Anger leads us nowhere

The President is angry. The Opposition is angry. The nation – shocked, humiliated, and frustrated. Anger can never be a policy. You may sustain it, even as long as forever, but anger leads nowhere.

In the past weeks I have been receiving requests from readers and friends to publish any column of my dad that would relate to the times. Many ask, “what would Max Soliven write if he were alive?” This is a touching compliment to me as I quietly know that some people miss my dad.  In hindsight I feel that many are just confused – we need enlightenment and so they tend to reflect on the lessons history has taught us.

I hope I do justice in the selection of excerpts from my dad’s columns. So here goes… The country according to Max:

Parallel to the ZTE-NBN Deal/ Investigation: The President, the Opposition, and the restive citizenry must come to terms with each other: seek a solution to the explosive situation that now exists. Obviously, the first order of the day is to investigate Ninoy’s assassination and mete out justice to his murders. Rolly may have been the man on the spot, but certainly Rolly wasn’t alone. At the same time, there must be agreement on freedom of speech and of the press: a restoration of the writ of habeas corpus; a guarantee of impartial justice in our courts of law. These are not easy conditions on which to agree, but getting this nation back on the track is not an easy task.

On the Press/ Media: When former President Diosdado Macapagal was newly installed in Malacañang in 1962, he asked my dad’s advice on how to handle the press. This, in effect was what my dad told him: Newsmen are as dangerous to the politicians as the swift and ferret-like Mongoose is to the Snake. They ferret out unwanted facts about the politician, catch him in unguarded moments, zero in on the chinks in his armor. You must never let your guard down. The most fatal remarks (to be quoted or misquoted) are dropped by a politician not during a press conference but before, and after. Your most perilous moments come when the press conference is over and you are shaking hands all around, or exchanging pleasantries, or walking your journalist-guests to the door. That’s when you’re relaxed. You believe that ordeal is over. You become indiscreet. Your off-hand remarks at this stage are what makes headlines.

Finally, there is no such thing as ‘off-the-record.’ If you don’t want something reported, don’t say it. The newspaperman you enjoin to secrecy may not use the item or story himself, but he may pass it on to someone else who wasn’t there. The convoluted reasoning is that if a journalist isn’t present when a pledge of silence is made, he isn’t bound by that pledge. I don’t agree with this, but in the press – as in every profession, it seems – the applicable rule is caveat emptor. Better careful than sorry.

Unfortunately for Cong Dadong, he forgot this rule on a number of occasions. I suppose no politician ever really remembers until too late.

On the Power of Speech Over Action: There has never been any lack of Filipinos eloquent in pinpointing what’s wrong with ourselves and our country. And, perhaps, this is what ultimately defeats us. We dish out rhetorical gems with such regularity that we have come to confuse ritual with reality. The mountain labors – and brings forth abolish speeches – on the entablado, at rallies, in the Rotary, Lions, Jaycees and Kiwanis clubs. Because we are a nation mesmerized by our own volubility. We have begun to mistake speech for action. Having launched a glorious tirade against men (and women) of evil, spotlighted the ills of our society, assailed force and fraud, corruption and graft, and elicited waves of applause with a stirring peroration, we take our bows, drink a final cup of coffee – and go home feeling virtuous and happy, but having accomplished nothing more than having whiled away the hour. Let somebody else do the fighting. Let someone else clean up the mess. We’ve done out part.

Stuart Chase, the founder of semantics once asserted that “with words we govern men.” But just as the Bible says that man does not live by bread alone, neither can he live on words alone. Saliva power is no substitute, if you’ll forgive the vulgarity, with kili-kili (armpit) power.

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On Selfishness: Looking at our faults, from the pursuit of privilege, to ambition and petty intrigue, all these can be boiled down to one word: Selfishness. We are not even guilty of pride, for pride is a heroic sin. We merely wallow in amor propio. Puny even in our shortcomings.

If our leadership would give this nation hope, it must cast all selfishness away. Put ambition aside. Accept responsibility for its mistakes. I see no sign of this, alas, only more of the same folly. This, in turn presents the Opposition with a challenge and an opportunity which it cannot afford to miss. For the stakes are the liberty and happiness of the Filipino people, no less. The hour grows late. Hope dims. Troubles escalate. If we falter now, generations yet unborn may never forgive us. What is worse, we may never forgive ourselves.

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My father was right to conclude that “Filipinos are the easiest to lead. For all their professed machismo, they are really docile. We are only hotheads in personal quarrels. When it comes to something abstract like liberty or the rights of man, we say bahala na or okay lang.” The LABAN noise rallies in 1978 served to confirm his opinion: “Everybody panicked in Malacañang. It was so successful it lasted up to midnight. But afterwards, nothing! That’s Filipino. In one brief evening, the Filipinos show heroism. The next day he simmers down. He says, ‘Okay, I’ve done my part’.”