Cha-cha crazy?

Feb 8, Constitution Day, the President declared unequivocally that he is in favor of the Lower House’s push to alter the charter’s economic provisions. As expected, the honourable Reps have since gotten even more aggressive, nagging the Upper House to pass RBH6 ASAP. It’s as though they’re sure that in separate voting, the Senate would oblige, say yes to inserting UNLESS OTHERWISE PROVIDED BY LAW in three provisions. It’s as though they’re still sure that it can all happen very fast, including a plebiscite (raise your hands?), maybe even preempt the 2025 midterm elections, pasensiya na kung totoo ang nababalitang balak ni VP Sara na tumakbong senador. 

It’s all so convoluted, layer upon layer of issues and agendas, and so many unfamiliar faces, in presscon after presscon, telling us why they’re right and the Senate is wrong to slow down the chacha process, whether through People’s (Politicians’) Initiative or Constituent Assembly. My kneejerk reaction everytime is, sino kayo? Why should I take your word for anything? I’d rather hear from people I know of,  like Rep Joey Salceda, who has been for chacha since GMA times (if memory serves). I’ve always wondered why, really. I’d love to know kung anong sagot niya sa mga anti-chacha na nagsasabing ang problema ay hindi ang econ provisions na nagawan na ng paraang luwagan; ang problema ay high power rates, poor infrastructure, bureaucratic red tape, policies that change midstream, atbp. 

Feb 15, Senate Prez Migs Zubiri in that interview with Karen Davila, said na sa ibang bansa, ang economic restrictions ay legislated, hindi nakasaad sa konstitusyon, so dapat daw siguro, gayahin natin para pumasok ang mas maraming foreign investments, or something like that. Ganoon? I’m sure that’s debatable. 

I gather from the Senate hearings na merong mga senador na pro-chacha. Si Sen. Imee Marcos mismo has nothing daw against chacha, but questions the timing and, kailangan pa ba?  Are there 17 who might say yes to the Senate prez? When are we going to hear from the Senators themselves?

Meanwhile, here’s an excerpt from must-read essay,“Machiavelli’s The Prince“ by Business World columnist Amelia HC Ylagan. Reminds not to believe everything we’re told by politicians, let’s not be deceived by appearances, self-serving press releases, warring dynasties atbp. Read also “Marcos Jr. explains in what sense he’s Machiavellian” by Inquirer‘s John Eric Mendoza.

Machiavelli’s The Prince

By Amelia H. C. Ylagan

… To celebrate the book’s 500th anniversary, the Boston University College of Arts & Sciences history department discussed why Machiavelli’s masterwork continues to resonate. “Some say he wanted to empower tyrants; others say he listed their crimes the better to expose them. Readers across the ages have found support for all kinds of causes: monarchists, defenders of republics, cynics, idealists, religious zealots, religious skeptics. Whatever its intent, one thing is clear. The book follows its declared purpose fearlessly and without hesitation: to show rulers how to survive in the world as it is and not as it should be” (bu.edu, Feb. 6, 2013).

Machiavelli himself was a “survivor.” He from whose name comes the pejorative “Machiavellian” qualifier, quite cunningly maneuvered himself in critical government posts (foreign service) through the changes among the powers-that-be in the turmoil of the 16th century flux of the Renaissance. He has been given the honorific title of “father of political science” by some admiring political analysts.

Machiavelli wrote The Prince just after he was forced to leave Florence as a political exile. Dedicated to Lorenzo de’ Medici, the book is Machiavelli’s advice to the current ruler of Florence on how to stay in power. It was also his effort, though unsuccessful, to gain an advisory post in the Medici government. Yet The Prince was not even read by the person to whom it was dedicated, Lorenzo de Medici (insights.som.yale.edu).

“The advice espoused in The Prince led his name to become shorthand for cunning, manipulation, and self-serving behavior— one of the few eponymous adjectives to strongly convey an abstract idea. His open appeal to guile and his subversion of Christian norms were regarded as so abhorrent that, in 1559, the work would be listed in the Catholic Church’s Index of Prohibited Books” (natgeo.com, Oct. 23, 2020).

But Machiavelli’s ideas on how to acquire power and glory as a leader had a profound impact on political leaders throughout the modern west, helped by the new technology of the printing press.

Leaders as diverse as Oliver Cromwell, Frederick the Great, Louis XIV, Napoleon I, Otto von Bismarck, and John F. Kennedy read, contemplated, and debated Machiavelli’s ideas. “The most one can say about The Prince in this regard is that Kissinger and Nixon preferred it as their bedtime reading” (penguinrandomhouse.com). Napoleon I of France wrote extensive comments to The Prince. After his defeat at Waterloo, these comments were found in the emperor’s coach and taken by the Prussian military. According to their biographies, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini wrote a discourse on The Prince and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin read The Prince and annotated his own copy.

Does Machiavelli, therefore, share some blame for the violence and brutality that has wracked the globe since he first wrote? No. “People don’t need The Prince to be inspired to commit every atrocity it names and more,” the forum at BU for the book’s 500th year anniversary concluded. “The impact of the book has instead been to force countless readers over the past 500 years to confront, in the starkest terms possible, the most important questions about politics and morality.”

And time must be looping, as in an automatic replay video, livestreaming strong-man rules in countries big and small, young and old.

“In order to get a secure hold on new territories,” the book advises, “one need merely eliminate the surviving members of the family of their previous rulers.”

It is terrifying how “the end justifies the means” is the backdrop of the to-the-death fight between Russia and Ukraine for territory. Ukraine claims that Russian casualties since February 2022 were 386,230, staggeringly high, but broadly corresponding with estimates from the US military and intelligence officials that Russia has suffered 315,000 dead and injured troops in the full-scale invasion. If accurate, this means Russian casualties are equivalent to almost 90% of the total personnel it had when the conflict began in February 2022. A New York Times report in August cited US officials who estimated the Ukrainian death toll at close to 70,000, with another 100,000 to 120,000 wounded. “Ukraine’s goal is not liberation of the territory. Ukraine’s goal is the elimination of the military threat from Russia, and the liberation of territory would be only a sequence of the main goal,” Ukrainian officials said (Newsweek, Feb. 1, 2024).

“Whoever conquers a free town and does not demolish it commits a great error and may expect to be ruined himself,” Machiavelli says in The Prince.

More than the liberation of territory for the sake of the people, the goal of the leader is to keep his power. The great leader, Machiavelli says, must be able “to conquer by force or fraud, to make himself beloved and feared by the people.”

And in our own little country, we live in fear at not knowing the truth, not knowing where we are being led to.

Machiavelli says princes are obligated to lie in certain circumstances. He also states that “while it is unnecessary for the prince to have positive qualities, such as honesty, trustworthiness, sympathy, compassion, or be religious, it is essential for the prince to be viewed so by the public” (ipl.org).

And we, the “vulgar” masses, must bow to the fathers and sons/daughters of warring political dynasties like in Machiavelli’s time.

“The vulgar crowd always is taken by appearances, and the world consists chiefly of the vulgar,” Machiavelli taunts us all. [emphasis mine]

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Amelia H. C. Ylagan is a doctor of Business Administration from the University of the Philippines. ahcylagan@yahoo.com