Who doesn’t get it?

There seems to be one line that dominates the organized defenses around President GMA. This line says that everything thrown against GMA is part of an opposition plot to "destabilize" the government and oust GMA. Thus, these attacks are unworthy of response.

The truth, administration defenders say, has always been there for all who have eyes unclouded by cataracts to see. Those who deny that the truth has been out there all this time counter that the people have been denied the complete and unembellished facts. All indications are that those facts may never come out since, from the incumbents’ point of view, those who ask are suspect and are therefore bereft of any right to even ask.

Take the cases of Joc-Joc Bolante, Bert Gonzales and, of course, Garci. No amount of spin doctoring can remedy the fatal flaw the administration’s case suffers from: Not one of the three has come clean with the facts.

While I make no conclusions about whether or not the three are involved in anomalies, it’s become increasingly difficult to give them and the administration the benefit of the doubt. If they did nothing wrong – Garci during the last national elections, Bert in regard to the Venable LLP contract, and Joc-Joc with the fertilizer fund–then why don’t they just come out and give straightforward explanations.

Citizens as a whole are neither stupid nor naive nor particularly partisan. We can sort out the facts from, to quote FVR, the "cow manure." Most of us can see the difference between an honest quest for the truth and opposition ploys, the schemes of destabilizers, or desperate and pointless inanities like a "People's Court." (As a person whose judgment I trust cogently asks: Who gave them the right to play God?) We can also distinguish between credible defense and mere dissembling and cover up.

Ex-Department of Agriculture Undersecretary Jocelyn "Joc-Joc" Bolante is assertedly better off abroad than in the country because the political opposition only wants to use him to attack GMA. Further, if the Senate really wants him to come back, there is a "cut-and-dried" process to get that done. Since the Senate isn’t availing of that process, what that body really wants him for is to attack GMA.

This is more cow manure. Has the Palace forgotten that embarrassing episode at the Rotary District Convention when International Director Joc-Joc was caught by TV cameras enthusiastically explaining something to a foreign Rotarian, but was inexplicably "absent" to receive a summons from Senate agricultural committee chair Jun Magsaysay?

After delivering a speech, probably on the Rotary Four Way Test (Is it the truth? Is it fair to all concerned? Etc., etc.), he slipped out through a back door and later boarded a plane for another "previously scheduled" engagement abroad.

Let’s get real here, guys. The bottom line is Joc-Joc must testify. The testimony of former Budget Secretary Emy Boncodin isn’t enough because all she said was that she released the money in accordance with law. Former Secretary Cito Lorenzo has washed his hands of the whole affair and claimed that it was Usec Bolante who handled the fertilizer fund disbursements.

Some of the beneficiaries of the fund have admitted that the money wasn’t used for fertilizers but for other purposes which they argue was allowed under the "guidelines" for the fund. Maybe so, but that still has to be established.

There may have been perfectly plausible reasons for the way the fertilizer fund was disbursed and subsequently utilized by the recipients. Maybe the funds really weren’t used for politics. So far though, other than bare budgetary documents which explain nothing, much less justify anything, the factual record is full of holes.

Our National Security Adviser On Indefinite Medical Leave, the Heart Bypass Patient-in-Waiting Bert Gonzales, was apparently fit enough to attend the birthday bash of Majority Leader Boy Nograles in Davao City. It seems that only a summons from Joker Arroyo’s Senate blue ribbon committee can send Bert’s blood pressure soaring and cause him to make a beeline for the Heart Center.

We’ve already said in this column that the Senate’s mistreatment of Gonzales was uncalled for and that the name-calling during the hearing was positively boorish. However, the Senators’ frustration was not unprovoked, given Bert’s meandering and unresponsive answers. Unfortunately, the net result is that the public is still in the dark about the Venable lobbying contract.

This is fundamentally unacceptable. The argument that this contract is covered by "executive privilege" is fatuous. Happily, the Palace’s legal eagles seem to have abandoned it.

Again, there may perfectly defensible reasons for the Venable LLP contract. But until the facts are disclosed about why it was procured, the particular assignments given to the law firm (including what a U.S. law firm had to do with charter change), who paid for it and why the National Security Adviser was the designated signatory, among other unanswered questions, the Venable contract cannot be dismissed as just another "routine" contract entered into by the government with foreign parties.

And then there is Garci. Although GMA’s defenders prefer to focus on the motives behind raking up the role of the then Comelec Commissioner, and on the illegality of the supposed audio tapes, there are other more basic issues. Questions have been raised by other witnesses about his alleged role in the crucial voting in Mindanao.

If Garcillano has nothing to hide, if there are sound and credible reasons for his actions during the last elections, then why hasn’t he come forward? If an offended party wants to file suit against an alleged perpetrator for the alleged illegality of the recording of the audio tapes, go right ahead. It is high time we get to the bottom of this mess.

We are, however, still stymied by one undeniable fact: Garci is missing. Whether that is by choice or under duress is unknown. Until he materializes and testifies on his role during the last elections, the issues concerning him will not be put to rest.

The line that our crisis is purely the work of destabilizers, the political opposition and others "obsessed" with GMA’s ouster may have succeeded in giving the undecided and the fence-sitters some pause. But at the end of the day, the truth is the only antidote to the poison that is still spreading throughout the body politic.