In our democracy, can justices be ‘brought to justice’, too, or what?

Speaker Joe de Venecia said yesterday he still had a few days to consider a motion seeking the impeachment of eight justices, including Chief Justice Hilario Davide, Jr. I won’t comment on the names of the three opposition Congressmen (you know, Suplico, Zamora and Dilangalen) who filed the 19-page verified complaint signed by former President Joseph E. Estrada, but many are already guessing about the outcome.

One guess, and I underscore "guess", is that Unflappable Joe will refer the thing to a committee where it will be buried under tons of press releases (which are the substitute in this country for action) and left squirming there, while political pundits, orators, broadcast commentators have a field day discussing whether the Supreme Court justices concerned should indeed be "impeached", merely given a spanking, or upheld by a scatter of mild applause.

Surely, Erap cannot be faulted for trying to insist he is still the country’s duly-elected President. From the public relations standpoint alone, such a move is necessary, I’d even say. But what can we say about former Senator Rene Saguisag’s move to derail the Supreme Court, accusing the eight justices he named of "culpable violation of the Constitution" et cetera? I won’t dwell on the legal issues raised. All I will comment is that, if Saguisag were to successfully push through his move it would be . . . well, a prescription for chaos.

What if the High Court were to recall its assailed decision declaring Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo "President" since Erap had, well, not "vacated" the post?

Since January 20, 2001, GMA has signed quite a number of laws enacted by Congress, has appointed government officials in several vital sectors of government, has issued executive orders, has entered into agreements with foreign governments and institutions. What would happen if, despite the de facto doctrine in public administration, all of these are subsequently declared null and void? Would not the entire government collapse?

What about the foreign governments who recognized the GMA government, and so forth? Salamabit, what about US President George "Dubya" Bush, now in Sharm al-Sheikh (Egypt) trying to discuss "peace" and other problems in the Middle East and scheduled to go to Jordan to promote his "road map" to peace between Israel and the Palestinians? Dubya, who still hasn’t found Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction (aside from two suspicious mobile lab vehicles), might be further perplexed by the thought he had invited the "wrong" President to the White House! Okay, that’s reductio ad absurdum – but, what the heck, too often in our dak-dak Democracy we seem to be living in the Land of the Absurd.

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It looks like President GMA’s visit to Seoul, South Korea, is more timely than it appeared when she left Monday. The Korean Peninsula has become the focus of a lot of news.

For instance, the G-7 (plus Russia) Sommet d’Evian, the summit of the world’s "industrialized" countries, hosted by French President Jacques Chirac concluded in Evian, France, yesterday. One of the major declarations made by the presidents and prime ministers gathered there was a warning to North Korea to stop any move to manufacture nuclear weapons. Or else? La Gloria is in position today to add that item to her speech repertoire.

Is it a coincidence, too, that United States Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz arrived in Seoul last Monday to discuss the future of the 37,000 US troops stationed in South Korea to help defend that country from the North? Wolfowitz was sent there to announce that Seoul and Washington, DC would reach agreement before year’s end on the nature of "force restructuring". Translation: Will many, if not most, of those American servicemen be transferred out of South Korea to other bases in Asia – like Japan, specifically Okinawa, and Guam, etc. And the Philippines, too? Our La Presidenta says, "no way, Jose", but shucks, "access" to our facilities, not "bases" (a no-no in our Constitution), might already have been hammered out, with the legal niceties simply waiting to be tidied up.

Why, North Korea’s "Dear Leader" is even on the cover of the new TIME magazine issue (June 9), just off the press! TIME calls him, "THE RACKETEER", and runs the teasing subtitle "How Kim Jong-Il Makes His Billions."

Inside, in a five-page article, the newsweekly alleges that Kim, "to fund his lifestyle – and his nukes – helms a vast criminal network".

The piece, by TIME perennial Anthony Spaeth, stresses that "missiles sales to other rogue nations constitute just a fraction of Kim’s legal, if questionable operations. His country is also a hotbed of counterfeiting and car smuggling. Perhaps the biggest money-spinner, though, is drugs – chiefly the manufacture and export of heroin and methamphetamines. North Korea supplies drugs to Russia and China, South Korea and Taiwan. Meth manufactured in the Democratic Republic of Korea (DPRK) amounts for a third of all such drugs sold in Japan, according to their expert on the trade – which puts their street value at $3 billion."

Who knows? Some of the tons of shabu which the Chinese smuggle into the Philippines monthly might have been manufactured in North Korea.

TIME correspondents John Larkin and Mingi Hyun also deal, in the same issue, with the current troubles of GMA’s host. The piece is entitled President Roh Sings the Blues.

The caption under President Roh Moo-hyun’s unsmiling photograph reads: MISERY. Roh’s first three months have been grim.

In this light, GMA’s visit is uncannily timely. Misery, as the saying goes, "loves company".

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You’ve got to give US President Bush an "A" mark for energy. In just a few days, Bush went to Krakow, Poland, then to Russia, then Evian (France) and now Egypt. He went to Krakow to thank the Poles from having supported the "coalition" in the Iraq war by sending troops to fight there (we only sent saliva), and for its postwar 2,000-man contingent which is on the way to "police" the former playground of Saddam Insane.

Iraq is still a mess, so Dubya needs 30,000 "peacekeeping" troops and military policemen from allied nations to help Tony Blair and himself in keeping the lid on trouble there. C’mon, perhaps we can give him a hand in this matter, and help solve "unemployment" here at home.

I’m not kidding. Did you know that the last census has just revealed that we have 82 million Filipinos, not just 79 or 80 million? Adding a thousand or more soldiers and cops to our roster of eight million OFWs won’t hurt our economy.

Would sending Filipino troops and policemen to Iraq constitute a sell-out? Susmariosep. Idealism, comradeship, defense of freedom and promotion of democracy, and other nice and high-faluting considerations aside (believe me, though, they count), our boys would be earning a decent living out there. The dispatch of a larger humanitarian expedition (doctors and nurses), soldiers, and military policemen to Iraq would make more sense than sending Triple R, Ambassador and Businessman Robert R. Romulo, the feckless Desert Shiek of Sikatuna, and his Chief Camel Driver Sostenes "Jun" Campillo, the allies of the Jewish insurance cartel led by Maurice Greenberg, to Kuwait and Iraq. The Arabs are already wondering whether Filipino males are circumcised in the Jewish manner.

As for the Evian G-8 summit, French President Chirac described it, in his closing press conference, as "a summit of dialogues". His most crucial dialogue had been, of course, with Mr. Bush. The two met for the first time since their quarrel over Iraq. The smiles were forced, the handshakes perfunctory, their joint press conference an exercise in restraint. But what the heck, at least they tried to be polite to each other.

Many years ago, at a dinner in Paris, someone remarked that diplomacy is just "a lot of hot air".

Someone else wittily and wisely replied: "Hot air, when pumped into your car’s tires, eases the bumps on life’s highway."

Methinks Bush and Chirac will never be friends (Dubya and the Americans were cut too deeply by France’s deliberate attempts to torpedo them in the United Nations Security Council.) But being courteous to one another suffices for the moment. There’s a French term for this, invented by the need for the Gaullists and the socialists to co-exist and cooperate in the fractured French political culture: co-habitation.

Co-habitation in France was never a happy situation. But it, somehow, worked – because it had to. Otherwise, après lui, le deluge.