Never-ending story

By Netnet Camomot

IT’S November! How time flies.

Parang kailan lang when you were thinking of what to include in your New Year’s resolutions, only to break them on the second day of the year.

Slowly but surely, I’m still in a spring-cleaning mode as I ask, Does this spark joy? Too many items, too little time. Whew! 

I didn’t have any New Year’s resolution, so, there’s no list to refer to as a basic standard for my daily choices. But I can compare my bodyweight today with that of exactly a year ago since I note down my weight daily, which is my hard habit to break. If only the weight gain can inspire me to diet and exercise, then that habit has its perks.

With Christmas so near, I can almost taste the recycled fruitcake, wishing for a slimmer body at this time of the year is like wishing for President Rody Duterte’s war on drugs to finally succeed with Vice President Leni Robredo as the drug czar. We can dream, can’t we?

Let’s see if the absence of Tokhang and extrajudicial killings will finally solve Pinas’ drug problems.

Robredo has about two and a half years to campaign for the presidential election, er, to apply her version of the war on drugs. Her calm demeanor will hopefully help drug lords, pushers and users to realize that drugs are dangerous to their health and can destroy lives, including theirs.

Drug lords are used to earning much moolah out of their lucrative business. Once Robredo has successfully banished drugs to anywhere but here, what business can drug lords switch to? Hmmm. Let’s calculate the ways: loansharking, investment scams, illegal gambling, smuggling, religious cult, and so on and so forth.

Duterte‘s successor in 2022 will then appoint a loansharking czar, investment-scam czar, illegal-gambling czar, etc. for his—or her?—war on whatever. A never-ending story. Like that song: “Rhymes that keep their secrets/Will unfold behind the clouds/And thereupon a rainbow/Is the answer to a never-ending story.”

And much like the seemingly never-ending deaths at the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) in the last few months. First, there was Cadet Fourth Class Darwin Dormitorio who died last Sept. 18 due to hazing. Then, on Oct. 28, Cadet Second Class Cedrick Gadia died from esophageal cancer. And last Friday, Cadet Fourth Class Mario Telan Jr. drowned in the PMA swimming pool.

Dormitorio was from Cagayan de Oro, while Telan was from Cagayan Valley. What’s with Cagayan and PMA? Any connection there?

PMA is one of Baguio’s tourist spots. I was there a long time ago when Baguio still had trees and no traffic. Those were the days.

With the Pinoy discovering new places to visit in Pinas, Baguio seems to be not his priority anymore as he goes to El Nido, Coron, Batanes, Boracay, Siargao, Vigan.

Christmas is also vacation time for the Pinoy but that’s better spent at home with family, to avoid the rush in airports, ports, and bus terminals where vacationers wait for their ride home.

Christmas is that time of year when the Pinoy is pressured to be happy, generous, and kind, complete with a kilometric Christmas list. And Robredo’s appointment as a drug czar could be Duterte’s Christmas gift to the drug industry, that is, if the latter sees Robredo’s compassion as an assurance that she’s for rehabilitation instead of extrajudicial killings.

With Robredo at the helm, will Lt. Col. Jovie Espenido be as rabid in stopping alleged drug lords? That’s the question that only Espenido can answer since Duterte did tell him to “go there and you are free to kill everybody” for his new assignment in Bacolod. Brrr.

Usually, the only person who can answer a question is the subject of that question, otherwise, the answer is nothing but hearsay. Even official spokespersons can be mere mouthpieces once they start to second-guess their boss’ thought bubbles. The spokesperson should admit that this time he has no authority to speak on his boss’s behalf if the boss is on leave and has not authorized anyone to release a statement. Better safe than sorry.

Presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo did have some encouraging words for Robredo before she accepted the challenge to be drug czar and was still doubting if Duterte was serious with the offer. Panelo said then that it’s a “rare opportunity to show everyone that you’re not just good at criticizing”:

“The offer is a sincere gesture on the part of President Duterte for VP Leni to provide her the venue to undertake a new tact in solving the drug menace, if in her mind the present method of dealing with the scourge of the prohibited drugs is a failure or ineffective. She may have a better solution. Entertaining the offer as insulting is an exercise in intellect devoid of logic” (GMA News Online, Oct. 30, 2019).

“Intellect devoid of logic.” Ouch.

But only happy thoughts are allowed as the recycled fruitcake awaits the avid Christmas fan.