Sunday, July 26, 2015

6. Why not Grace Poe?

How many times did this country elect a minor league senator to the presidency? Correction -- how many more times? Grace is the stuff of legend, the daughter of the fallen film hero, Fernando Poe, Jr.  poised to reclaim what her father lost to electoral fraud in 2004. Her press kit says she stirred the Senate to pass the Freedom of Information Bill. Yet, the effort isn't enough for the bill to become a law, because everyone else is dragging it to make sure it doesn't apply to the current administration.  That only shows the limits of her clout. Yet, for whatever good  she has done in her five-year stint in government,  the crucial question is: can she scale it? Will she be able to replicate it a thousandfold for the big league politics that is the presidency? She has no big league team, never mind a political machinery.  Chiz Escudero, once her father's boy wizard of politics, is her only big league teammate, so far. That's not yet a team; and it's late in the game. Rumors are circulating that she's flying around the country using Danding Cojuangco's helicopters. So, is he -- a Marcos crony -- her big league teammate or coach? It makes you think there's a catch somewhere. Further, the legal questions that are being raised on her residency and citizenship make it uncertain if she can hurdle a Supreme Court challenge to her candidacy. Some people spend a lifetime trying to scale up the good things they do for the world with no success. Some people are luckier than others. Maybe Grace is lucky? Maybe the legend will live on and the daughter can finish the late father's work of national redemption? Everyday, it's all becoming clear that a vote for her is like a Hail Mary shot. Yet, if we have only one shot to make things right and to elect the person who's got her heart in the right place, why not trust, put our names on the line, and take the shot? Bahala na Poe. 

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