Shyster. I often heard this term from top-tier and preeminent counsel Juan Ponce Enrile. He used it to describe many of our lawyers in the country. The Merriam-Webster dictionary describes a shyster as “a person who is professionally unscrupulous especially in the practice of law or politics.”
Lawyers like former President Rodrigo Duterte and current VP Sara Duterte are what many may refer to them as “low-yers” in the noble legal profession. To declare the manner in which a warrant of arrest was to be served to fugitive impostor Apollo Quiboloy as an “overkill” is an overkill by them as well.
Glad there was no sheriff around. Nevertheless, it would be best if the Duterte duo would advise their spiritual adviser Quiboloy to submit himself under the rule of law instead of questioning the manner in which justice to this person would be applied. He is a fugitive, but is entitled to appear in a court of law and to due process like everyone else, and not appeal to public opinion and their fanatics.
Enough of the drama. The Chinese Politburo leadership is watching, thus making them conclude that political infighting in our country will make it easier for them to invade a divided people someday.
That’s the trouble with former presidents who never accept the reality that they are no longer president. So what do they do? They make noise in the hope of being relevant still. We all know that the not-so-hidden agenda here is to topple the Marcos regime and install a second Duterte government.
Reason why they keep insisting that President Marcos is a cocaine user but they could never prove it. It’s the Goebbels syndrome all over again – “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.”
It is really just another propaganda known as giving the “illusion of truth” wherein a typical experiment works. Their results show that such illusions of truth worked just as strongly for known as for unknown items, suggesting that prior knowledge won’t prevent repetition from swaying our judgments of plausibility.
Part of guarding against this illusion is the need it compels us to stop repeating falsehoods. We are in a world where facts still matter.
But like the Dutertes and their sycophants who repeat things without bothering to verify them for accuracy, then they are helping make a country where lies and truth are so easy to confuse with each other.
So, if no less than a lawyer like Rodrigo Duterte would insist that the man who now occupies his former office is a cokehead but can never show evidence, then we must free ourselves from this Pinoy Goebbels with this in mind this Independence Day: freedom from the creeping lawlessness of this administration’s rabid critics and their political accomplices in the guise of patriots and lovers of country.
For how can one love a country while at the same time threaten to divide and dismember its people just because they couldn’t have it their way again.
ECPAT
We should all join the many caring folks in supporting the efforts of the officers and members of ECPAT (End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography, and Trafficking of children for Sexual Purposes) who have dedicated themselves to stop the exploitation of children all over the world, and especially in Asia.
ECPAT reports that in the Philippines alone, there are more than 70,000 prostituted children below 18 years of age, and who have been deceived to sell their bodies as cheap commodities or used by sex perverts in pornographic media. These children are regarded as objects of loot and lust, it was stressed.
The Philippines is said to be one of the favorite destination of sex perverts from the West, because poverty has driven many families to sell their children. We denounce a previous publication by a Japanese magazine nude photos of children aged 12-14 years, from Cebu City and Manila.
The mag even printed the addresses of brothels where the children could be found. The publication was quoted as stating that “Manila and Cebu are the treasure lands of girl prostitutes.
If you want to buy young girls but cannot afford to go to Thailand, Manila is the place to go. Night entertainment in the Philippines is one of the best in South-East Asia. Filipinas are full of hospitality ranging from services in bed to serving food.”
How revolting. In their enthusiasm to lure foreign tourists, the Department of Tourism (DoT) would do well to coordinate with concerned private groups like ECPAT just to make sure we don’t also bring in the wrong visitors who are perverts and sex offenders ECPAT reports the failure of authorities to the existence of prostitution in the country.
The law’s effectiveness could only be seen when the rights of the child are fully protected and children are no longer seen in the streets being sold for sex. Furthermore, it is said that many police officers and local officials and bribed regularly by vice lords who run the brothels.
Sex syndicates, perverts and pedophiles and owners of brothels must be punished severely, as corrupt police and government officials (and even church leaders!) who abuse power by allowing child sex exploitations must be exposed and sent to prison.
So who says prostitution is a thing of the past now in big cities in the country and have fled to the countryside? Wrong. Just go to P. Burgos in Makati City or to the Poblacion area. They’re there. Makes one wonder if Makati has legalized prostitution already.
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Lastly, as I write this, I am watching from my computer the 126th Independence Day rites happening at the Rizal Park.
And then I came across this apposite and congruous message from President Bongbong Marcos.
Excerpts: “While the times may be different, our struggles remain the same. Still, we continue to witness the true spirit of freedom in every Filipino who fights fairly in their day-to-day lives. We see it in the resilience of our farmers and our fisherfolks as they provide us sustenance. We see it in the dedication of our teachers as they nurture the minds of the future generation. We see it in the tenacity of our soldiers as they protect every inch of our territory, adamant as they are in the certainty that Filipinos do not, and shall never, succumb to oppression.”
A proud moment again to be a Filipino.
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Factoid: Ferdinand Edralin Marcos Sr. was baptized as an Aglipayan and grew up under the teachings of the Philippine Independent Church or in Ilokano the Nawaya a Simbaan ti Filipinas. He lived with Carmen Ortega, a common-law wife and a 1949 Miss Press Photography winner. He converted to Roman Catholicism in 1954 upon meeting the beautiful Imelda Trinidad Romualdez and married her shortly thereafter.
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