A banana republic without bananas

LINDEN, New Jersey – We’re committing media-suicide with all that frantic talk about destabilization plots and coup conspiracies, first quoting former President Erap Estrada against ex-President FVR, then claiming that it is Estrada money "funding" the efforts allegedly designed to overthrow the GMA government.

Enough is enough. Everybody at home has grown inured to such hyperbolic rantings – we all know that nothing will come of all that belligerent rumor-mongering and coup talk. Look at what happened in Oakwood two years ago. The mutineers called for a revolution, like they were organizing a dance party, but nobody came. The problem is that there are still a few people abroad, including jittery portfolio managers, who get bothered by those silly but persistent coup "scenarios" so blithely brandished about.

Before I left Manila on this trip, for example, I met with worried portfolio managers from the United States, concerned about whether our Congress was serious about Value-Added Tax, imposing the necessary new taxes, tackling the fiscal deficit, and our prospects for fighting ourselves out of the hole in general. Many in the group represented Bear Stearns which was recently voted America’s "most admired company" in the Securities Industry in the "FORTUNE" 500. Bear Stearns was named Bank of the Year in 2004 and ranks No. 1 in "stock picking" for total returns over the past seven years.

However, the stock-pickers of BS are nervous. They say they invested the life’s savings of widows, orphans, retired teachers and other retirees in our country – but see the prospects increasingly bleak.

I had to give them my usual upbeat spiel, which, hopefully, is not wearing thin: "The Filipino is like Ivory Soap: he floats." Sometimes, on the other hand, I get that sinking feeling.

I think it’s time we canned that frenetic "coup talk". Our geriatric generals and our sensation-hunting media have cried "wolf" so often, nobody will come to help if, one day, the wolf will really be at the door.

In the old days, those unstable countries in Central and South America used to be dunned "banana republics" in derision and despair. This is because these nations, run by United Fruit of the USA and subsequently United Brands, got themselves tinpot dictators in round robin fashion by the staging of golpes del estado or putsches in such frequent fashion that it was a case in the Palacio of here today, gone tomorrow – gone, of course, to Miami (Florida) on the last plane out, with all the purloined loot.

We’re beginning to look like a banana republic ourselves, but we’re running out of bananas. All we’ve got are a lot of nut-cases who think they can do better than Gloria, even ex-Presidents who would dearly love to do a MacArthur, with ambitions of "I shall return." I propose they return the money first.

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Over here, all is not sweetness and light either.

The newspapers say that after his first 100 days, President George W. Bush is faltering, with Social Security reform, the insistence of his rub-the-wrong-way Ambassador pal, John Bolton, representing the US in the United Nations, etc. First Lady Laura Bush had come to Dubya’s rescue by joking at a press conference that she was a "desperate housewife" (referring to a popular TV show) married to a President who is asleep by 9 p.m., et cetera. Laura outpoints Bush in the poll surveys, but she’s not exhibiting any Hillary Clinton complex – nor is this likely. She’s a honey and this humanizes Bush.

In California, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s star is dipping, too. In a speech last January, Schwarzie had pledged to be a tough state boss, changing the way pensions are managed in California, the state budget is balanced, legislative districts are drawn, and teachers are paid.

"The special interests will run TV ads calling me cruel and heartless," the Guv alias The Terminator predicted, "They will organize protests outside the Capitol. They will try to say I don’t understand the consequences of these decisions."

Schwarzenegger’s dour predictions have come true. His popularity has plummeted, and he had to back-pedal on some initiatives. Two opinion polls showed his approval rating dropping below 50 percent for the first time since he, a Republican, upset the Democratic Party Governor and seized office in November 2003.

The immigrant from Austria who skyrocketed from Hollywood fame to the State Capitol, with the help of his wife’s family, of course, the dynamic Kennedy clan, may still be hopeful he’ll eventually climb up to the White House. This requires an amendment of the US Constitution (remember cha-cha at home?) – but Americans have amended their Constitution 27 times before, including the inclusion of Human Rights clauses which weren’t there before.

So, the Terminator need not despair, or even strive to improve his accent which makes him sound, at times, like his former province-mate Adolf Hitler, with beefcake. No. Schwarzie is no Hitler, and to his joy this may even be the Teutonic Century, or so it seems. Who would have dreamed that our Roman Catholic Church would get a German Shepherd (of the Flock) like Papa Ratzi, His Holiness Benedict XVI? (Papa’s namesake San Benito – Benedict – by the way is the patron saint of my late father, Don Benito T. Soliven – and the brother, don’t forget, of Sta. Escholastica. We discovered this only when we visited St. Scholastica’s shrine in Italy).

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What may hurt Schwarzenegger is how he deals with fellow immigrants like himself. America’s big headache today is the flood of illegal immigrants inundating the country.

In the past ten years, an average of 700,000 to 750,000 undocumented immigrants a year have arrived in the USA. The Pew Hispanic Center has estimated that this population has grown fastest in states that previously did not have a significant immigrant presence!

"We’re swamped: no vacancies!" Exclaims William Gheen, president of Americans for Legal Immigration in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Among the immigrants are not just Hispanics, as one might expect, but Muslims from different Arab and North African countries. There are a multitude of such legal immigrants, too, holding Green Cards, even US citizenship.

Would you believe, many strategic ports in the US have security guards, legally hired, who are 70 to 80 percent Muslim? This does not mean that Muslims are unreliable, except that some Americans expressed fears to me that if fanatics tell them that Allah wishes them to commit acts of terrorism or sabotage, what will they do? America is unmanned by its own laws of equal opportunity, human rights, and equal justice for all. If companies reject or lay off guards in installations and businesses owing to their religious persuasion (like Islam) they get slapped with discrimination suits, based on charges of religious bigotry, "profiling," or prejudice.

Terrorists have no law, or if they do, it’s the law of the jungle. The US has to operate by "the rule of law." Down in the jungle, the Americans cannot slug it out, toe to toe – not even in Guantanamo Bay. Clever lawyers may yet get most of those now being held there – the hardliners – released.

Democracies are in peril in this treacherous world where no rules seem to apply. The other day, incidentally, was World Press Freedom Day. This is meaningless if too many journalists, as in our country, get murdered. Yesterday, a broadcaster in Dipolog was shot seven times and is in critical condition as of press time, a mockery of our press freedom. Sometimes, alas, it’s been said, too much "freedom" can also be deadly. Our enemies gleefully utilize these liberties to destroy our society.