How to lose

AT this early, when the campaign for local positions is yet to start, there are already a number of candidates seemed destined to lose. No thanks to campaign inanities and plain stupidities.
How would you make of this political dwarf whose sole reason for running is: Subukan yu na ku man pu. Makiliwas ku mu, emblazoned in those large white, blue and yellow streamers.
No legislative agenda, no program of government. Just plain give-me-my-turn. As if he had a right to the position. As if the congressional post were a matter of reliyebo.
Try something more imaginative, boy. Like Malunus na ko pu. Patakmanan yu na ku mang panyambut. Sinawa na ku pung masasambut. Unoriginal, yes. But it worked wonders for John Santos to the provincial board in 1992 and Jay Sangil to the Angeles City council in 2004.
The Goebbelsian dictum on the lie – that which is constantly repeated becomes truth – works only in the realm of idiots or those deprived of the means to information, as in the totalitarian milieu .
Thus, the salutations to Gov. Mark Lapid for making Pampanga among the “Top Ten” provinces in the Philippines in “good governance” fell flat as bare-faced deception. The period covered in the report – as checked in the internet by Joel Mapiles and a thousand others – was 2002-2003. Before the reported impregnator of a far-from-famous starlet became governor.
So, go on with the lie. But remember the truth will never be far behind, in the cited case, a mouseclick behind.
Corollary to the lie is the practice of local politicos to arrogate unto themselves – impact upon their sorry mugs, pointedly – the handsome faces of movie stars.
So Mayor Boking Morales always gets away with his Gabby Concepcion-look-alike teasers. So, not every politico is like Boking, in ways more than one. Who could ever approximate his four successive terms in a republic that limits these terms to three? Sige nga.
“Deadringering” the countenance of an abnoy to that of actor Bong Revilla or Richard Gomez is the ultimate in suspended disbelief. Not to mention the grandest insult to the actors, nay, to beauty itself.
You, aesthetically-challenged, learn from Mayor Tirso Lacanilao. The self-effacing pogi parlayed his un-beauty to three full terms in Apalit. A sampler: “Sasabyan da pu deng kalaban ku, lupa kung kabayu. Mangalaram la pu ren. Ikayu mismu, akakit yu, kalupa kung tsonggo.”
Go down to earth guys, accept the face God gave you. You have no one to blame but your genes. Or, go to Belo or Calayan before facing the electorate.
Then there is the comebacking mayor who wanted to consolidate into his camp a group of tricycle drivers who believed they were “deprived” of their waiting shed by the incumbent.
With the enticement of gift checks from a supermarket – no, not SM or Robinsons – the trykies gathered at a village green and patiently tolerated the hour-long harangues of the wishful returnee against his opponent. At the end of an eternity of vitriol, 50 pesos were given each of the hundred or so attendees, a raffle was held with 20 plastic bags of pebble-strewn low-quality rice and 10 gift checks worth P300 each as the prizes.
No need to guess the utter consternation, err, dismay, err, wrath of the tricycle drivers against this comebacking fellow. The once hated incumbent now the more desirable candidate.
“Sinira na neng dok ing aldo mi, ininsultu na ke pa,” spat Emoy, the TODA treasurer in my subdivision.
As the campaign period approaches there will be more unraveling of idiocies and scenes of comedies among the candidates. This is a circus, remember?
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