‘How I wish it were the first Marcos visiting DC this year. It would be great to see Trump try to bully FM, because I don’t think he would get far.’
SO it came to pass that, for the second time in his presidency, Ferdinand Marcos Jr set foot in Washington, DC to meet with the President of the United States.
BBM is the first head of state from ASEAN to be invited by the new President of the United States for an official visit.
The President (from a photo I saw) deplaned not from a Philippine Airlines chartered wide-body but from a private executive jet. When he landed, there wasn’t much pomp and pageantry, no trooping the colors or honor guards; just the US Ambassador to the Philippines, the Philippine Ambassador to the United States, and a few other officials on hand to greet him at the bottom of the staircase. He arrived in a non-matching coat and trousers with the regulation lapel flag pin. He shook a few hands and then, I suppose, was whisked to his hotel rather than to the Blair House, where the US houses heads of state on state visits to the US.
As of this writing, BBM has yet to meet Donald Trump, who must be sifting through the Epstein files and seeing how many pages contain his name and thus should not be released. BBM already met with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth – China, are you watching? – but I am sure that BBM did not dare raise a glass to toast Hegseth and the historic ties between our two nations
He would have needed a bottle. Or two.
In one picture, I noticed Defense Secretary Gibo Teodoro sitting next to BBM as they met Hegseth. My UP Law school contemporary and idol looked freshly scrubbed but not too happy – or at least he had a poker face on. Surely, US briefing books on this visit note that Sec Gibo recently went through the social media wringer over his old passport from Malta, with even some generals in the active service allegedly hoping for his replacement. Methinks either they’re Duterte generals, or generals not too happy with Sec Gibo’s staunch anti-China position.
I wonder what the briefing books have to say about BBM and his immediate (wife and children) and extended (mother and sisters) families?
Some commentators are bound to zero in on the “honor” of having been the first to visit the White House. Well, I would disagree on two counts: first, BBM had been there before as President, when Joe Biden was President. Second, we’ve seen how this POTUS has bullied some of his visitors and so I won’t be surprised if he tries to do the same with BBM.
Having money – or being President – doesn’t equate to having class.
How I wish it were the first Marcos visiting DC this year. It would be great to see Trump try to bully FM, because I don’t think he would get far. And while FM would be polite (but more as nice as BBM), knowing he is a guest in the White House, he would not in any shape, manner or form allow anyone – not even the President of the United States – to put him or the Philippines down.
He would have been too quick-witted and too widely read for Trump. I could imagine that the only thing Trump could say in return would be, “Your English is very good. Where did you learn English?”
(Trump’s English isn’t too bad, especially when compared to a fifth grader. But listening to him, I know you know deep in your heart of hearts that he needed a ghost-writer to write most of “The Art of the Deal.”)
Now that should be in the Philippine briefing book for this official visit of Marcos (the younger) to DC!
