Is There a Moral Universe?

Finally, House leaders including known Arroyo allies declared that Con-Ass before the May elections is dead – but for the wrong reason. They didn’t have a change of mind. It wasn’t public pressure that made them abandon the con-ass madness. It’s for a reason that’s totally consistent with the kind of people they are – trapos. The House of Representatives is not likely to get a quorum in its sessions because the honorable congressmen will be out in the districts campaigning for the elections.

I’m sure they were aware how terribly important amending the constitution had been to President Arroyo. It’s part of her grand scheme to make history and realize a life-long dream, or call it fantasy. At this point, however, it has come down to a fight for dear life for her and her family. How pathetic it is to watch her remaining loyal hirelings fending one attack after another. Each of them appears terribly uncomfortable, embarrassed and at wit’s end trying to salvage the situation. It’s a spectacle of comic proportions.

So, where are her friends and supporters now, especially those in the lower chamber of congress? They are out campaigning, trying to attend to their own survival. Whatever happens to the political edifice that they helped Arroyo build for herself and also for them is now of no consequence. The con-ass used to be their ticket to power forever; now it’s a millstone around their necks. They already felt its weight when they voted for HR 1109, that’s why instead of a nominal voting each of them was hoping to hide behind a viva voce voting.

But shouldn’t these people be made to go down the way of the Arroyo’s? They are partly responsible for creating a Gloria Arroyo. Gloria tempted them and they happily, eagerly and wholeheartedly yielded to her temptation. A vigilant House of Representative could have prevented the rise of a regime that shows no regard for decency and no respect for the rule of law and the rights of its citizens. They may be less guilty than the president, but they are guilty nonetheless. And they must be made to pay.

Civil society is possible on the assumption of a moral universe. We believe that things like truth, justice, honesty and the like are the stuff that makes human association possible and that choosing or siding with these virtues over and against wickedness and falsehood is what defines true and genuine humanity. And yet the contrary seems to be the way things are in this our universe. Bad leaders are replaced with other bad leaders, and the situation seems to be getting worse. Those who run for office don’t seem to believe in a moral universe. When they appeal for our votes through political ads, they think that we are idiots. On voting day, voters are herded, fed, ferried to the voting centers to write names from sample ballots. When the votes are counted and canvassed they try all means to change the numbers because it’s the numbers that count not who the people have actually voted for.

This practice is totally immoral and yet it is what rules in our society. Why? Why are the laws of a moral universe not working? The answer is this: it is people that make a moral order. There’s no such thing as a self-operating moral law order. A moral system is a complex of moral actions executed by individuals and collectives of people who act morally. Given a rotten political system that has bedeviled us for so long, nothing less than a moral insurrection of a morally aroused population can establish a truly moral order. Under a democracy the people go through a cycle of political exercises, called election, that serve as an opportunity take a moral stand – to say enough is enough and to make politics an arena of moral struggles.

Morality in governance is the central issue in politics. An electoral exercise is not merely about choosing one set of leaders over another but a moment to restore the people’s trust in a moral universe.