 daily cases on January 22 to 250,000 on January 29 while hospitalizations and deaths slightly declined. Experts say these are early signs that the infection wave may be starting to peak. Even Bill Gates sees a silver lining to this massive global Omicron surge.

The vaccination mandate, particularly on federal employees, has become so politicized here that big demonstrations are being conducted in Washington, D.C. as we speak — protesting the mandates.

In social media the debate between the advantages or disadvantages of vaccination and boosters has been obscured by partisan politics with claims that mostly the Republicans who value more the concepts of individual freedoms and have fused to be vaccinated are prone to infections hinting further that they comprise the greater majority of those hospitalized and among the dead. There are no figures to prove or refute this allegation, but it is a measure of how deep the divisions have driven American society apart that these questions are even being considered.

Pandemic to endemic

As of this writing, several countries, particularly the United Kingdom, Denmark and Spain have declared Covid-19 and its variants as no longer posing a threat to society. As opposed to pandemic, an endemic is defined by the US CDC as "the constant presence and/or usual prevalence of a disease or infectious agent in a population within a geographic area." Endemic means "it is here forever" like the common cold. With a stroke of a pen and an official government declaration, Covid-19 has been degraded to a status equivalent to the common seasonal flu that appears from time to time. As a pandemic, Covid-19 is gone along with the memory of the millions killed since the winter of 2019. Those dead souls will thus become footnotes with those that died during the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918 that reportedly killed 100 million worldwide and the Black Death of the Middle Ages that decimated 30 to 60 percent of the population of Europe, Asia and North Africa.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is, however, skeptical and thus ambivalent about the declarations made by some of its member countries. They maintain that the pandemic is still here with us until three billion of the seven billion people on earth will have been vaccinated. WHO and some holdout countries still maintain that unless 60 to 70 percent of the world's population have been vaccinated, herd immunity will not be achieved and Covid-19 continues to ravage the land.

Partisan politics —US and the world

The daily Senate hearings on the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the US Capitol by former president Donald Trump's sympathizers continue to be highly partisan and toxic to the political conversation; and the civil and possible criminal cases now haunting Trump, his family and his allies impinge negatively on the American body politic, although Americans in poll after poll welcome this painful development perhaps as a purging mechanism.

On top of this is an issue of global import that has threatened to reprise the old rivalry between US hegemony and Russia's nostalgic longing for a return of the preeminence of the once formidable Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). This saber-rattling in the Crimea and Ukraine by both sides may yet turn serious. NATO allies are now involved by sending ships and fighter jets — armaments of war — to Eastern Europe, putting forces on standby. America is again mulling over sending boots on the ground to allies in Eastern Europe confronting Russia's massing troops on its border with Ukraine. All this after the decades-long debacle in Afghanistan where America had to retreat reluctantly like it did generations ago in Vietnam. Now this European sortie could be the beginning of Biden's war — with perhaps the same results as in Kennedy's, "Dubya" Bush and Obama's wars.

Just this week, North Korea launched another test missile meant to irk not only the US but even its allies China and Russia. These moves by Kim Jung Un were always being in the past to divert the attention of his people from their dire straits, a raging pandemic coupled with its economy collapsing, and perhaps to squeeze concessions from its allies — while playing to his megalomaniac tendencies. But the timing this time while global tensions are running high are at best puerile and dangerous. South Korea and Japan are the two countries, allies of the US, that are on tenterhooks and can merely look toward America for a proper response.

Incongruously, on the other side of the globe, China is putting up its best face forward for the Winter Olympics in the next few days — although the US may boycott the affair.

PH scenario

Meantime back home, the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) recently revised its guidelines for incoming international passengers. The entry, testing and quarantine protocols for arriving Filipinos and foreign nationals have been lifted for those fully vaccinated but still requiring negative results of the Covid virus from the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test taken 48 hours prior to departure from the country of origin. This is welcome news for the tourism industry. Although the country has not declared itself Covid pandemic-free, massive vaccination of citizens is still mandatory. This is perhaps one of the major triumphs of Duterte's initiatives in reviving the economy while minimizing the debilitating effects of Covid.

Personal predicament

There is however a personal issue to the RT-PCR tests. In the US, studies have shown that Omicron-infected people with pre-existing health conditions are immunocompromised for months, showing a lingering virus presence in their system, appearing as positive or false negative although asymptomatic. This prevents boarding on international flights. I have pre-existing asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). My household of seven, including three grandchildren aged 6 to10 years, were infected with Omicron on Dec. 23, 2021. By year's end, my family's infection was gone. Mine did not. As I write this, I have had two RT-PCR tests showing positive results and two home antigen tests proving negative. Yet PAL cannot allow me a plane seat home for months on end until my RT-PCR tests turn negative. I may be stuck here, imprisoned by Covid until after the May 9 elections and condemned to accept an incoming president I did not vote for. Both sad prospects!

Last of 2 parts

THE introduction to social market economy (SOME) in the first part of this article last week hinted at a Philippine version for the benefit of the five major presidentiables, any one of whom could take the presidency. But the advocates of SOME and federal-parliamentary (fed-parl) government must ascertain who among them hew close to these concepts, discounting their mouthing motherhood statements and passing them off as ideological principles.

We've been had by candidates reversing themselves on political and economic reforms once elected. It is critically important that those elected senators are on the same page with the next president in a display of political will to work together to initiate the revision of the1987 Constitution.

Excerpts

We continue from last week excerpts from my past columns (Nov. 11, 2016; Jan. 3, 2018):

"In the capitalist system, where the practice of unimpeded free market is undisturbed by the state, the better capitalized actors will tend to dominate, distorting the market mechanisms. Cartels, oligopolies, and monopolies arise and eventually exploit the weaker players. 'Survival of the fittest' is not only axiomatic but it becomes the guiding principle. The market is by nature not equipped with a conscience to correct the inequities done to the less fortunate.

"Both systems therefore run counter to the Christian concept of the value of dignity of the individual. Admittedly, there are fine distinctions in both prototypes and the marriage of these nuances: the social amelioration and safety nets of the left; and the tempered free market of laissez-faire induced the Germans — after their post-war near total devastation — to create a new economic order. Social market economy in a few years brought about the German economic miracle with a stable democracy, social peace, and stability — making the country the most powerful economy in Europe.

"The three pillars of social market economy:

"1. Free market. A system that is designed to allow everyone who owns privately the means of production to produce goods and services and also allow the acquisition of the same goods and services at an agreed price. This interaction between supply and demand is the basic characteristic of a 'free market' economy. Market therefore should be the only arbiter of prices of the goods, commodities, and services.

"2. Strong state. The role of a strong state in the social market economy is primarily to establish, maintain and protect the competitive environment and regulate the market mechanisms to prevent distortions to the market through the emergence of cartels, oligopolies, and monopolies.

"3. Active and vibrant participation of the citizenry in the political life of the community which involves a healthy respect for common rules and regulations promoting freedom and enhancing the dignity of each human being. This entails the uplifting of the less privileged in society.

"Free markets are by nature blind to the iniquities of humans and do not give cognizance to the weak and physically disabled members of society, the sick and the elderly. Neither can it feel for the downtrodden, children and the helpless.

"Our vision of the Philippine version of SOME does not veer away from the German model and in fact uses it as a starting point. It will require amendments to the Constitution and laws correcting decades of malpractices. The following overarching principles however should be infused in all aspects of Philippine economic life.

"It is not centralized planning and control of the state taking away the freedom and incentives for good work from the individual. It is not inhuman capitalism, rule of money without respect for weak human beings."

Economic order

"Our current economic order was handed down by the Americans, technically our landlords from the turn of the century until the end of World War 2. We are therefore more familiar with 'free market' economy. This is a key value that also exists in the German model. The other important factor is that which was handed down to us by our Spanish colonizers; our Christian faith, which also values the inherent dignity of man. This crucial concept is the driving force behind the political and economic order of post-war Germany. There is therefore no fundamental contradiction between German and the Philippine economic order, and the transition could work.

"Our economy has been characterized by a few major players who are also the major actors in the political stage. The same political dynasties likewise hold the levers of economic power. These are fundamental iniquities that result in other distortions in the market. The modern oligarchs of our time have been the ruling families ever since — that includes the Aquinos and the Cojuangcos — who did not only rule over our political lives but also penetrated the economic system. Almost 80 percent of the country's wealth is controlled by the few ruling families. (Inquirer.net)

"The economic boom appears to have only benefited a tiny minority of elite families. Meanwhile, a huge segment of citizens remains vulnerable to poverty, malnutrition, and other grim development indicators that belie the country's apparent growth.

"The strength of a state is not measured by the muscle of its armed forces or the police or the behavior of a dictator who controls the levers of power. This strength is gauged by the state's ability to enforce the rule of law equally to all its citizens. This strength is then mirrored by the citizens responding positively to the actuations of a strong state through similar conduct, by respecting the rules and laws imposed by the state legally, legitimately, and fairly."

Conclusion

"In essence, social market economy is the consequence of the clash of two grand ideologies — capitalism and socialism — which have dominated the world economy long past the Middle Ages and after the informal demise of feudalism. The impetus for this conflict is the search for and definition of the common good seen from a different historical perspective.

"The model is continuing to evolve and inevitably will be a predominant force simply due to the injection of the universal concept of human dignity, its core value.

"The ability of the social market economy to reconcile opposing forces with its promise of freedom, justice and solidarity no doubt will induce our government to place the welfare of our people paramount."

Where we are today

Candidate Duterte's position was similar to this before assuming power. Many of his policies were directed initially towards some principles of the social market economy which were basically the guiding economic programs of the original PDP-Laban of Nene Pimentel. The party may still adhere to many of the guiding principles telescoped under the following slogans: "theism, authentic humanism, enlightened humanism, democratic socialism and consultative and participatory democracy."

Based on these principles, where do BBM, Leni, Isko, Ping and Manny, and the senatorial candidates figure? More importantly, who among these people, when gifted their positions, will adhere to what they believe in and push for what is called for?

My next columns will attempt to critique the five major presidentiables and selected senatorial candidates vis-à-vis the Centrist Democratic (CD) positions outlining the ideological underpinnings of SOME, fed-parl and the deletion of anti-FDI provisions in the 1987 Constitution in the hope of guiding the intelligent voters in their choices.

WITH intermittent snowfall generating outside temperature around the low teens and with Omicron lurking about this small farming community, more time has been allotted to reading posts of my friends on social media networks Facebook, Messenger and Viber, comfortably nestled before a faux fireplace. Separating the chaff from the grain has always been time wasting but not with these bloggers who post stimulating content. Claire Carlos, an author and political technocrat par excellence, is one of those that dish out short staccato-like numbered arguments, parsing complex problems, reducing them to bite-size morsels with clarity of which only an accomplished classroom schoolmarm is capable. Her thoughts on imposing discipline on logical processes explained how past president Fidel V. Ramos (FVR) concocted his "complete staff work" — a mantra many of us working under FVR understood only too well.

But the country's concerns go beyond — poverty alleviation, corruption, prohibited drugs, bureaucracy reform, foreign policy, the West Philippine Sea, etc. I refer to another blogger posting his 10 cents worth, which nonetheless are thought-provoking. Norman Madrid, a retired New York-based economist, posted eight-point policy initiatives, foremost of which was the amendment of the 1987 Constitution, striking out the anti-foreign direct investments (FDI) provisions (for details, friend him and access his FB). This echoes our Centrist Democratic (CD) position, articulated well by another prolific blogger, Orion Perez D, an advocate of the federal-parliamentary government and economic liberalization.

But to put things in proper perspective, these views were congruent with then candidate Duterte's stand on federalism, crusade against corruption and proscribed drugs, and political reforms, among others, which would in effect open up the economy. To prosper it needed one last ingredient — a display of political will, a sine qua non without which the 1987 Constitution remains untouched. He balked! These structural reforms were later dropped for political expediency in lieu of semantic contortions like the lamented Duterte Doctrine on "whiff of corruption" and "Operation Tokhang." But the underlying concepts are still valid and even timely for the next administration to consider, whoever takes the helm of the presidency — BBM, Leni, Isko, Ping, Manny. This time we must elect a president with a sufficient number of senators who will seriously revise the 1987 Constitution.

Current economic situation

At the twilight of his regime, the President may claim bragging rights to some economic gains during his tenure. The country posted a 2021 third quarter GDP growth of 7.1 percent. This was led by the industry and services sectors while agriculture, forestry and fishing contracted by minus 1.7 percent in the same quarter. Weighed down by the pandemic, forecast for the Philippine economy is a respectable 4.7 percent this year, hopefully accelerating to 5.9 percent in 2022 and 6 percent in 2023 (Philippine Statistics Authority). Although the pejorative "sick man of Asia" no longer applies to the Philippines, our economy comparatively is not as healthy as that of our neighbors — a consequence of this antiquated politico-economic system embedded in the 1987 Constitution.

Poverty may have declined to 16.6 percent rate in 2020 from 21.6 percent in 2015. But with the world pandemic-induced economic dislocations, poverty incidence is back to 23.7 percent in the first half of 2021. Duterte's AmBisyon2040 targets a decline of 14 percent by year-end 2022 totally eradicating poverty by 2040. This, by creating more jobs, improving productivity and investing in health and nutrition of the Filipino. But a recondition to all these are the dismantling of our perverted economic and political structures.

The following are excerpts from "Introduction to social market economy (SOME)" (The Manila Times, Oct. 27, 2016).

Wealth disparities

"A larger slice of the national wealth is still enjoyed by the very few families who are also game players of our political and economic landscapes. They have been enjoying their present positions that they will do everything just to maintain their rankings on Forbes' top wealthiest families in the Philippines.

"Top-to-bottom approach of our current development framework is no longer viable and has failed generations of Filipino families working their way out of the slums, only to be slammed back to the ground because our present economic policies have never been pro-people, but pro-elitist!

"The coming administration should look into SOME as a guiding concept and its imperatives, a tool for reducing poverty and nourishing conditions that respond to the needs of the people so they may also live a dignified and humane life."

Two traditional economic models

"In a capitalist driven economy, an individual takes precedence over the community and one should be free to take sole decisions on the course of his life. However, extreme liberal capitalists practiced an uninhibited and untrammeled free market economy where prices of goods and services and the production and distribution thereof are dictated solely by the market.

"On the other hand, the leftist model is notorious for the direct intrusion of the state due to a very centralized economic structure. It determines what goods and services to produce, who will produce them and subsequently who will consume them. Private property is absent and the means of production and distribution of goods and services are in the hands of the state. The economy is therefore centrally planned; clearly, a direct opposite of the capitalist economic model."

Economic framework that does justice

"SOME is a synthesis of two classical models of economic order. To the left is the socialist centralized planning adopted by countries such as (the "old") China and the Soviet Union, and to the right is the liberal capitalist model practiced by the (erstwhile) United States. These two models both have certain vital characteristics that when put together, form an economic model that carries with it the principles of social amelioration and the safety nets of the left, and the tempered free market of the laissez faire.

"SOME first laid its Midas touch to the still recuperating German economy way back in the post-World War 2 era. Lessons from the war provoked the Germans to create a social and economic model that does justice and seeks the common good. The inherent dignity of man, irrespective of religious faith and the belief in a God, is to take precedence over all. It must involve the right to self-determination, freedom of personal development and decision making.

"SOME, therefore, acknowledges the importance of an individual's creativity, innovation and decision-making capacities — and from the social context, it seeks to aid the disadvantaged through channeling revenues and resources from the privileged in our society."

PH version of social market economy

"The proposed economic model for the Philippine version of SOME does not veer away from that of the German model. Our country has inherited some of the important principles of the social market economy from our colonizers. Uncle Sam has planted the seeds of capitalism and independent-mindedness in our social fabric. We are therefore more familiar with the "free market" economy. This is a key value that also exists in the German model. The other important factor is that which was handed down to us by our Spanish colonizers — our Christian faith that also values the inherent dignity of man."

(To be continued on Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2022)

CUSTOMARILY, I write a column or two while on Christmas holiday. These are fundamentally upbeat as I travel with my family and grandkids like we did years back. Some excerpts: "I have now experienced more than seven decades worth of Christmases, and I have pleasant and wonderful memories with those that I can still remember. But the years have extracted their toll, and seldom do I recall occurrences in streams. The mustiness and fog concealing precious details are just too thick to penetrate, perhaps locking them forever." Our current 2021 to 2022 vacation is no exception, wonderful experiences with the little ones and warm family bonding deposited into memory banks later to be retrieved at leisure, except for a pall of dread and trepidation hovering over our lives these days. This is not, therefore, about holiday vacations per se, but the stress of flying in and out of airports.

International travel used to be a cinch prior to Covid-19. Just make sure your passports and visas are updated; book your flights and hotels early to avail of deep discounts; pack your bags, not forgetting the kids' devices needed for a long-haul flight; and then settle down in the plane. More importantly, don't leave any kid behind — as in the Christmas movie, "Home Alone."

Not this year. My grandkids left for the States at the end of June 2021with parents Matt and Lara as soon as school was out. They had been isolated in Davao since April 2020 at the start of the pandemic with the kids doing online schooling and parents working from home. They had a much better time in the provinces as Metro Manila's congested populace underwent a series of lockdowns and quarantines running intermittently through 14 months. Davao was not exempted from these strict protocols, but infections were comparatively low. Davao with its wide open spaces, greenery, beaches and mountain areas coupled with the local government's excellent handling of health protocols gave the kids safe venues and parents peace of mind.

After a respite of five months, we the grandparents followed the kids to the US, settling with the whole family in a farming community in Reisterstown, outside Baltimore in Maryland, where the dying days of autumn presaged the coming cold winter nights. The kids wished for snow on Christmas Eve as it would be easier for Santa's sleigh to travel over from chimney to chimney. It didn't snow that day and Santa may have just outsourced deliveries to Fedex and UPS, as the boxes of gifts and toys were laid around the tree on Christmas morn.

Travel bureaucracy

But getting to the States in November 2021 was another story. Having planned this trip two months earlier, we updated our Philippine passports as they were expiring in six months upon arrival — beyond the minimum requirement of the US Immigration Service (USIS) allowing foreign guests in — even with valid US B1/B2 visas. But thanks to the Deegong's restructuring of the DFA passports office, we got ours renewed in two weeks, and won't need another renewal for the next 10 years.

It was different with flight bookings. We decided on PAL as it offered a convenient 16-hour direct flight to New York. The first hurdle was to take a Covid test, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) 48 hours prior to boarding a local flight which is likewise valid for the international leg, provided your connecting flight does not go beyond 72 hours. Our five-day stay in Manila with our other grandkids required another PCR test for the flight to NYC.

Aside from the mandatory masks and shields (the latter "only in da Pilipins" courtesy of Pharmally Inc.), passengers need to download the Traze mobile application to one's cellphone or IPad to "generate and scan their QR code when entering in, boarding from, and upon arriving in all Philippine Airports starting Nov. 28, 2020, as mandated by the Philippine Department of Transportation." All passengers must register with the PAL passenger information form 24 hours before flight time, showing as evidence that the passenger is Covid-free with their PCR test results. If you don't have a screenshot of this in your device, you can have this printed. Sylvia and I had both — para sigurado.

Covid travel protocols

But months before, the two-step vaccination is required for any passenger, local or domestic. We had the two Sinovac jabs done in early June and mid-August. But social media postings were rife about the US rejecting the Chinese vaccine — which turned out to be fake news. But again, para sigurado, we had a booster shot of Moderna the first week of October, and for good measure, another one two weeks before our flight.

We had to laminate our Covid-19 vaccination cards as part of our growing pile of IDs and documentation, aside from our passports and valid US visas, and present them at the PAL counter where for some reason, this hazmat-suited guy, who may not even be a PAL employee, perhaps a Philippine immigration bureaucrat, rejected my second set of Moderna vaccine accepting only my Sinovac vaccine card.

Weird, but luckily I had both. Several passengers on the queue were still arguing with the hazmat guy when we were done with our departure formalities; perhaps the reason why the four-hour waiting time at airports was prescribed.

Flying back home

Our three-month stay with my grandkids from the Thanksgiving weekend to Christmas Eve dinners and New Year celebrations have been documented in my past columns. Unlike past vacations we didn't have a Delta variant fighting it out with Omicron. And these are concerns that pervade and restrict our every move — from bringing the kids to school, to grocery visits at Wegmans and shopping for stuff at Target, Marshalls, Home Goods, etc. and the usual visits to museums and zoos and sites which were ordinary travel activities in years past.

So far, we have postponed our trip back to Manila twice awaiting clarification on the quarantine protocol which has been reduced to the current 5 from 10 days. Travel costs aside from the usual flight tickets and hotel bookings have been substantially increased. For one, PCR tests which go for around P3,000 a pop have to be taken four to six times per head depending on your final destination. But the bigger amounts are the mandated stays at select hotels upon arrival in Manila adding an estimated 20 to 30 percent to your vacation budget.

These protocols may be good for preventing the spread of the pandemic and a boon to hotels but may be negative to the tourism industry in the long run. There are no enforced quarantines for arrivals in America, but Covid testing kits are widely available and some counties dispense them for free.

To lessen travel stress, it is imperative for the IATF to review its international travel policies. The enforced hotel quarantine may perhaps be substituted by a better tracing and tracking system, preventing such isolated incidents as this "Poblacion Girl" escaping from a Makati hotel.

Duterte has done a good job compared even to America. But it's high time for a reboot for the country's health and economy.