Pissing off FPJ

Here’s a short list of things I don’t like:

1) I don’t like waiting in line.
2) I don’t like people cutting in line.
3) I don’t like the church for turning a blind eye to its priests’ abuses and castigating the government for poverty, and then have the nerve to tell the poor that contraception is a sin.
4) I don’t like getting caught in the rain (but I like pina colada).
5) I don’t like people who kiss the asses of rich people.
6) I don’t like people who think the poor are always right.
7) I don’t like people who sing in karaokes thinking they sound like Frank Sinatra and end up shooting other people who tell them their singing is as pleasant as nails running across a blackboard.
8) I don’t like Sharon Cuneta’s TV commercials because they are too many.
9) I don’t like walking into a boutique and the sales person looks at me like I can’t afford to buy anything from her. (She’s probably right, but I don’t like it just the same).
10) I don’t like what Bayani Fernando has done to Quezon Avenue.
11) I don’t like people whose loyalty stops them from forming an intelligent opinion.
12) I don’t like people who think popularity and sincerity alone qualify them to run for public office.
13) I don’t like that buffoon Erap.
14) And I sure as hell don’t like FPJ running for president.

Last year, Fernando Poe Jr. said he wasn’t going to run for president; last December, President Gloria Arroyo said she wasn’t going to run for president. I don’t know how they make their decisions, but it sure sounds like they do it on a whim because today both of them are talking about their "sacrifices" – how hard the next six years are going to be for their families, how they have to give up their privacy, how they have to deal with the criticism and mud slinging and how much they love this country.

Oh please.

You’re all beginning to sound like Kris Aquino.

Watching the news on Wednesday when FPJ announced his intention to run, I panicked when I saw Susan Roces looking alarmingly like Imelda as she cried on TV and said that her husband was running because he just wanted to help the people, so why is everybody so mean to him? I kept thinking, oh my God, is she going to break into Dahil sa Iyo?

That scared the hell out of me. That and the clip where FPJ mumbled through his one-on-one interview with ABS-CBN wearing shades. Did he perhaps misplace a wristband? Or when he was asked about his economic policies and he said…what did he say? Nothing, that’s what. You’d think if you were going to announce your presidential ambitions you would have at least prepared something – anything – on how you were going to lead the country aside from the overused line about being the savior the masses need.

Now showbiz people are complaining of the criticism FPJ is receiving. Their loyalty is fascinating. I can watch their display on TV all day and be alternately amazed and confused about whether part of their brain goes on auto pilot when they’re talking about FPJ. It’s the same kind of loyalty for Erap, which led Senator Tessie Oreta to do that little jig in the Senate during the impeachment proceedings.

Look where it got Erap.

You don’t know whether their loyalty to FPJ comes from personally knowing he has the brains to lead the country or simply because they belong to the same profession. There must be something about show business that creates this strong bond, this persecution complex that leads them to think that because they are actors people think they’re stupid.

In this country that has elected showbiz people and made them mayors, councilors, governors and senators barangay captains, and hell, even president – why do they still complain of a bias against their profession? You don’t hear electricians saying, "Oh they’ll never elect us into office!" And you certainly don’t hear economists fanatically defending GMA just because she is one.

We all know there are many accomplished actors whose achievements go beyond their profession. You see their every move in newspapers every day, for God’s sake.

The biggest bias against FPJ is not that he is an actor, but that he may lack the skills, temperament, and attitude to become a leader. People say he has such a kind heart, unquestionable sincerity and that he has helped a lot of people through the years – shouldn’t this be enough?

No, it’s not. I need my president – whoever he or she is – to be better than the average Juan. I want him to know history and poetry as well as economics, to be able to quote Shakespeare and argue with Allan Greenspan, to stand shoulder to shoulder with the world’s most powerful leaders, to make me proud – not to make me laugh – when I see him on TV. I want to love my president and I want to respect him.

I want a president who doesn’t have to surround himself with economists to know how to run the country. I want him to know these things on his own and listen to advice but not be influenced by people who have a different agenda.

I want to talk about my president to foreigners without being embarrassed, without shaking my head and saying, "Well, Filipinos aren’t the most mature electorate in the universe." I don’t want to hear that Filipino doctors are now studying to become nurses just to apply for jobs abroad or college students choosing their courses based on what the most popular jobs are in other countries.

Sincerity is a beautiful thing, but it’s not the only thing that makes a president great. In 1998, when Erap was elected, I was hoping he would succeed, that since he was wildly popular and beloved, he was going to do good. But look what he did. He surrounded himself with advisers and friends, he drank and he womanized – oh how he womanized and how they built their mansions.

Does anybody remember any of this?

It was as if he was chipping away at the stature of the presidency and the country piece by piece. He said the most godawful embarrassing things at the most unfortunate moments. The things that saw print, they weren’t even close to what editors wouldn’t print because they were just so stupid and depressing. He didn’t inspire the poor to do better – he just fueled their anger and pointed it to the wrong direction. You don’t have a house? You don’t have a job? Blame the past presidents, blame the rich, blame the middle class. He never said, well, why don’t you get off your asses and look for work?

He didn’t encourage people to work harder because he didn’t improve the economy. He blamed the rich, played to the poor and completely forgot about the middle class who didn’t cheat on their taxes or steal other people’s land.

Like Erap, FPJ polarizes people. It’s the kind that creates so much anger and distrust on both sides. This early, the people surrounding him are far from reassuring. Tito Sotto? After showing his fantastic grasp of economics, of what drives foreign exchange? Hello? This is not Eat Bulaga, sir. Nobody is laughing.

Somebody should pinch FPJ and tell him this is not the movies. That he cannot fight off our Asian neighbors for measly investment with his magic sword.

Erap and now Ang Panday. It’s so depressing I want to cry.

A friend warned me about pissing off FPJ. She said, "Be careful what you write about him, he may be your next president."

What’s he gonna do, drop an anvil on my head?

* * *

E-mail the author at tanyalara@yahoo.com.