Surviving a post-presidency scenario is tricky for a president who is the most unpopular in the history of the Philippines. If elections are held in May 2010, it means Gloria has an exit strategy. Speculations about the First Family preparing to live in Portugal or Canada have been reported even in major dailies, just as speculations about Charter change in order to allow her an extended term.

Or, Gloria can invest in a "stay" strategy — by Charter change, emergency rule, or by making a candidate of her choice win the presidency. Charter change has been a preferred option, an open one and, in fact, a reelection promise. The only problem is that the people do not want it and the Catholic Church hierarchy, in a rare show of unity, has openly objected to it.

Gloria cannot afford to frontally defy the Church. She had gone to great lengths to establish special relationships with many bishops and had even has a Church relation group in her office just for that purpose. The Reproductive Health Bill is an interesting issue. By articulation, Gloria is against anything that is counter to natural family planning. By actuation, it does not seem so as she makes no move to kill the bill when she easily can.

Charter change needs most of Congress to support it aggressively, and most of the Church to simply stay out of it. Gloria needs to walk the tightrope, and the tightrope is getting tighter

Emergency rule, leading to justifiable martial law, requires certain conditions to be present. First of all is chaos, or the threat of chaos, and chaos does not just suddenly appear. Ferdinand Marcos arranged it by having bombs explode in Metro Manila. Protestors had been marching and pounding the streets, many ending in violent acts either by an angry mob or by an angry police or military force. Of course, it also used a fake ambush against the Defense Secretary then as trigger for governance under emergency powers.

If the abovementioned conditions are not met, or are not arranged by deliberate design, it will be difficult to get the military to play ball. Pushing the military might backfire and force an intended coup d état instead. The characters that have to be key actors in a dastardly zarzuela are not aligned with one another, surely not in any such common plan, and even more surely not sharing the same intimate character traits and value systems.

In the Armed Forces, a loyal but reasonably professional leadership is in place at the very top. The heads of the major services are not considered lapdogs of their commander-in-chief even as they have not shown any desire or propensity to be a reform group either. Within the year, however, others may begin to take their place and replace their professionalism with a personal brand of loyalty to the person of Gloria beyond the position of president. It becomes possible, then, that unusual loyalties will translate to blind obedience.

With some major players of geopolitics not about to look the other way, Gloria may not be able to simply apply Marcos’ formula of almost 40 years ago. And there is another tightrope that Gloria has to walk, this time not just to avoid falling into the abyss of a resentful, and maybe vengeful, population but into control dynamics of superpower America and a super China. With Gloria's blessing, and with that of her husband if rumors and accusations are to be believed, China has become the new super partner and “Chinoys,” or Chinese-Filipinos, now dominate the Philippine economy.

Meanwhile, the United States appears to be making a last stand in Mindanao. Under the Visiting Forces Agreement, America has established a virtual base in Mindanao, especially the Muslim side of the island. America is a lonely force in Asia with main allies Japan and South Korea not so eager to confront China anymore as trade and history make Asians more comfortable with neighbor Asians. In Chinese and Muslim dominated region, only Filipinos and Mindanao offer any security to a defensive America.

The United States has made it clear that it wants the Philippine government to enter into a peace accord with the Muslim secessionist movement represented by the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). The US is insisting so despite the overwhelming Christian response against an agreement that promises the MILF a great degree of control over ancestral domain and the natural resources in them. The role of the US as peace mediator is not so impartial and neutral anymore when it insists that development in the Philippines is not possible without peace in Mindanao — the kind of peace it has been trying to broker.

An unpopular relationship with her own people and a delicate relationship with a country whose new and very popular president snobs Gloria over and over again is not going to make Gloria comfortable, much less confident. As she makes great strides in the political dominance of the country, an edgy America is dangerous. History has witnessed how America becomes suspect in sudden changes of leadership in other nations every time it is edgy. On the outside, Gloria may seem very smug, even arrogant. In the inside, I cannot fathom how she can be.

It might ultimately mean that the 2010 elections will come to pass as scheduled and with Gloria simply preparing her graceful and safe exit out of Malacañang. But how can a scorpion change its nature or a leopard its stripes? If elections are unavoidable, then a candidate of her choice will have to run, and win at all costs. It would benefit presidential wannabes to cut a deal with Gloria if only to inherit either campaign resources or to have their votes counted and registered officially and accurately. A staged drama can be acted out by seemingly incompatible forces like Gloria and outspoken critics while, in fact, secret arrangements are made with intermediaries acceptable to both sides.

In the end, Filipinos who want change may find themselves in a deeper hole. Treachery is in the air. It is foul in smell even while it cannot be seen. I am gravely afraid of it. At the same time, one more serious act of treachery against the people may just be the last straw that will break the camel's back. This is exciting, and promising. My fear is countered by my hope. In the end, options narrow for the traditional — and widens for change.

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