By an overwhelming majority, Overseas-Filipino workers (OFWs) and Overseas Filipinos (OFs) like the move of President Benigno Simeon Cojuangco-Aquino, III (PBSCA3) to form a “Truth Commission.” The special presidential fact-finding commission is geared to investigate corruption and abuses like human-rights violations allegedly committed by top officials of the previous administrations. But . . .

Many OFW and OF community leaders think that President Aquino should change the Truth Commission’s name. They want for instance H. E. PBSCA3 not to use “Commission” as part of its name. Why? They say that the President even ought to abolish any and all Commissions, as the name has been linked in previous administrations to 10-percent or even 50-percent “commissions” that the crooked Filipino top officials and their minions solicited from government contractors and vendors.

Then some OFWs and OFs think that PBSCA3 should call the special investigative body the “Tooth Authority” (TA). They reckon that “Authority” carries more weight than a mere “Commission.” Secondly, it should be “armed to the teeth,” so that the corrupt public servants will not laugh at it. Of course, the President is urged not to appoint members of the TA who wear false teeth, as they do not have the capacity to bite back at the officials they are investigating – if the latter would threaten them.

Several Filipino-American dentists say also that the TA idea makes sense. They claim that the actual idiom is “Truth – like tooth pulling – really hurts.” And they say that they can intimidate those arrested into confessing their sins and crimes without being grilled by the so-called “Third-Degree” or the water-boarding “experts.” The dentists – if made members of the TA – can threaten (without really trying) those arrested for corruption. They can, for instance, offer to do on them dental work like root canal without any anesthesia. Since humans fear—as a natural reaction—dentists and dental work, then it would be easy to obtain confessions from the suspects and making them do restitution.

Therefore, this writer thinks that the adoption of the proposed name, “Tooth Authority,” is a good idea.

In fact it is suggested most-respectfully that even the “Blue Ribbon” Committees of the Philippine Senate and the House of Representatives ought to change their name to “Blue Tooth” Committee, for the same toothy reasons as advanced above. Besides, the Philippine Congress may be able to persuade the makers of the “Bluetooth” short-range wireless connectivity device to pay it some advertising fee for promoting the said product. Thus, Philippine Congress may finally be able to tell the Filipino people that it is not an all-expense-making body but also an income-generating entity. It will be the first in the history of the Philippine legislative body.

La Gloria’s First Bill in the House of Representatives

A nd speaking of the Devil, oops, of Philippine Congress, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) is now the newly-elected congresswoman of the Second District of Pampanga. She and her son, Camarines Sur’s Congressman Diosdado “Dato” Macapagal-Arroyo, have filed their first bill. The bill calls for the Congress of the Philippines to convene itself as a “Constitutional Assembly,” so as to propose amendments to the 1987 Freedom Constitution.

Critics of Representative GMA say that she wants to change the form of government from presidential to a parliamentary system. They say that if the change is made, she will become the nation’s first Prime Minister—under the new form of government—as the Office of the President will be abolished. Thus, the parliamentary system is La Gloria’s way of redemption, if not her Second Coming as the country’s paramount leader – if the French model is not chosen by the Constitutional Assembly.

Thus, this writer was able to contact Representative GMA and asked her more details about her idea of a parliamentary form of government. I asked her for an interview, even done via e-mail. She agreed to receive my queries and answer them online. But she said that due to pressure of work, she would answer my questions on an installment basis.

So here are the initial questions that I sent by online chat, as edited to conform to the length of this column:

Question (Q): What model of a parliamentary system do you propose?

Answer (A): It is the English model.

Q: You mean that it will have two chambers: The House of Lords and the House of Commons?

A: Yes.

Q: But the Philippines does not have royal families or positions such as dukes, lords, etc. Who will fill up the House of Lords?

A: Oh, the House of Lords will have many members – from the ranks of the landlords, the warlords, the legal-gambling lords, the legal-drug lords and even Bro. Eddie Villanueva can be named to it.

Q: Why Brother Eddie?

A: He represents the “Jesus Is Lord” denomination.

But before I could type in the next question, Representative GMA said that she had to accompany her husband, Mike Arroyo, to the doctor. And thus ended prematurely our online chat.

Hopefully by next week, this writer will be able to reproduce his online conversation with Representative GMA, if I can get her again online.

(To be continued . . .)

E ditor’s Notes: Excerpts of this presentation were published in the Philippine Times community newspaper of Los Angeles County, California, July 15-21, 2010, issue.