३० जून, २०२२

"I once knew a man who saw what little had been achieved since independence in a land filled with people with the greatest potential for achievement, and yet they were poor."

"But he got it done. Sometimes, with the needed support. Sometimes, without. So, will it be with his son. You will get no excuses from me."

Said Ferdinand Marcos Jr., in his inaugural address, referring to his father. And... there to witness it all, Imelda Marcos, still alive and kicking — I say "kicking" to call attention to her feet, famously possessed of a multitude of shoes — at 92. 

[I]t is unclear what a second Marcos government will mean in concrete terms. The prospect horrifies many of those who remember his father’s reign, first as elected president, then as a ruthless dictator, from 1965 to 1986. Marcos Jr went into exile in Hawaii with his family. His father died in 1991 after being exposed as a kleptocrat who had plundered the state coffers of as much as $10 billion.

१२ टिप्पण्या:

Enigma म्हणाले...

First, many people do love kings and dynasties. Second, the definition of graft is fluid if you have totalitarian soul...kleptocrat...king...president...no difference...


GrapeApe म्हणाले...

Never underestimate the public’s willingness to elect thieves and idiots. Some times a two-for-one deal. Waving at Biden as I exit the room.

Michael K म्हणाले...

Commander Bulkeley who got MacArthur out of the Philippines in 1942, also was given the task of getting President Quezon out lest he align himself with the Japanese. If Quezon resisted, Bulkeley was authorized to use force.

PM म्हणाले...

Funny that he has the same nickname as our President.

Carol म्हणाले...

Maybe they shouldn't send their best to the US.

But I'm glad they do.

stunned म्हणाले...

“Mama always said you could tell an awful lot about a person by the kind of shoes they wear.”

Dr Weevil म्हणाले...

It's been just about exactly 50 years since I packed up all the possessions of a lieutenant commander in the Navy and his wife who were moving from Virginia Beach to his next duty station. (I was paying my way through college working 60-80 hours a week every summer for Mayflower.)

The wife had 218 pairs of shoes: also 50+ sweaters, though I don't remember exactly how many. (When we saw how many of each were in the walk-in closet, we decided to count them as we packed.) I thought then, and still think, that 800 pairs of shoes for the wife of the dictator of a country with more than 50,000,000 people was less extravagant than 218 pairs of shoes for the wife of a lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy (equivalent to a major in the Army).

By the way I figure there's at least a 1-in-100 chance that one of the other commentators will now say "Hey! That was my mom!" or "That was my best friend's mom!".

Dave64 म्हणाले...

Funny that he has the same nickname as our President. That's hilarious!

Yancey Ward म्हणाले...

Well, we can make fun of the Filipinos until Hunter Biden is sworn into Oval Office in 2036.

Larry J म्हणाले...

My wife was a young adult in the Philippines during the Marcos dictatorship. She describes the nation was completely corrupt from the lowest petty official and cop through Marcos himself. Paying bribes was the cost of accomplish any government function, and there was no trust in the society. If a building contractor bribed the government inspector to ignore the lack of rebar in concrete and the building collapsed during one of the frequent earthquakes, oh well. People in America don’t understand what a zero trust society is like, nor do they realize the danger as the Democrats and the all powerful bureaucracy push us closer to becoming one.

Andrew म्हणाले...

"By the way I figure there's at least a 1-in-100 chance that one of the other commentators will now say "Hey! That was my mom!" or "That was my best friend's mom!"."

That was me, before my transition. Thanks for moving my stuff. Now that I'm a man, I only have three pairs of shoes.

Ernest म्हणाले...

My comment got eaten, so here’s a second try. In the early 1990s we toured Malacanang Palace. Pres. Corazon Aquino allowed these tours to show the corruption of the Marcos regime. We did see the shoes and dozens of racks of hand-made gowns, worn only once, if ever. But the most striking to us was the two large open crates, about 4 ft by 4 ft by 4ft. They were filled to overflowing with jewelry cases from top-notch places like Harry Winston and Cartier. These cases were all empty as Imelda had stripped them of their precious contents and taken them when she and Ferdinand fled to the USA. That lady has yet to spend a single day in jail.