Opportunity missed
President Duterte missed some real opportunities by appointing Lucas Bersamin as new Chief Justice of the Philippines instead of Antonio Carpio, long regarded as the most likely choice for the position. But as he has already proven on so many, the president has a knack for rubbing people the wrong way.
Of course, all the nominees in the short list that the Judicial and Bar Council submitted to the president for him to choose from consisted of the best there was, only that Carpio appeared in the public mind to be the most independent-minded, if by occasionally riling against certain presidential actions in public were any effective measure for independence.
Had Duterte appointed Carpio, he would have had obtained a tool by which he could silence his critics for a very long time. He could have told them everytime that “I appointed Carpio, didn’t I?” But then again, Duterte is not the type to throw even just crumbs to the enemy.
And so, while it was a real opportunity missed, it was a miss consciously and deliberately taken. Skipping Carpio in favor of Bersamin who, on the other hand, was somebody the president’s critics feared he would do, was in keeping with Duterte’s not so secret desire to give his critics long sleepless nights and long angry days.
As expected, every Duterte critic is now consumed by angst, conjuring every conceivable fear there was to imagine about a Bersamin Supreme Court. From issues about the South China Sea to a hung vice presidency, Duterte critics are rendered all too busy, to Duterte’s impish delight most probably.
In the end, opportunities taken or missed are no longer matters for Duterte to concern himself with. His critics have assumed these concerns for their own selves. If Duterte farts twice instead of once, Duterte’s critics think he is farting too much and must be sick. If he does not fart at all, they think he is keeping something to himself and must be investigated.
It has all become a big ha ha really and I truly pity the predicament these critics have assumed for their own selves. Just look at how they promptly gashed their teeth and tore at their own hair over an announcement Duterte made that he would create death squads to go after communist terrorists.
The critics are reacting as if the supposed death squads are already there, running wild in the city streets and mountain trails of the country. But all that is just talk that Duterte loves to needle his enemies with, hoping perhaps to eventually make nut cases of every single one of them. I can just imagine Duterte going to sleep each night with a villainous smile on his face.
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