No more tough talk

The editorial “Cayetano’s bluff” (6/1/18) should have been titled “Cayetano’s mediocrity.” I used to admire the guts and gumption of then senator Alan Peter Cayetano, who always asked the toughest questions and went for the jugular in any Senate committee investigation on corruption in high places.

His crusade against the Arroyo administration’s supposed attempt to make a mess of the $329-million contract for a National Broadband Network with China’s ZTE Corp. precipitated its junking.

His persistence during another investigation into the alleged shenanigans of the Binay dynasty in Makati must surely have caused the shellacking of then presidential candidate Jejomar Binay.

Now, as foreign secretary, Cayetano is mostly dishing out nonsense in defense of his boss, right or wrong.

In the teeth of China’s military buildup in the West Philippine Sea, public clamor for a reaction from the Duterte administration has grown to deafening proportions.

Cayetano’s response?

His office has been making “several protests, maybe 50,100 — I’ll have to count…” Yet, he couldn’t show any!

Even to the ordinary observer, that snarky and dismissive response had “liar, liar, liar” heard unmistakably in the backdrop, and spoke volumes of the level of mediocrity Cayetano has sunk to.

What happened to you, sir?

ANGELI O. MARCONI, [email protected]