Don't Criticize the Marcoses IF You Love Living a DEBT-DRIVEN, EXTRAVAGANT LIFESTYLE

BBC News

It's September and some people are already starting what I call a premature Christmas countdown. The thought of having an extended Christmas season used to thrill me as a child. For those who celebrate Christmas, we just need to admit that we're more often than not, looking forward to what we can receive, to the Christmas party (and my goodness, many of them are full of calorie-dense meals), and then we can all look forward to angry creditors running after debtors in January (read here)! In my case, September gives me the chills for reasons. One can think of September 11, 2001, which happened when I was in high school under the K+10 curriculum. The other would be remembering that on September 21, 1972, when martial law was declared, some of my folks, out of the blue. I wasn't born yet, but the narrative against Ferdinand E. Marcos Sr. focused on human rights violations.

It's crazy how people can afford to badmouth the Marcoses. One must ask, "Where did Bongbong (the current president) get the money for that car? Where did Imelda get that money to buy that many shoes?" Just hearing that kind of talk makes me think of Lee Kuan Yew's encounter with Marcos. LKY wouldn't even lend the money to Marcos, very certain that he would never see the money again. LKY must've observed that President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. was living like a crown prince during that era. Not to mention, the Marcos regime was driven by rampant economic protectionism.

This claim by Emmanuel S. De Dios (and sadly, the link is down, and hopefully it'll be up and running again) says this from the UP School of Economics:

It is instructive that neither Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, nor any major Asian country catastrophically experienced negative growth in the early 1980s. The Philippines was the exception, following instead the example of protectionist and over-borrowed Latin American countries. This suggests that there was nothing unavoidable about the crisis the Philippines suffered, and that it was the result instead of failed policies. In 1977 the Philippines’ total debt was all of $8.2 billion. Only five years later, in 1982, this had risen to $24.4 billion. Thailand’s debt in 1982 was still only half that amount. Thailand and other countries of the region thus avoided a debt crisis and ultimately went on to attract foreign direct investments in export-oriented industries in the now-familiar East Asian pattern. But no such thing happened under Ferdinand E. Marcos, notwithstanding the arguments and exhortations of people like Gerardo P. Sicat (who would cease to be active in the regime by 1980). By the early 1980s, the pattern would be set where foreign direct investments in neighboring countries regularly outstripped those in the Philippines. (The intermittent coups d’etat post-Marcos did us no favors either.)

Is it me, or does having an extravagant lifestyle usually follow up with a debt-driven lifestyle? I've heard someone who was having such extravagant parties was actually not as rich as he claimed. Instead, it was a debt-driven lifestyle. The people I heard about were partying on a yacht, but they borrowed tons of money. I've heard of people who have so much flamboyancy (that is, extravagance beyond reason) are the type to get buried in debt so soon. Of course, not all extravagant people would party on a yacht. However, the one thing in common with all types of overspending and extravagance is that they're usually debt-driven.

Funny enough, I've met some people who don't know how to prioritize money, who also hate the Marcoses. These are the types of contradictions that I could see:

Complaining about Imelda's 3,000 pairs of shoes, all the while, the wife has expensive taste. A woman doesn't need to own 3,000 pairs of shoes to be an overspender!
Complaining about Bongbong living like a prince, all the while, they keep giving in to their children's whims. One doesn't need to give their son a yacht party to make a spoiled brat, because there are other ways to do so.
Complaining about Marcos' national debt (which affects the country) all the while one is also borrowing money without paying it back. One doesn't need to be a dictator to accumulate lots of debt! You just need to be an overspender who doesn't know how to value money!

Think about how overspending is really the norm in the country. Sure, the wife may not own 3,000 pairs of shoes like Imelda. Sure, the son isn't having a yacht party. However, if the wife has expensive taste, if the son keeps getting treated like a little prince, and if the head of the household keeps borrowing money just to impress others--it puts that family in a similar situation as the Marcoses! The family may not be stealing away from the national coffers.

Even funnier, such people are still blaming the long-dead Marcos for the country's current ills (read here). These people definitely have no moral high ground. I'm not saying that the Marcos wealth isn't real. I'm disappointed to think of how the Supreme Court of the Philippines dismissed the case. It's already stupid enough to hate the Marcoses but love their protectionist policies that led to crony capitalism.

Sure, not all debt can land you in jail. However, think about that people with debt-driven, extravagant lifestyles might be guilty of estafa (borrowing without the intention to pay back), or absconding with the intent to defraud. Some people, whether they're in business or in the working class, may be able to commit these acts of fraud. Really, why demand the Marcoses to pay back the debt if you're unwilling to pay back that debt?

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