SO WHAT DO YOU SAY IS THE BIGGEST weapon this government could wield against those working to put it down?
Definitely not the ever-soaring oil prices.
Not the chaos and corruption in the overall system.
Not the choking pollution and rampant criminality.
Not Juetenggate and the exiled members of the First Family who had to run away from accusers.
The magic weapon is right there. No need to search long and hard.
* * *
The happy answer for the besieged President of the Republic came on Sunday morning.
It was a Sunday like no other. And Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had every reason to glow, gloat and feel glorious.
Arroyo had just sent three astronauts to the moon!
Don’t laugh now and ask if the Philippines had a space program to speak of.
We don’t even have a decent weather forecasting station.
Philippine Air Force officials should be flattered if their dilapidated aircraft fleet is mercifully labeled outdated.
* * *
But when Manny Pacquiao successfully spearheaded a boxing expedition that resulted in a three-for-three knockout victory Sunday morning in the United States, Arroyo jumped in joy.
She grabbed the nearest phone to call and thank the three gallant Pinoys.
The national thrill sparked by the triple triumph could not be aptly measured.
But there’s no need to send out pollsters to ask the citizenry, mainly the plodding masa, the impact the great RP boxing expedition had on them.
The euphoria and sense of fulfillment felt around here could be equal to what the entire USA had savored when Neil Armstrong and flightmates made it to the moon in July 1969.
It was also around that time when witty Gloria Diaz played it super, shapely and sharp to bag the Miss Universe crown.
* * *
Now, this is not to diminish or undermine the impact of world beauty crowns the Philippines had won.
But these international beauty titles rolled into one cannot measure up to what Filipinos Manny Pacquiao, Brian Viloria and Rey Bautista achieved with their scintillating victories in dear old LA.
OK, Arroyo had done more than enough, mainly in the questionable handling of the last elections, to divide this nation.
But that awesome fissure was greatly diminished, people in the streets started calling one another brother again, on Sunday morning.
We all shared as one, like poor farmers enjoying a golden harvest, the Philippine masterpiece performed by Pacquiao, Viloria and Bautista right in the heart of the United States. (Hermie Rivera says RP’s three main islands were properly represented: Viloria from Ilocos, Bautista from Bohol and Pacquiao from General Santos.)
* * *
It’s perfectly fine if you had allowed yourself to get carried away.
So when was the last time we all took a glory ride of this magnitude on a boxing zeppelin?
Those old enough to either see or feel the similar thrill could point to the Summer of 1960, the inauguration of the Araneta Coliseum, when Gabriel Elorde stopped Harold Gomes of Rhode Island in the seventh round to annex the world junior lightweight boxing crown, which the former bootblack from Cebu was to retain for the next seven years.
Well, things were, more or less, in their proper places then.
Elorde had no beleaguered President to shield from opponents and displeased society that had charged her with corruption and cheating.
Anyway, the odder part of the success story is that this government, although it has to ride on the prowess of our poor fighters to project credibility, has no decent national boxing program to speak of.
It’s as strange as landing Pinoys on the moon, without the help of a national space program. This, indeed, calls for a holiday.
