Brutal police dispersal sends a chilling message to change agents

That incident which happened at the rally before the US embassy confirms our deadly fears---that this government has effectively turned our state into a garrison state. The behavior exhibited by the police under the command of a certain Pedrozo is reminiscent of the SS during Hitler's time, and that of the AVSECOM and special groups deployed by former dictator Ferdinand Marcos during his heyday. The only difference now is the absence of a strong group of New Katipuneros capable, able and willing to fight a China-backed government.

Who will now protect the people from these kinds of abuses and predation seeing that civil society has now been compromised and leaders of the Left movement are now part of this regime? Let us remind and refresh the memories of these leaders on how China treated the Tiannanmen square protestors and even the Hongkongers who were demanding for a more democratic society--the Chinese government treated them with brute force. This is exactly what the PNP did several days ago.

Let us thank God that He has allowed us to watch this on national television. But, woe to us because we don't see and hear those miffed cries of rural folks victimized by state security forces in the name of the anti-drug campaigns. Many organizers working for farmers, fisherfolk and the rural poor have been killed, executed in brutal style and arrested all in the name of the anti-drugs campaign. Even this has been weaponized. It has not just been politicized, what with attempts at creating a political link with those who actively oppose the regime---it has likewise been used to violate basic human and people's rights.

These things clearly show a policy of intolerance, which, even us, we experience this daily in our engagement with DDS members online. We are slowly being asked to toe the line. We are being asked to choose just one option, otherwise, be killed or be economically deprived of your rights. Our options are being clearly delimited to just follow the options and dictates of Higher Powers, which, clearly does not augur well for us, ordinary citizens. The last time I checked, this is still a democracy and not a state-sponsored, China-backed, China imperialist-inspired pseudo-democracy.

Our forebears have fought not just for the attainment of freedom but of democracy. Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, Macario Sakay and several others died for us to enjoy what they did'nt. They all fought for equality. They all fought for the right to freely express ourselves and surely, they fought for the recognition of our identity as Filipinos, a people united under the banner of democracy.

All of these sacrifices, all of these years of struggle are now slowly being removed from us by a government who thinks that Might is Right and that they hold the only key towards our supposed "salvation" from poverty and underdevelopment.

Are we ready to sacrifice our individual rights and freedoms in exchange for billions of Chinese-backed loans and fresh funds for infrastructure development? Note that China is not giving us more aid---they are giving us loan facilities which our beloved Leader says "we can pay liberally over time" while we allow Chinese intrusion into our economy. Brilliant.

Are we ready to sacrifice the use and enjoyment of our maritime resources, in exchange for the pursuit of a so-called independent foreign policy and an orientation shift from Western to Sino-Russian? (In normal circumstances, this is actually expected since a Sino-Russian orientation connotes Asian orientation, as opposed to Western orientation, which is a fresh new idea worthy of consideration. But, not this way. Other presidents would have done it better, without alienating its age-old allies like the US, Japan and the European Union)

I don't know about you, but, our beloved President criticized the imperialism of America while accepting the imperialism of China at the same breadth. Is this not imperialism? We will allow "joint resource exploitation" and who will benefit from it? China. Our entrepreneurs and big business are now salivating for a share in that US$ 8 billion from China without even thinking that these monies are not without strings attached--they are loans stupid, and not free aid. These loans have interests which our government is supposed to pay at a definite time.

These loans are ruses meant to further prepare the integration of our economy into the bigger Chinese economy. If this is not neo-imperialism, I don't know how to call it.

Since we are orienting ourselves to Sino-Russian, then, we need to overhaul our values, our policy positions, our entire diplomatic policy framework, even our military and economic infrastructure to reflect a more Sino-Russo oriented one. Our beloved Leader probably did not realize that we cannot do this thru rhetoric. It involves a total re-engineering of our current system for us to fully realize what he wants.

For example, instead of Google, we need to learn to use Alibaba. We need to reject Macs and instead, settle with a much cheaper Android. And likewise, we need to include Mandarin and Russian into our basic language courses for our kids to get competitive advantages over these Chinese and Russians.

I have nothing against China or Russia. These are ancient civilizations which have adopted excellently in modern times. They have surpassed the world's expectations, from being third world countries wracked by centuries-long civil wars to stable societies with strong values and strong traditions. And seriously, I really expect these two to gain a stronger foothold over the world economy due to their populations, their more developed industrial economies, further improved by the socialism of their respective governments.

China's and Russia's successes prove how effective and efficient Socialism is, as a political ideology. Had the 1915 Russian revolution failed, the Russia we see today would have been different. Had Chiang Kai-Shek repulsed the advance of the People's Liberation Army towards Beijing, China would not have gained its stability and things would have been different. China would probably be still a country wracked by internal insurgencies.

Orienting ourselves with them is a good move. However, this could have been achieved without alienating or severing our ties with our traditional allies. As what former president Fidel V. Ramos proposed--let us create an inter-dependent foreign policy. This is the trend and even China and Russia do this. Interdependence is the name of the game, not just in foreign relations but particularly in economics. The world is interconnected, and this is something of an advantage for us, but, sadly, we are slowly veering away from this global reality and slowly closing ourselves from the world instead of further opening ourselves for more opportunities.

That brutal dispersal shows our current reality, both in the domestic as well as in the way we handle our external affairs. While societies are democratizing, we are going into the opposite direction. I just pray that this is seriously the correct path otherwise, we might find ourselves in the lurch and again, revert back to our original state as the sick man of Asia (sick not just economically but dangerously, even sick in mind)