Figure of spits

What was truly objectionable about Duterte's speech at his PDP proclamation is that one of its founders—who is still very much alive as of this writing—was not invited. Many might say that had I been present I would not be here today. Don’t believe that for a second. Absent proof beyond reasonable doubt, Duterte hasn’t hurt even a fly. Where’s the dead fly?

He says he killed and had others killed, but absent proof, he is just getting his rocks off or blowing steam like we all do when we threaten to kill in our frustration. Killing is just a figure of spits, as we Filipinos say.

I know people who have really killed. I was related to one, nice guy. At his trial he put his arms around me and asked after my aunts in Negros, “Give your tita Conchi my best.”

Real killers do not talk. Noli de Castro warned me that they are the most polite people I will ever meet, always adding “po” after every phrase. The rough ones are all talk. If DU30 ranted and raved about killing, it was just a way to get votes without paying for them or words he is now regretting having said. And yet he did not rant.

He soberly insisted he is a murderer. It is murder to kill the innocent before they are proved guilty in a trial. After the trial, it is homicide because there is no death penalty.

We can dismiss all that talk as mere expression with a small vocabulary. To be sure, I like it better than listening to a slippery boy talking Tagalog in circles. As for his repeated use of—ano ba yung…tanginang…coos word…gina-gamit niya, punyeta?—my father had exquisite manners and said puñeta at every turn. As for insulting the Pope, I’ve done that on twitter but insulting an imam es otra cosa, that takes guts.

What is interesting is whether you can charge a man for homicide on his repeated insistence that he personally killed or ordered to be slain people on mere suspicion of being criminals. If he raises the defense of no corpus delicious, then he’s talking through his hat. Miriam made her own threats but when I confronted her with her statement that if elected she would line up customs officials and shoot them, she said, “What lousy law school did you go to, Teddy? No one, least of all a president sworn to uphold the laws can do that.”

No need to ask Duterte. He said he will do on a national scale what he insists without proof he has done on a local: kill at will—which presidents are least able to do. In short, he gave 2 reasons you should or should not vote for him. No. 1, by his own admission, he is a serial killer. And No. 2, absent proof, he is making false claims. What a pity. Before he spoke he was the best of all the candidates.

Disclaimer: The views in this blog are those of the blogger and do not necessarily reflect the views of ABS-CBN Corp.