“The revolution is not
an apple that falls when it is ripe. You have to make it fall.” Che Guevara
By Alex P. Vidal
AYN Rand would have been amazed by the force
and effectiveness of today’s netizens to influence and shape public opinion.
In this generation, they constitute the social
media’s New Intellectuals, the most vigilant vanguards of the nation’s social,
cultural, and political spectrum via the Internet.
No act of brutality, arrogance, malfeasance
and demagoguery in the civilized society can escape the radar of amazing digital
world.
A hailstorm of public censure and
condemnation awaits those who possess the delusions of putting the law in their
hands; those who think they are above the law and reason, owing to their power
and influence, pelf and privileges for belonging in society’s higher social and
political strata.
Gone are the days when publicly performed
criminal acts and other forms of civil disobedience can be kept under wraps and
the culprits getting away with impunity.
There’s always a big brother and sister
watching: CCTVs and mobile phone cameras.
IDEAS
Meanwhile, objectivist Rand held
that abstract ideas are man’s basic means of dealing with practical life.
She stressed that abstract ideas enable man
to understand concrete issues, to evaluate them, and to act successfully to
deal with them.
Rand further held that the problem with
Western civilization was not that it was too intellectual, but that too many of
its intellectuals accepted and propagated fundamentally wrong ideas.
Rand believed that what the world needs
urgently are New Intellectuals.
As civilization marks this year the official
end of the French Revolution on December 15, 1799, we begin the era of fighting
graft and corruption, abuse of authority in military and government through a new
wave: the social media.
We cannot afford today to give life to a
modern Napoleon Bonaparte, the dictator who wanted to overrun Europe had it not
been for his Waterloo defeat.
Politicians who want to overrun our
treasury via pork barrel and other thinly-veiled acts of plunder and graft and
corruption, are the smaller versions of Napoleon.
The specter of graft and corruption in
government today is the rallying point of public anger and disgust that
transformed into a bloody revolt; the tipping point that brought down the
monarchy and cut off King Louis XVI’s and Marie Antoinette’s heads in the
revolutionary scaffolds.
MANTRA
Under the mantra of “Liberte, egalite,
fraternity” (liberty, equality, fraternity), French society itself underwent a
transformation as feudal, aristocratic, and religious privileges disappeared
and old ideas about tradition and hierarchy were abruptly overthrown.
Under the mantra of “tuwid na daan”, the
President has failed to curb the age-old graft and corruption.
The rich becomes richer; the poor
becomes poorer.
Marie Antoinette wanted to give the
French people with empty stomachs cake; our government has been giving us empty
promises and empty treasury.
The wealth of the nation has been
wasted.
Our leaders have abandoned the spirit
that ignited the “Cry of Balintawak” or “Pugad Lawin” of the katipuneros, and the
“Cry of Sta. Barbara (Iloilo)”.
We give them our votes and confidence;
they gave us shame and scandal via plunder and graft and corruption.
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