Jerky Talks: Let Them Eat Cake

Before I continue on writing, let me just express that I am not one given to writing much about personal matters or socio-political affairs. The world is diverse and filled with opinionated individuals; opinions written down on such matters often cause alienation, flaming, hatred, and unnecessary discussion / drama, which I do not want. I do not blog about these things because I dislike the internet culture of bullying. People have opinion, I choose to respect everyone's opinion and still be able to express mine. That does not seem possible, but I will proceed anyway with that in mind. In short, please be kind. I'm but a humble blogger with little to no fan base to back me up. :D Going back to the topic in hand:

Last December 18, a controversial twitter "peek-a-boo-boo" and I meant a boo-boo, really, between several PH goverment officials and Ms. Valerie Concepcion, caused a stir on the Internet community. The issue being discussed by Valerie Concepcion and the other government officials is the party happening in Malacanang, and in attendance is none other than PNoy. 489 miles from Malacanang, however, 20,000 families have lost their homes, and  a vast part CDO / Iligan, can you imagine this, has been converted by Typhoon Sendong (TS Washi) into a brown sea. Sendong, which made landfall on Mindanao last December 16, has brought in torrential rains that triggered flash floods, claiming 632 lives (as of this writing) with hundreds still missing.

Contrast the jovial scenario at the palace and the dreariness of people dying and suffering over at CDO. That's what everyone did who's been criticizing the party at Malacanang last night, and that's understandable. People get angry over these things. As a race we do tend to have overly high expectations of people in power, and as a race, we do tend to behave contrary to people's expectations once we're in power.

What fanned the fire was a continuous deletion of tweets by Valerie Concepcion and several misinformed ones by palace spokespersons Manuel L. Quezon III and Abigail Valte offering vague ideas and denials about the party currently taking place. There was simply no response on when PNoy is to visit the makeshift brown sea that was once CDO. And people were eager to have the president thrown to CDO and do things expected of a president in times of crisis.

In the short time Noynoy has been president, I can conclude these things about him: 1. He is always calm until he gets to the mic to lambast his enemies. 2. His action is always geared toward fighting corruption, previous or recent, and 3. he always makes Binay do the dirty work, such as foreign relations with China and calamity response, for which Binay obliges.

What prompted me to write is the call for PNoy to be at ground zero on day one, not the party or whatnot, but the reaction over his not being there on day one and only this Tuesday. 

I am no PNoy fanboy. Far from it, actually, and I hated that he ran last 2010. But here's what. This is something that I do not understand. Why do we always want our head of state in a dangerous place? That's the effin' balding head of state we want to place in danger. I mean not just for Noynoy, but for the other presidents before him. We are so angry when they aren't there the day the relief operations has started. I do not understand that. The President is a very important person, why do we want him in an unsafe place? Isn't it enough that he has (or his subordinates) the army and the Red Cross mobilized to bring support and relief to those struck by the disaster. And if we need a figure of authority there, Binay is already there as soon as he possibly could. And by golly, the president is no expert in calamity and disaster response. He has people for that, and those are the ones who need to be there. Why do we want someone who's not adept with that sort of thing taking charge over that? Why? Just because he's the president, I really don't understand it. Just because he's the most powerful being in the country? Can't he use that power from a safer place? I mean that's the point of having people to do those things for you. So they would do it for you, so they'd get their hands dirty so you can attend to other things (parties included). I mean if I were in the disaster area, I'd very much prefer to see the soldiers doing their thing over a president lording around and talking on his phone attending to matters he left behind in Manila.

Now with that said, I think the most we can do is help. Follow this link to see how we may help the victims of Tropical Storm Washi.