That is unfortunate, because encounters with the press kind are a valuable learning process for both parties, especially at this time. The President can also learn from the dialogue – if she is attentive enough.
For instance, by studying carefully questions being posed, the President may yet discern the sense being conveyed by the people through the media – that insisting on Charter change at this time is doing the nation more harm than good.
With the Malacañang-House cabal pushing self-serving Charter change before the May 2007 elections, the opposite is happening.
The nation lies bleeding in a respectable hospital, yet the Arroyo-De Venecia ambulance wants to pick it up from the ICU and rush it, leaky tubes and all, to a hospital that still has to be built, equipped and staffed.
There is nothing seriously wrong with the present hospital (while not perfect, the presidential system has served us well enough for decades until…), but it is better for the moment than one that is still in the fickle mind of politicians drugged with power.
The inescapable conclusion is that the President better order a halt to that divisive campaign for Charter change (Cha-cha) before next May, be it by people’s initiative, constituent assembly or constitutional convention.
Give it a rest. Drop everything and, instead, attend to at least two priorities:
1. Press the relief operations in the areas devastated by typhoons and other calamities.
2. Take mitigating steps to make this Christmas at least tolerable for most Filipinos in the lower economic rungs.
There are just 10 days before Christmas, so "Tama na yang Cha-cha! Mag-Merry Christmas muna tayo!"
They have not shown such devotion and persistence in crafting laws that are of direct and immediate benefit to the people.
Would it not have been compelling if, during that marathon con-ass session last Tuesday, all the Bicol congressmen rose as one and moved to transfer the session to Naga or Legazpi? Or even at the foot of Mt. Mayon!
That way, the alleged representatives of the people would have seen the state of calamity there and realized the urgent need for less talk and more action, for less selfishness and more service.
In Albay, for instance, where the amount of earth moved around by the typhoons dwarfs all the doomsday scenarios of the anti-mining groups, we do not see the noisy NGOs and anti-mining advocates, the priests and the Left.
This is the best time for them to show they really care. But what I heard is that instead of helping, two priests are going around further spreading gloom and doom.
Fr. Ino Bugaoisan, who has refused to say Mass on Rapu Rapu island, reportedly because the chapel was built by the Lafayette mining firm, has accused the company on TV of causing the tragedy that Reming had caused.
He offered no proof, but he was given air time without his allegations being vetted. The combination of runaway advocacy and reckless media at the worst time possible certainly did not help at all.
Bishop Arturo Bastes of Sorsogon has also been reported as texting media of an alleged fish-kill in Puerto Diaz, the same place that was hit by a similar mercury-in-fish hoax early this year, resulting in 5,000 fishermen not being able to sell their catch.
But even that, at this point, is too late. Relief goods are needed instead. If Greenpeace can send its ship to wherever its banners and streamers are needed for its photo-ops, it certainly can afford to send a few bottles of drinking water to the Reming victims.
This is not meant to polish the image of anybody, but it should be noted that right after Reming left, mining companies sent their own rescue teams to help dig out the survivors and the victims. Being based in Albay, Lafayette served as the overall coordinator.
Mining people were not shouting, by the way. They were just digging, helping, doing the job they had to do.
That day, the UP Alpha Phi Omega fraternity will stage the 2006 "Oblation Run," dubbed the "Ritual Dance of the Brave," at Palma Hall, College of Social Sciences and Philosophy.
More than 20 fraternity members promised to run naked to, according to their spokesman Joselito Narciso B. Caparino, "send our message loud and clear and register our strong opposition, again and again, on any attempts of Arroyo administration to change the 1987 Constitution for self-vested interests of Gloria Arroyo herself and her cohorts in Congress."