Clowns

Former presidents, senators, ambassadors, police, and military generals, as well as captains of industry — you name them and they have most likely guested on DAILY TRIBUNE’s digital show Straight Talk.

Through the years, many thinkers and movers have taken the show’s hot seat to answer questions thrown at them by editors and netizens during the live airing, sprouting front page exclusives for days to come.

Straight Talk this week took a Conan O’Brien-ish tenor when we invited political analyst and law professor Edward Chico. Ahead of his coming to the studio, Chico sent word “to bring it on.”

“Everything’s on the table,” he said over coffee in our pre-show banter, as we awaited a recorded show to run its course with our executive editor Chito Lozada holding the forth.

“Chiz (Escudero) taking over from Migz (Zubiri) as Senate President? Fine. West Philippine Sea issues? Shoot,” continued Chico, who did not look like your typical nerdy (though he still had his glasses) political analyst.

The guy proved too hilarious, someone who did not disappoint with his other interest — doing stand-up — necessitating the use of slapstick sound effects by the show’s production people, something alien to the seriousness of Straight Talk.

But then, as I told the lawyer, politics is action, drama and comedy rolled into one, and tickling people’s funny bones at the expense of the oftentimes laughable characters who inhabit that world has become a staple of American late-night shows.

My explanation, nonetheless, was not the reason why Chico said his favorite Philippine president happened to be Joseph “Erap” Estrada. I quipped that it must be because of the funny “Eraptions,” or jokes that had been made, actually, not by Estrada, but at his expense by those making fun of his presidency.

Estrada, if I remember correctly, good-naturedly just allowed those suspiciously-intentioned jokesters to make him the butt of their ululations. Anyway, Chico delivered the clincher to his Erap-is-my-president spiel and it was drop-to-the-floor-laugh-yourself funny.

I’m not spoiling the joke, though. A caveat, however, that Chico himself provided, smiling sheepishly: “It takes a little bit of IQ to appreciate political jokes.” That, I told him, goes without saying because it presupposes knowledge of current events to be able to appreciate nuanced takes on issues, including those using parody and similar devices.

As for the change in the Senate leadership, Chico explained that the same can be expected to happen again and again as long as Filipino lawmakers are guided in their actions by their vested interests of the moment, and not by some firm conviction.

He posited that while in theory, the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government are co-equal and independent of each other, the executive, as history has shown, has a way of reaching into the legislative domain, or of rendering the judiciary inutile.

Control by the executive over the legislative has been marked by the so-called argumentum ad crumenam or the suasion of the purse (remember the multi-million-peso pork barrel fund?) and by political quid pro quo.

For the latter, can there be a more clear-cut example than Leila de Lima, as Justice Secretary, throwing into the wastebasket a Supreme Court order in 2011 allowing the medical trip of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo?

Lawmakers would always tend to gravitate toward Malacañang and the latter, of course, using its hold on the same people, can rock the boat or effect the change in congressional leadership as it sees fit," Chico explained.

And Chico, the stand-up comedian-cum-political analyst, said that with nary a hint of humor, "Why would he, with all the clowns that get elected to office each election year?"