Dispatch from Crame No. 1067:
Sen. Leila M. de Lima on Duterte Backing out from the WPS Debate

A debate demands preparation. If we were taught one thing in law school, it is not to come to class unprepared. As soon as we become lawyers, we carried this lesson, and remember not to come to court unprepared. This is because both classroom and courtroom engagements are in themselves debates, the former with the law professor, and the latter with opposing counsel and the judge.

No remarkable record as a law student and lawyer to speak of, Duterte must have realized that he cannot hack the gargantuan task that a debate of this nature entails. Thus, as soon as his challenge to a debate on the WPS was accepted by former SAJ Carpio, a brilliant lawyer and jurist, he did not waste any time in squirming out of his own challenge by designating his Spokesperson as his substitute.

However, once Duterte did this, the fight was already over before it even began. No one can be a loser more than someone who backs out of his own challenge. Appointing Roque as proxy is already irrelevant. The nation expected no less than the President to stand up for his own treasonous conduct in a debate against Carpio, and not via a subaltern. This is not to say that Roque should not be given the chance to defend his own treasonous conduct. He must, but all in good time.

All this DDS howling on Carpio's supposed presumptiveness in expecting to actually debate with no less than the President, as well as his "backing out" from the Roque substitution, is all just noise coming from a camp that was just served their master's head on a silver platter, cut clean not even by the sword of his enemy, but by his own cowardice.

Duterte calling on Roque as proxy was not a substitution, but a concession. By thus conceding, he has, in the minds of the Filipinos, bowed to Carpio's victory without the latter even firing a shot, aside from merely accepting Duterte's challenge. If it was a sports competition, Duterte in effect lost by default.

Rather than expose the bankruptcy of his thoughts and the treason of his actions, Duterte chose to just minimize the damage of blasting off his brains by just cutting off his balls. But that too has repercussions. The Duterte mythos of the ultimate "siga" is now shattered, leaving nothing but a castrated caricature of the feared figurehead of Davao.

From now on, Duterte will no longer just run around like a headless chicken. He is simply a chicken.

(Access the handwritten copy of Dispatch from Crame No. 1067, here: https://issuu.com/senatorleilam.delima/docs/dispatchno1067)