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| ON THE OTHER HAND |
| 2003 � Best and Worst Scenarios By Antonio C. Abaya January 02 2003 For the long suffering Filipinos, victims of poor governance from the trapos and trapped in a cannibalistic political culture nurtured by the worst kind of American-inspired liberalism, the promise of deliverance may finally come in the year 2003. The trigger for this potential historical watershed is the stunning announcement last December 30 by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo that she was not going to run for a second term as president in the 2004 elections. Suddenly the political landscape was shaken up by a completely unexpected tremor that left many trapos and the bad-news media (and the communists) dazed and momentarily disoriented. President Arroyo echoed what many of us have often complained about, that �there is a feeling of too much negativism and conflict in our society� and that the government that succeeds hers in 2004 �may merely end up inheriting a country as deeply divided as ever.� Exactly my feelings in my column of December 16 titled Even Roco Would Fail. Her stateswoman-like decision not to run in 2004 is the necessary jolt that can spur the entire nation towards a reawakening and a redefinition of how we want to be governed, and she is to be congratulated for making this momentous decision. But it can only be a beginning, not an end in itself. ***** In the best-case scenario, President Arroyo may now form a government of national salvation to draft the changes that we have to make in our political system and our political culture so that future generations are not hostage to our decayed and decaying body politic. This government of national salvation should include leading opposition politicians such as Raul Roco, Panfilo Lacson, Edgardo Angara, etc and even representatives of the communist movement, if they are interested. But it must also include, in the majority, members from the non-trapo community. A trapo-dominated government of national salvation would be a contradiction in terms since the trapos are one of the scourges we want to be saved from. As president, Mrs. Arroyo has the prerogative to dictate the complexion of this new government. She would be making a grievous mistake if she were to populate it mostly with overstaying, burnt out and recycled trapos that many, if not most, of the vital middle class are sick and tired of seeing and hearing in their newspapers and TV sets. In this best-case scenario, this government of national salvation will engineer a shift to the parliamentary system as well as draw up a new set of electoral rules that will govern future elections and safeguard the new system from the grip of Big Money and political dynasties and against the entry of morally and intellectually unqualified charlatans such as convicted child rapists, criminally inclined ignoramuses and fugitives from the FBI. It must also promote the healthy growth of political parties by penalizing political turncoatism and other forms of opportunistic behavior so prevalent in the present system. The worst-case scenario in 2003 would be the reverse of the above in which President Arroyo throws away the chance to leave a historical legacy to the nation and uses her last 18 months in office making deals with the trapos to protect her family�s fortunes and the fortunes of her key lieutenants from prosecution by the next government. But from the admittedly little that I know about her, this is almost unthinkable. At this point in her career, her main concern must be to leave behind a legacy that will guarantee her a prideful place in history. ***** The worst-case scenario in 2003, not only for this country but for the rest of the world as well, could develop if and when George W. (for Warmonger) Bush unleashes his dogs of war on Iraq. Bush himself has recently warned that an Iraqi attack on the US would cripple the US economy, without telling us when it was that tiny Iraq threatened to attack the mighty USA. As of this writing, the more than 100 UN weapons inspectors have visited almost 300 sites in Iraq and have apparently found no evidence of the weapons of mass destruction that Bush insists the Iraqis have. The Iraqis have invited the US to send CIA agents to Iraq to point out to the UN weapons inspectors where exactly they should look. The Americans have rejected this invitation, calling it mere gimmickry. Bush is in effect saying, �My mind is made up. Don�t confuse me with the facts.� It could all be a bluff to scare Saddam Hussein into exile in, say, Libya. But suppose Saddam calls Bush�s bluff? The shallowness of Bush�s belligerence towards Iraq is underscored by his soft stance against North Korea, a country that has openly admitted that it has a nuclear weapons program, has recently expelled international nuclear inspectors and is known to have more advanced missile capability than Iraq. Why the kid gloves towards North Korea but the mailed fist towards Iraq? Simple. There is not a drop of oil in North (or South) Korea, and the six million Jews of Israel are half a world away from Pyongyang. ***** On the other hand, an American attack on Iraq could indeed cripple the US economy and the economy of the rest of the world. It would be incredibly na�ve and stupid to believe that attacking Iraq will not draw an appropriate response from the rest of the Muslim world. The Muslims will retaliate, and since they do not have aircraft carriers, B-2 bombers and cruise missiles, they will retaliate with the only weapons at their disposal: terrorism and human suicide bombers, not just against military targets but more against civilians, and not only in Iraq but all over the world, including North America, Europe, Australia, Africa, Asia and everywhere else where targets of opportunity (meaning, Americans and their obsequious sacristans) present themselves. For the Americans, the worst-case scenario would include the assassination of some key allies in the Muslim world itself. There are at least ten Muslim countries where the current leaders are pro-American but the lumpen population are scathingly anti (because of US support for Israel). A US attack on Iraq would stoke these anti-US passions to boiling point and could lead to spectacular assassination attempts in Hamid Karzai�s Afghanistan, Pervez Musharraf�s Pakistan, Megawati Sukarnoputri�s Indonesia, Hosni Mubarak�s Egypt, Abdelazziz Bouteflika�s Algeria, King Abdullah�s Jordan, Emir Sheik Jabir�s Kuwait, Emir Hamad al-Khalifa�s Bahrain, Abdullah Gul�s Turkey and/or, most problematic for the Americans, King Fahd�s Saudi Arabia. When I was in Abu Dhabi in 1995, as guest of the UAE government, I got to talking to the British editor of a government-owned newspaper. Although he asked me not to quote him, for fear of losing his job, he volunteered the assessment that �the Saudi royal family would be overthrown in five years.� Those five years have come and gone and the lecherous degenerates are still in power, but it does not erase the dichotomy that exists in Saudi Arabia between the rulers and the ruled, a dichotomy brought into sharp focus by 9/11 (when, it turned out, 15 of the 19 bombers were Saudis), which could play out devastatingly in a US attack on Iraq. Overthrow of the Saudi royals would almost certainly result in a military mutiny and popular revolt against the US military presence in Saudi Arabia (one of the two main motivating grievances of Osama bin Laden and the Wahhabis of al-Qaeda) and could lead to a mass sabotage of oil wells. In a flash, the Americans could lose both their oil and their most important ally in the Persian Gulf. The mad cowboy Bush has the unique capability of wrecking the entire global economy single-handedly. ***** The bulk of this article appears in the January 20, 2003 issue of the Philippine Weekly Graphic magazine. |
| OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Reactions to �2003 � Best and Worst Scenarios� MR. ABAYA, Touch�. God bless you! Mila Aguilar. [email protected] January 07, 2003 ����������������������������� AT 10:11 AM 1/7/03 +0800, you wrote: >The mad cowboy Bush has the unique capability of wrecking the entire >global economy single-handedly. Do you really think that's his brainchild and he is acting single-handedly? Why do you refuse to investigate, let alone accuse, the dark forces that make this intellectually challenged (or the sake of peace we're going to war) puppet move? Peter J. Ritter. [email protected] January 07, 2003 MY REPLY. Why don�t you come out and openly accuse the people who, I know, you are certain are responsible for all the problems in the world: the Jews? ����������������������������� (Forwarded) JESS, ROME Do you guys get Tony Abaya regularly? You should. I wanted to send this to Art, but I couldn't dig out his email address independently of that yahoo group that includes the undesirables. Rome, if you can, maybe you can relay this to him, even though for all we know, he might already be getting Tony from elsewhere. Art, Nito, and Ganny - maybe even Picoy - are the guys in that unfortunate conglomeration I think should read Tony regularly. Tony makes anyone with a brain use it, whatever their persuasion, and they can only benefit. Happy New Year! Bobby Hilado. [email protected]. January 08, 2003 ����������������������������� HI THERE, Mr. Tony, Greetings! Have just read your column "2003- The Best and Worst Scenarios". You wrote "Warmonger" as George W. Bush's middle name. I write it as "WAR-lito" to put a Filipino touch (ha!ha!). I always enjoy reading your column, can�t wait for the next one. Napoleon P. Serrano. [email protected]. Dhahran, Saudi Arabia January 07, 2003 ������������������������������ LET�S NOT blame "Amrican-style liberalism" Would you rather have Jap-style one-party LDP? Or Baathism? (Why, are those the only choices? Haven�t you heard of the democratic socialism of Western Europe? Or the �Asian values� or communitarianism of Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, South Korea? ACA). When Saddam is done with the Middle East might stabilize somewhat. The Palestinian terrorists would get the message that killing innocents doesn't pay. (Or then again, the Middle East might blow up �somewhat� and take the rest of the world with it, and the Israelis would get the message that humiliating the Palestinians doesn�t pay. ACA.) Ross Tipon. [email protected] Baguio City January 09, 2003 ���������������������������� TONY, it seems GMA has one more big unmentionable reason which is not political and nothing to do at all with preserving her wealth,.....Abangan ang mga sumusunod na balibalita. Rose Bulahan. [email protected].. January 09, 2003 OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO |