Did Mar Roxas win last Sunday’s television debate and is he now the man to beat? In his mind, maybe, he did and he is—but only in his mind.
Yes, Roxas believes that he was ganged up on by the three other presidential candidates who were with him at the debate. And the reason why they did that to poor, defenseless Mar was, according to the administration candidate himself, he has become the man to beat in the coming May elections.
Not only does Roxas promise to continue the work of his former running mate and boss, Noynoy Aquino. He seems to have contracted Aquino’s severe detachment from reality, as well.
Privately, I guess Mar now realizes why Aquino never agreed to debate with anybody in the run-up to the 2010 elections. If, for example, Aquino had debated with his rivals back then, he would probably be exposed just as Roxas has been in the current televised face-offs.
And what Aquino has in common with Roxas, we already know: Both of them whine a lot and cannot take criticism, both can only mouth vague motherhood statements (notice how “ibalik ang pagiging disente” sounds so much like “kung walang korap, walang mahirap”) and both are so misinformed they would probably call the Muslims of Mindanao “invaders” in the land that they had occupied for several centuries before the first Christians even set foot on the island, just like Roxas did last Sunday.
But of course, people who are crazy enough to seek the presidency should have a reality-distortion field so strong that they cannot see impending defeat even if it went up to them and poked them in the eye. It would help Roxas, though, if he didn’t go around saying publicly that he is now the man to beat—especially if the only evidence he can show is that his rivals seem to love to beat up on him.
Perhaps, Mar, you aren’t really the man to beat. Maybe it’s just that nobody—with the possible exception of your mother and your wife —likes you.
And it’s really easy to see why, Roxas’ own personality flaws aside, many people have never really cottoned to the Liberal Party candidate. In the same manner that Aquino only succeeds in making Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. more popular every time the President attacks him, Roxas just sinks a little lower in the rankings whenever his former boss sings his praises.
And in this respect, Roxas is just like Aquino, too: Whenever any of Mar’s rivals pointed out an apparent failing of a member of the administration during the course of Sunday’s debate, Roxas would quickly say that it wasn’t him who erred.
I’ve already written about how Roxas has been severely handicapped by his slavish declarations of following in Aquino’s footsteps on that mythical straight path of his. But that is the deal he made, in exchange for all the government resources that are being used to prop up his hopeless candidacy, and he will have to live with that.
It is too late now for Roxas to break away from Aquino’s death grip. But at least Roxas should really stop pretending that, like Noynoy in 2010, he has somehow become the frontrunner in this race.
Perhaps because of his long career holding top government positions and his service in Congress, his background in real private-sector work and his academic credentials (never mind if he doesn’t really have a Wharton MBA), I never really thought Mar would be as delusional as his boss. All this time, I merely suspected that, like many officials in this thoroughly mediocre administration, Roxas was just dumbing himself down, in order to blend in with the rest of Noynoy’s Cabinet.
But after last Sunday’s debate, I think I may have to revise my position. And I may have to rethink my belief that craziness isn’t contagious, as well.
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Some may disagree with me, but I’d like to congratulate TV5’s Luchi Cruz Valdes for a yeoman’s job of moderating the debate last Sunday. The debate at times came dangerously close to spinning out of control, but Luchi’s firm hand (and voice) eventually brought all four candidates back in line.
Given the free-wheeling format—compared to the stilted, advertising-is-everything first debate, anyway—it was all Luchi could do to rein in the candidates. As Senator Grace Poe pointed out, this was the format that the organizers wanted, so they couldn’t really complain about the ensuing chaos.
Some people may quibble that it was Luchi’s fault that the hour-and-a-half delay happened, because she agreed that Vice President Jejomar Binay could bring papers to his podium. I prefer to think that she was placed in an impossible situation to begin with and still succeeded.
Having said all that, I hope the people organizing the third and final debate of the candidates for president learn something from the first two. And I hope Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago is well enough to attend the next time, just to liven up the debate and lift it up from the gutter a little.
