Expecting good press for bad performance - Gotcha

You can take off your earplugs now. After three days of ranting and raving into radio and TV mikes, Malacanang aides and LAMP legislators have had their fill of bashing Time. They seem self-satisfied with how they lined up to pay homage to a President whom that magazine had belittled with a cover headline, "In over his head," and story of a small-town mayor. Not that Time was inaccurate, just that the truth hurt. And Joseph Estrada's pals and partymates hate it when he frets and closets himself in his Palace quarters and asks them why, oh, why are they doing this to me?

Some persons may be out of the Palace, like ex-press secretary Rod Reyes and spokesman Jerry Barican, but the air of a doting mother fussing over a spoiled child is still there. They were fond of exhorting press and public to pity Estrada who's having a hard Time but trying his darned best. Barican even made it look like the electorate had forced the Presidency on Estrada in '98, as though he hadn't sought the position as far back as '92, just that he had slid down that Time as vice presidential runningmate to a man he calls Boss.

But such is the Presidency. More so if the man at the helms turns it into what political scientist George Reedy warned as personal power-trip instead of wielding power for the people. Wrote Reedy in The Twilight of the Presidency: "The notion of the overburdened President represents one of the insidious forces that serve to separate the Chief Executive from the real universe of living, breathing, troubled human beings. It is the basis for encouraging his most outrageous expressions, for pampering his most childish tantrums, and for fostering his most arrogant actions. More than anything else, it serves to create an environment in which no man can live for any considerable length of Time and retain his psychological balance."

Which is what Time pointed out -- that Estrada seems unprepared, unsuited for the job: "Despite his warm personality and good intentions . . . the longer reach and policy grasp required of a President still escape him."

That's what escaped Estrada when he taunted Moro secessionists for being untrue Filipinos because they want to dismember the Republic, when Moros historically don't consider themselves Filipino. That's what escaped him when he twitted peace advocates for trying to stop Army offensives when he supposedly is trying to save lives of children in evacuation camps and soldiers in battlefields.

That's not how Estrada's closest circlers view it. From where they stand, Cardinal Jaime Sin has it all wrong when he talks of leadership vacuum and directionless administration. Even if they contradict each other about Abu Sayyaf's $2-million ransom demand or Metro Manila mall bombers, they claim to have direction. Even if Estrada cuts short a China state visit purportedly to deal with pressing problems back home, then shows up for work at 4 p.m. the next day, they see no vacuum.

What they do see is a Time magazine (and Newsweek before it) whose writers abused the President's hospitality of chopper rides, a local press that criticizes too often, a public that expects too much. They can't bring themselves to look at things from the other side of the fence: that the press reports on bad work because the good is what's expected of the party in power with no praise or fanfare, and the public expects performance because that's what they're paying the administration for. In short, the President can't expect a good press or public rating if he's doing bad or isn't doing enough good.

Now Estrada's aides and partymates want to have the last word by writing Time to protest its report. After which, they presumably will return to supposed vacuum-less leadership and direction-full administration. There's big work to be done. Twenty-one mostly foreign hostages have to be freed from Sulu bandits through negotiations with no petty politicking or grandstanding by Cabinet members left in Manila. Seven other hostages, five schoolchildren and two teachers, need to be found and not forgotten in Basilan. Moro rebels have to be wooed back into peace talks in Lanao-Maguindanao after the Army shelled their camp that Malacanang had recognized as sanctuary. Manila mall bombers have to be arrested instead of merely labelling their supposed political leanings. Millions of workers have to be given jobs so they won't run amuck in burger stalls or rob plane passengers in-flight. Inflation has to be reined in and the peso stabilized lest they trigger another round of fuel, transportation, electricity and food price increases.

Decisions have to be made by a President who, hopefully, no longer is alternately fuming and sulking from a magazine's painfully true story.

What is happening to the National Police? Bombs are bursting all over the country, yet the Aviation Security Command let a man into the Davao airport with hand grenade and pistol. PNP chief Gen. Ping Lacson is sacking high offcers for failure of intelligence, yet Metro Manila generals are sending incompetent and corrupt patrolmen to Mindanao to discipline them. People are relying on policemen to curb senseless violence in the streets, yet senior cadets in the police academy are maiming and killing rookies. Senators are contemplating a supplemental budget for police work, yet cops on EDSA-Cubao can't even sort out traffic. The PNP brass are begging for more intelligence funds, yet they didn't even run after ambushers of the President's eldest son.

INTERACTION. Willie Vicedo, Carson, Ca.: They should have included centrists, not only leftists and rightists, as suspects in Manila bombings. That way, they'll get the real culprits, not just fall guys (Gotcha, 24 May 2000).

Joey Legarda, Makati: The confusion caused by Erap's Mindanao war is a chance for him to get back at critics whom he always calls "destabilizers."

You think it's Time for me to disappear, Joey?

Grace Inocencio, mydestiny.net: They blamed "anti-Cha-Cha rightists" for mall bombings; at the same time three senators revived Cha-Cha. I can't believe anti-Cha-Cha groups are bombers, but I'm sure bombings have a political agenda -- if not martial law, then Cha-Cha.

Francis Roque, hotmail.com: First, natural disasters like typhoons and floods. Then, war in Mindanao, bombings in Manila. The economy and peso sink. Do you have a feeling that all this happened before? Are we seeing a prelude to . . . .

Ugh, Francis, I hate summer reruns, especially of flicks from 1972.

Dave Domingo, Manila: I wonder why human rights activists are silent these days about atrocities committed by Abu Sayyaf, which beheads and tortures abducted Christians and Muslims, and mutilates the bodies of slain soldiers.

Kenneth Y. Haguisan, weblinq.com: I'm from Mindanao, and it pains me that bandits disguised as Islamic fighters and secessionists are holding our island hostage. Terrorist chaos now threatens Metro Manila, too. They're blaming it on MILF and Abu Sayyaf as scenario for martial law.

Rene Moral, cnl.net: I absolutely agree with you that local officials, from mayors to barangay captains, are to blame for proliferation of squatters (Gotcha, 22 May 2000). They serve the interest of squatters because that's where they get their votes. Taxpaying lot-owners should organize themselves the way tricycle owners and drivers form TODAs. Squatters may outnumber them, but organized lot-owners can sue local officials for abetting squatters.

Thank you, Ramon Sagullo, Pete Lacaba, Mira Castillo, Dr. Zen Udani, Atty. A.G. Arellano and other readers who took time out to write.

YOUR BODY. A treatment designed to kill cancer cells but not harm healthy tissues, as convention chemotherapy does, shows strong promise in tests for patients with chronic myelogenous leukemia. This, researchers announced in a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. For more, visit cnn.com/health.

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