An interesting bit of news

Morning sometimes sees me doing monitoring. The advent of Net-based news, and the fact that Inq7 updates 24/7, means that something new might have come out that the morning newspaper's edition doesn't carry.

So I check. And I also check the blogs of note if I have the time (or inclination). And one of those I regularly check is Dr. Meinardus' blog, my liberal times. And he has this interesting post on something Prof. Mario Taguiwalo, President of the National Institute for Policy Studies (NIPS), wrote.

Actually, I was going to respond to the post, but it got long and rather, er, strong. So as not to put to risk Dr. M any further - some people in the other camp have been doing their damndest to get rid of him as Resident Representative - I have decided to make this post instead.

According to Dr. M, a commentary by Prof. Taguiwalo has appeared in a 4-page booklet entitled “Liberal Party on the Road not yet taken“. Dr. M quotes the following, and I extract this verbatim from his blog:

“Despite the fact that our shared position on GMA’s unfitness to remain president may have initially defined us (in contrast to other liberals who have a different opinion on this issue), being simply anti-GMA is not a fruitful, wise or sustainable direction for our political party. Being anti-GMA is not even the universe of liberal aspirations for our country. And worst of all, being anti-GMA is not the most productive way of applying liberal principles in serving our people at this time… Just as overwhelmingly being pro-GMA can warp one’s liberalism, being obsessively anti-GMA can pervert our liberalism.”

Well. That's interesting.

I've always said that what torpedoed the whole scenario the LP finds itself in right now was the rather intransigent position of some of those in the anti-GMA camp on the issue of July 8. They REFUSED to listen to the fact that so many of us who challenged the statement of July 8 weren't doing it on the grounds of whether we were pro- or anti-GMA but because it was a question of process, of the mechanisms for decision-making and consultation that is at the heart of what revived the LP in recent years.

If only the question of GMA's legitimacy could be divorced from that of what the Party did leading to July 8, then MAYBE we could get somewhere.

Seeing what Prof. Taguiwalo wrote gives me hope that some people, especially in Sen. Drilon's side, will start rethinking this whole thing. They HAVE to listen to Prof. Taguiwalo somehow.

My tirades against Sen. Drilon in this blog wasn't because I was pro-GMA (although I HAVE heard that some people in the Drilon camp are trying to paint it that way) - far from it: I DON'T agree with so many of what she has done since the Garci tapes came out - but because, as Staff of the HQ and an officer of the youth wing, I saw firsthand how this perversion of liberalism by some in Drilon's group happened. Heck, I AM, after all, a victim myself of this perversion.

When I speak out against Sen. Drilon and those around him, I don't do so because I am simply with the Atienza camp, but because I was taught one thing during my time with the LP and I saw another thing when 8 July 2005 happened and in the long months leading to 2 March 2006, how some of my elders acted contrary to what I was taught and made to believe.

I am in the Atienza camp not for anything some people - and they know who they are - say I am, but simply because I saw and experienced PERSONALLY how the values I was made to believe in as a member of this Party were twisted, manipulated and yes, perverted to support a particular action that has NO official sanction of the Party's majority.

You know, I was thinking this: those who went against GMA are the intellectual and moral elite of the Party. I have seen how they could tilt the balance in their favor during a NECO session simply by stating their case clearly and concisely.

I was thinking: what if Sen. Drilon, using his power and influence as LP President and Senate President, INSISTED to the NECO to convene on July 8, and allowed people like Mario Taguiwalo to present the case vs. GMA, allowed a full debate to happen? What are the chances they could have convinced a majority of the NECO to side with them?

How many were pro-Roco leading to the 2004 elections? Yet what happened after all the data came in from the process that was approved by the NECO in determining our standard bearer in the 2004 elections?

It's like what we said in KALIPI's position paper after July 8: who knows what the LP would have decided if we simply followed the processess we are known for as a Party? The anti-GMA group may just have won!

But July 8 had to happen. Even worse, they did nothing that could be termed as in keeping with the LP's traditions and processes in the months leading to March 2. Actually, much worse was the suppression, the cover ups, the PRs with so much false information fed to the media through our email and website. I think, if someone asks me why I posted all of those press releases in www.liberalparty.ph loudly proclaiming the LP's so-called stand on GMA, all I could answer is , it was my job to post them, and because my boss at the time said to put those up.

And then there's CALD. This is the most painful of all, because we had to include our sister parties abroad in this insanity.

You know, I wish COMELEC had asked for witnesses or some such. I wish my name had been called. I would have stood or sat there and told the Commissioners, your honors, do you want to know WHY March 2 happened? I would have answered, because Drilon and his people allowed it to happen. Because, contrary to the rules, traditions and ideals of the Liberal Party, they not only refused to convene the NECO for so long but did their damndest best to suppress anything that would have hinted at a division in the LP or a question from the ranks about July 8.

I would, perhaps half-rhetorically, ask the Commissioners... ask yourself, your honors: if Drilon had convened the NECO anytime between 8 July 2005 and maybe the anniversary of January 2006... do you think March 2 would have happened?

Like I have been saying for a long time now: was anyone suprised March 2 happened?

Unless, of course, Drilon and his people have started to believe their own propaganda. Now that is a problem, indeed. Because you cannot reason out of something anyone who was not reasoned into it in the first place. Or anyone who has deluded themselves into thinking that a particular position is the truth after telling a lie for so long.

And if you think my being in the LP's pro-GMA camp has perverted my sense of liberalism, then look here.