Year of the Brats?

That was a beautiful cartoon the Daily Tribune carried yesterday. It showed two shadows walking away, with the obviously younger one comforting the elder. “What we failed to remember, Dad, is that it's the year of the Brats”. The brats he was clearly referring to could have snapped back at him, “And what about you?”

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I wish I knew the cartoonist so I could congratulate him. I confess that one of my frustrations as a journalist is that I cannot produce editorial cartoons. What satisfaction, what fulfillment one must feel after being able to convey a message, a conclusion, without the use of words. They say actions speak louder than words, but I think cartoons are more eloquent. How I envy cartoonists their gift.

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I also envy writers, especially columnists whose words flow out with such ease, and with such impact and imagery that they overwhelm readers. My late friend Max Soliven of the Philippine Star was one of those, and that is why he continues to be missed by his readers. Even if the space he held in the Philippine Star has been filled, it still looks empty to me sometimes. But another friend who also has the same talent for expressing himself is Amando Doronila who now writes for the Inquirer and keeps full track of Philippine events even if he resides in Australia .

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He will forgive me if I quote some of his statements in his column yesterday which I very much wish I were capable of writing myself. This was when he called the ouster of Ex-Speaker Jose de Venecia “the most gruesome political assassination in Philippine legislative history”. He also said De Venecia was “stabbed with more than a hundred knives in a political butchery recalling the murder of Julius Caesar”. The Inquirer editorial also sounded like the poetry of Carl Sandburg when it described the Congress event “a gangland fashion Mafia assassination”. So many writers and commentators bloomed in eloquence describing the incident. Maybe William Shakespeare felt that way, and got his inspiration in the same manner researching on the assassination of Julius Caesar.

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Why are we getting so many thrills and excitements these days? Hardly had the ones De Venecia had denounced as “traitors” and “Brutuses” ended their celebration (and payback, some say) when the headlines screamed again about the “kidnapping” of a witness that the Senate had been chasing in and out of the country. Well that witness, who flew off to Hongkong a few days ago, flew in again the other day but never reached his home, because, as he himself texted his family, he had been kidnapped! It was later found out that the one who took Rodolfo Lozada away from the airport was a former general named “Angel” Atotubo. Of course, his wife panicked. She must have thought he had been flown to heaven already!

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According to Joey de Venecia, Lozada was all set to tell all he knew about L'affaire ZTE, and when he couldn't be located for a while, his wife sought a writ of habeas corpus from the High Court. Lo! The military said he was with them because they were protecting him. For a while I thought we were back in the days where there was a Fabian Ver with his faithful Dobermans.

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Anyway, we got distracted up to late last night because of the results coming in from the votings being held during America 's Super Tuesday. Well, the results were not as super as the tornados that whirled through several southern states, killing dozens and wrecking millions in property. Some may attribute that further to the bad luck of the Republicans, but one Republican is shooting up ahead of those who used to beat him. John McCain seems to be a sure winner, that is, if the big trend yesterday is sustained. Well, he looks dignified and presidential enough, in case.

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As for Democrats, the black and the woman are still running neck-and-neck, so it's still anybody's game. Clinton won the big ones, like New York and California , but Obama was picking up the smaller ones, especially states where colored people are predominant. Anyway, we “Clintonians” in the office are just happy that Hillary captured Massachusetts . That's one in the eye for those Kennedys, who do not realize yet that their most popular member had been a non-Kennedy, the inimitable one named Jackie.*

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