IF JUAN Ponce Enrile hadn?t been too impatient, he might have made a grand slam. That is, if he hadn?t led those coups against Corazon Aquino, he might have thrived under her too. Thereby flourishing under a succession of Philippine leaders, some of them ideological opposites, over the last half century. In fact, if he hadn?t tried to seize power from the hugely popular and American-backed Cory, he might have succeeded her as president. He?s far the more astute politician than Fidel V. Ramos.

As it is, with the exception of Cory?s, he has done quite magnificently under all the presidents since the 1960s: Marcos, when he was still an elected one; Marcos, after he declared martial law; Cory at least immediately after Edsa; Ramos; Joseph Estrada; Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo; and now Benigno Aquino III. You?ve got to marvel at the man?s talent to reinvent himself. That is the polite way to put it. The other way is to say, you?ve got to marvel at the man?s gall to shift alliances, or abandon loyalties, or stab former patrons or partners.

His latest trick has been to become Senate president (Kiko Pangilinan never saw that coming) by dealing alternately with the Liberal Party (LP) and Edgardo Angara?s bloc, offering the first the choicest Senate committees and the second some crumbs in exchange for a crack at storming back to prominence under his new Senate watch. Enrile himself had assured his transition into P-Noy?s government by doing in Manny Villar, P-Noy?s chief rival in the elections, with his middle-of-the-campaign revival of the C-5 issue in the Senate.

Dealing with the LP and Angara?s group also meant kicking Miriam Santiago?s butt all the way to an indefinite leave, Miriam lusting after the blue ribbon committee, which Enrile gave away to Teofisto Guingona III?adding insult to injury in Miriam?s view. What can one say? If she thought she and Enrile were the Lone Ranger and Tonto of the Senate, destined to be partners forever, she was, well, the name of Lone Ranger?s partner says it all.

All this suggests that we still have a long way to go before the politics of opportunism becomes a thing of the past. Or indeed, before it even shows any signs of slackening. Enrile?s continuing political robustness?and not quite incidentally physical one, mid-?80s and going on like Eveready Battery?drives home two things we?ve always lacked that have hindered any drive toward political maturity.

The first is real political parties. Here, political parties do not own their members, their members own political parties. Right now, the LP, the dominant political party after P-Noy?s victory, is owned by Mar Roxas, or his mother. The other political parties are owned by past or would-be presidents. They certainly do not represent anything of any ideological or public-interest significance, representing only the fact that they are either in power or out of it. The much touted revival of the pre-martial-law rivalry between the LP and the NP during the last elections, with P-Noy and Villar as their standard-bearers, respectively, was just a mirage. The ease with which Enrile has worked his ?now you see it (LP or NP or Lakas-Kampi or NPC or whatever), now you don?t? shows so.

With a political culture like this, turning back on one?s loyalties does not carry the crushing weight of a betrayal of principle. Those loyalties are assumed to be expedient, fickle, temporary. They have nothing to do with beliefs, other than the belief that one?s advancement overrides everything. They have to do only with personal relations, specifically relations with other politicians who would do exactly to you what you do unto them. Opportunism, or indeed prostitution, is the nature of the beast.

I remember again the reaction of a Japanese official when I asked him what would happen if a politician switches loyalties from one party to the other. He was so dumbfounded he took a while to answer. When he did, it was to say: ?But if somebody did that, no one will vote for him again.? The thought that turning away from one?s party, or friends, constitutes a betrayal of something awesome?we?re still worlds away from harboring it.

The second is the lack of public outrage, or opprobrium, over brazen displays of political disloyalties or fickleness. It?s like corruption, and for much the same reason. We register no violent reaction to corruption because we do not see that what is being stolen is our money (we see taxes as tribute to our liege) and we register no violent reaction to political opportunism because we do not see that the people being screwed are us. We see the betrayals as private back-stabbings. In fact we do not just fail to see the corrupt and opportunist as contemptuous, we succeed in seeing them as admirable. In public we frown on them, but in private we marvel at their roguishness, we laud their abilidad, we strive for the same ?resiliency.?

Compare that again to the Japanese reaction that compels the corrupt to commit suicide to spare their families the shame and to hew to a strict political code that says if you cannot be loyal to the party, you cannot be loyal to the people?and vice versa. In the end, it?s only the people that can stop corruption, it?s only the people that can stop opportunism.

Of course, I keep hearing it said today that this will be Enrile?s last hurrah: he?ll remain loyal to P-Noy to the end because he?ll be 92 when P-Noy finishes his term, and he?s in legacy mode. But I keep remembering the story of the scorpion that stung the carabao that was helping him cross the river, thereby assuring their mutual destruction. All he could say was: ?What can I do? It?s in my nature to sting.? Sometimes scorpions get to be in their mid-80s.

And sometimes carabaos get to be 50-year-old.