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All these hideous attempts to dismember the Philippine republic constitute the concluding chapter of a failed democratic experiment.  Our great American political facade can no longer hide a Spanish reality in which a few families monopolize wealth and power. 

Now that emerging Filipino Chinese power blocs position themselves for supremacy, and while their Hispanic counterparts put up a fight to preserve their seat of influence, the nation finds itself torn in the middle---caught between two opposing plutocrats who care nothing about the country's future. 

Provoked largely or in part by the failures and abuses of these ruling classes, a political meltdown is inevitable; disintegration will be an inescapably byproduct.

Philippine Roman Catholic bishops claim they too receive hate mails from anonymous letter writers but say they do not read them. How come they know they were hate mails if they didn't them at all?

A new movement called Federal Republic of Mindanao, reportedly an extension of the federalist agenda former Philippine president Fidel Valdez Ramos espoused, has been formed in southern Philippines. Initial supporters include Davao City Mayor Rodrgio Duterte, a handful of lawmakers from the House of Representatives, former mayors and vice mayors, and a network of former governors and vice governors. This mix of incumbents and have-beens is puzzling.

Attempts by politicians to dismember the Philippine republic are getting obvious nowadays. One bloc headed by former president Fidel Valdez Ramos trumpets the advantages the nation gets if it changes government form from the presidential to the federal. Another bloc, apparently composed of lackeys and apologists of the sitting president, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, throws its weight behind the shift to the parliamentary one.

The interplay of these political configurations will, in the end, test the strength and maturity of the people. Two major blocs vying for the nation's ear, on the one hand, will bomb the minds of the population, if it truly it has a mind; it will blow hard on the nation's soul, if it still has one, on the other. Never has been an issue so divisive as this.

As the battle for the nation's heart and mind rages, and as divide-and-rule tactics become the means to an end, there will be more victims than beneficiaries. With poverty alleviation programs ignored in favor of political exigency, the poor will be rendered poorer and restless. It will breed new zealots for reform---more violent and power-hungry than the ruling class it will be seeking to overthrow, narrow-minded in its grasp of national agenda, but sincere in its conviction to make changes happen.

The middle class will be split in the middle, its fortunes will be cannon fodder to a new revolution, and its biggest faction will decide which one between federalists and parliamentarians will gain the upper hand.

To which side Lower House Speaker Jose de Venecia swings remains a puzzle, as does Senate Speaker Franklin Drilon. For lack of any better choice or by force of political expediency, former presidents Corazon Aquino and Joseph Estrada will expectedly join Ramos.

Oligarchs break ranks to lay their stakes on whoever has better winning potential. One need not be a prophet to see the signs. Here and now, the nation teeters on the brink of turmoil and upheaval.

The influential Roman Catholic Church will never be a neutral factor. Circumstance will drive it to one side of the conflict, and most likely it will be Ramos's.

Factor in the disillusioned elements of the armed forces---restless junior offices of the army, air force, marines, and navy and a handful of senior generals who knew they can swing the great ax to quicken the pace of upheaval and help the nation rise quickly on its feet. Do you will see that Ramos has three aces up his sleeve against Arroyo's?

Your future and mine are at stake. Question: Which side must we belong?