In review and in prospect
There may be a lot of things accounting for the national political chatter over the last several weeks but, in reality, it has been a slow news month. We see this in the depth of the “news” making the headlines on mainstream media, and the increasing diversity but lack of depth in their opinion-editorial sections. Media workers including opinion columnists go from one week to another scrambling to meet deadlines and, as a result, are going after just about every molehill with hopes to turn them into “trending” mountains (increasing topic diversity) but, in the process, spreading themselves thin and not finding much to work with off the topics they pursue (reducing depth and substance).
The fact is, there is no news — at least of the sort that sells papers and hooks eyeballs in the Philippines. President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. and his cabinet are hunkering down to do work — boring work. The Opposition, for their part, remain a decimated force. The only characters news spinners have to work with are the Opposition’s sorely-beaten leaders and the odd celebrity sound byte that has the potential to be made into the nucleus of the next outrage fad. Beyond those, there is the stuff that routinely fly over Filipinos’ heads that constitute real news to people who do possess actual sound strategies to make a neat buck or score political capital over the long haul. Emphasis on that latter term is because the real game in the Philippines is slow and careful laying of foundations upon which substantial gains in personal fortunes and political power can be built. Much of that game may be played behind closed doors and gates in boardrooms, bedrooms, and golf courses. Just the same, even if salient information about these machinations were on exhibit for all to gawk at, much of it will be incomprehensible to the small minds that make up much of the pedestrian chatter. Think back to those popularity surveys during the campaign in the lead up to this year’s elections that the noisiest of the lot ignored or, worse, dismissed and it is easy to understand how much of the important stuff happening is being missed by the hoi polloi.
An example of the important stuff is the perfect economic storm currently brewing. Inflation is galloping — driven by external factors much of which ordinary Filipinos nor their government exert much influence over. The only levers being pushed or pulled (mainly pulled) are interest rates which serve only to dampen domestic demand. However, with demand not accounting for much in the way of inflation drivers, one can only worry about how higher interest rates could impact businesses already struggling to downsize as demand is crushed by inflation (and rising interest rates). Given this nascent hole of stagflation forming in the Philippine economy, it is hardly surprising that the Philippine peso is buckling as well — very likely on wavering confidence that a food-, capital-, and fuel-insecure country can muster enough resilience to weather this quadruple whammy.
Key then to an outlook on what fortunes and politics will and can be gained (or lost) over the next 100 days is in finding the key people, communities, organisations, and trends to watch that all the other traditional “influencers” are missing. Which ones of these will profit or lose on the back of (or under the weight of) this brewing perfect storm? Certainly, quibbling over “historical revisionism”, “press freedom”, and “human rights” will not reveal those important insights.
Last week’s blog posts
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