When the Election Was Over, Reality Arrived: What Every Political Candidate Needs to Discern

*Dr. Rodolfo John Ortiz Teope, PhD, EdD, DM 

I want to speak to you now without theater and without slogans—only with the honesty that comes after everything has gone quiet. The election is over. The posters are down. The caravans have dissolved. The phones that once rang nonstop now sit still. In that silence, there is a truth that hurts more than defeat itself, because it arrives without mercy and without noise.

I once appeared in a YouTube video enumerating ten ways how to lose elections. When I recorded it, I spoke as if these were abstract errors—mistakes made by other candidates in other places. I sounded composed, almost academic. Looking back, I realize that video was not commentary. It was a warning that only makes sense after the loss. It was meant for someone like you.

You were told you were winning. You were shown surveys, crowds, clippings, and airtime. You were booked on radio and television. Newspapers carried familiar names beside yours. Political “experts” surrounded you, speaking with confidence, promising control. And in the exhaustion of campaigning—between hope and fear—you believed that all this noise meant momentum.

Now that the noise is gone, the question arrives quietly and painfully: what did they really know?

Most of the people who advised you have never stood where you stood. They have never run for office. Never waited for precinct returns at dawn with a dry throat and shaking hands. Never carried the weight of public judgment. Many have not even won as a barangay kagawad. Yet they spoke to you as if they understood sacrifice. They sold theory as experience, exposure as credibility, and confidence as wisdom.

In sports, this would not pass the first test. A basketball coach is usually someone who once played—maybe not a star, but someone who felt the court, the pressure, and the pain of losing. Experience gives authority. In politics, you were coached by people who never played—only watched, read, and sold advice. When the final buzzer sounded, they were already gone.

Let me be precise now, because elections are not won by moral posturing but by discipline. I am not saying that candidates should not spend money. That argument is naïve and irresponsible. Elections require funds—for organization, logistics, voter education, legal defense, watchers, transportation, communications, and the protection of votes. A serious campaign needs structure, machinery, and operational capacity. It needs planning. It needs execution. It needs what seasoned practitioners correctly call special operations—the quiet, methodical work that ensures a campaign survives election day.

What I am condemning is not spending. It is misallocation. It is paying for illusion instead of infrastructure. It is confusing media exposure with ground strength and consultants with commanders. Money must be a force multiplier, not a substitute for legitimacy. It must reinforce an existing relationship between the candidate and the community, not attempt to manufacture one overnight.

Candidates lose when spending replaces connection, when budgets replace presence, and when strategy is outsourced to people who have never been accountable to voters. No amount of money can compensate for the absence of trust, narrative coherence, and ground discipline. Campaign funds that are not anchored to a real organization simply evaporate—leaving noise, debt, and defeat.

There is another illusion that costs candidates dearly: the belief that party affiliation guarantees victory. It does not. Being under a strong, administration-aligned, or incumbent political party is never an assurance of winning. I have seen candidates spend enormous amounts just to secure a Certificate of Nomination and Acceptance, believing that the party name alone will carry them across the finish line. What they really bought was a logo, not loyalty. A letterhead, not legitimacy.

Political parties do not vote—people do. A party’s machinery is only as strong as the candidate’s relationship with the ground. Without personal credibility, local trust, and real presence, a party endorsement becomes decorative. In some cases, it even becomes a liability, especially when voters see the candidate as imposed rather than earned. Paying for a nomination without building parallel grassroots strength is simply another form of outsourcing belief—and it fails the same way every time.

Yes, money matters in elections. Vote buying exists. It is rampant. It has become a quietly accepted culture in many places. You were likely told—more than once—that if you did not play that game, you would lose. That without spending, without "logistics," and without distribution, you had no chance. That reality is ugly, but denying it is dishonest.

Here is the truth they did not explain: money can buy presence, but not belief. It can buy noise, but not trust. It can amplify a message, but it cannot create one. When the message is borrowed, when the story is rented, voters feel it—even if they cannot explain it. People know when a candidate has outsourced his soul.

In that YouTube video, one of the ways I mentioned to lose elections was exactly that—outsourcing your soul. At the time, it sounded like a line. Now it feels like a wound. Because the moment you trusted strangers more than your own understanding of your people, the campaign began to slip away. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Quietly. Like something precious misplaced and only noticed when it was too late.

The hardest realization is this: losing the election hurts, but not as much as realizing you were deceived. That you did not simply lose to another candidate, but to an illusion carefully sold to you. That the confidence you paid for disappeared the moment it was no longer profitable to stay.

They will move on. They always do. Another candidate will replace you. Another promise will be made. You are left with exhaustion, regret, and the slow work of rebuilding—not just a political future, but judgment itself.

Listen carefully in this silence.

This loss does not mean you were unworthy. It does not mean you were incapable. It means you were human—and humans trust. Elections have a cruel but honest way of revealing truth. They strip away money, noise, and performance and leave only what was real. Now that everything is quiet, clarity has finally arrived. Painful clarity—but clarity nonetheless.

If you ever choose to stand again, do it differently. Slower. More honestly. Build roots, not shortcuts. Spend with purpose, not vanity. Choose people who have felt loss and stayed anyway. Earn trust instead of applause. And never again pay someone to pretend they know your people better than you do.

I am not speaking to reopen wounds. I am speaking so that this loss will not be wasted.

Because the most painful way to lose an election is not to be rejected by the people.

It is to wake up and realize that you spent millions believing a lie—and that the silence you hear now is the sound of truth finally being heard.

__

 *About the author:

Dr. Rodolfo “John” Ortiz Teope is a distinguished Filipino academic, public intellectual, and advocate for civic education and public safety, whose work spans local academies and international security circles. With a career rooted in teaching, research, policy, and public engagement, he bridges theory and practice by making meaningful contributions to academic discourse, civic education, and public policy. Dr. Teope is widely respected for his critical scholarship in education, management, economics, doctrine development, and public safety; his grassroots involvement in government and non-government organizations; his influential media presence promoting democratic values and civic consciousness; and his ethical leadership grounded in Filipino nationalism and public service. As a true public intellectual, he exemplifies how research, advocacy, governance, and education can work together in pursuit of the nation’s moral and civic mission.

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If This Is Contempt, Then We Are All Guilty: An Analysis of Indirect Contempt, Criticism, and Power

*Dr. Rodolfo John Ortiz Teope, PhD, EdD, DM

I remember sitting quietly one afternoon, scrolling through my phone, watching a familiar scene unfold yet again. Someone had criticized the Supreme Court sharply, emotionally, and perhaps even unfairly. Within hours, defenders appeared. Not judges. Not justices. Ordinary citizens, keyboards in hand, furious in tone, declaring that a contempt case must be filed. As if the Court needed saving. As if offense alone was already a crime. That moment stayed with me, not because of what was said about the Court, but because of how quickly we confuse anger with justice.

That is where this analysis begins, through the eyes of a political whiner.

I speak not as a lawyer, nor as someone hiding behind legal technicalities, but as a private citizen, an educator, a former municipal legislator, a public safety and law enforcement professor and researcher, a political analyst, and a hopeless romantic who just recently found loving a siopao complex with a pancit curly noodle beauty, who has spent years observing how institutions behave under pressure. I call myself a political whiner not to trivialize the argument but to be honest about the role I occupy. Someone who complains because silence, when power is misused, feels like quiet consent.

When people hear "indirect contempt of court," they often assume it is about insult. About disrespect. About someone crossing an invisible line and bruising the pride of the judiciary. But contempt, especially indirect contempt, is not about feelings. It was never meant to be.

Indirect contempt exists for one reason alone: to protect the administration of justice. Not the ego of judges. Not the prestige of institutions. And certainly not the emotions of private citizens who feel compelled to be offended on the court’s behalf.

It is true that a private citizen may file a petition for indirect contempt. But this procedural allowance is frequently misunderstood and, at times, dangerously abused. Filing a petition does not mean contempt exists. It does not establish wrongdoing. It does not even obligate the court to act. At most, it is an invitation asking the court to take a second look. The existence of contempt begins and ends with the court itself.

This is because the offended party in contempt is never the filer. It is the court.

Courts are expected to endure criticism, even harsh criticism, even unfair criticism. A judiciary that collapses under dissent was never strong to begin with. Judges are not fragile officials who require constant public defense. If judicial authority is truly threatened, if justice is being obstructed, the court will recognize it without the need for intermediaries or self-appointed defenders.

This is precisely why the present indirect contempt petition involving Senate President Tito Sotto deserves careful public attention. The petition was triggered by his public criticism of a Supreme Court ruling, criticism delivered in his capacity as a political stakeholder responding to a constitutional controversy. Whether one agrees with his tone or not, the core question is not whether the Court was embarrassed or disagreed with him, but whether his statements actually posed a clear and present danger to the administration of justice. Jurisprudence has long drawn this line carefully. Courts have consistently held that criticism, even intemperate criticism, is not contempt unless it creates a real risk of obstructing judicial proceedings or undermining judicial authority in a substantive and imminent way. To treat political disagreement as contempt is to confuse dissent with defiance and commentary with coercion.

If criticism alone is now to be treated as indirect contempt, then intellectual honesty requires consistency. By that logic, I myself must also be guilty. I have written this analysis and other articles openly. I have examined, questioned, and even agreed with the statement and principle articulated by Senate President Tito Sotto in disagreeing with the Supreme Court’s decision. If academic critique, policy commentary, and principled disagreement are enough to constitute contempt, then every educator, researcher, columnist, and thinking citizen becomes vulnerable. That conclusion is not only absurd. It is dangerous. It transforms contempt from a narrow judicial safeguard into a broad instrument of silence, where agreement with a dissenting view becomes punishable not because it obstructs justice, but because it dares to question power.

The danger begins when criticism alone is treated as contempt. When courts are urged to cite individuals simply because their words are uncomfortable, embarrassing, or politically inconvenient, the line between justice and intimidation erodes. Debate gives way to fear. Dissent becomes silence. Citizens begin to measure their words not by truth, but by personal risk. When contempt is misused this way, it no longer protects the judiciary. It shields power from accountability.

There is an even deeper danger that must be confronted. When private individuals repeatedly invoke indirect contempt against critics without any real obstruction of justice, the court itself risks being bastardized. It becomes an unwilling instrument of harassment, dragged into personal vendettas, political rivalries, and loyalty tests. The judiciary was never meant to be a venue for political score settling or personal grievance airing. When it is used this way, judicial dignity is not defended. It is quietly eroded.

At the same time, it must be said clearly. The absence of a private filing does not weaken the court. If an act or publication genuinely undermines judicial authority or obstructs the administration of justice, the court, guided by law, experience, and institutional wisdom, may act motu proprio. In such cases, contempt is not triggered by outrage but by necessity. The court acts not because it feels insulted, but because justice itself is at risk.

This is why speech-based indirect contempt carries the highest threshold. Words alone, no matter how sharp or provocative, are not enough. There must be a real, clear, and present danger to the administration of justice. Not imagined. Not emotional. Real.

Often, the most misunderstood judicial response is silence. Silence is mistaken for fear, weakness, or tolerance of disrespect. But more often than not, silence is restraint. And restraint is not surrender. It is confidence.

In a democracy, institutions prove their strength not by how quickly they punish criticism, but by how calmly they withstand it. When a court chooses not to react, it may not be because it failed to notice the criticism. It may be because it understood that not every loud voice deserves the full weight of judicial power.

So yes, I am a political whiner. I complain because I care. I question because I refuse to confuse authority with infallibility. And I believe that the judiciary is strongest not when it silences its critics, but when it shows the discipline to rise above them.

That, to me, is the true meaning of indirect contempt. No offense. Not pride. But restraint in the exercise of power.

__________________

*About the author:

Dr. Rodolfo “John” Ortiz Teope is a distinguished Filipino academic, public intellectual, and advocate for civic education and public safety, whose work spans local academies and international security circles. With a career rooted in teaching, research, policy, and public engagement, he bridges theory and practice by making meaningful contributions to academic discourse, civic education, and public policy. Dr. Teope is widely respected for his critical scholarship in education, management, economics, doctrine development, and public safety; his grassroots involvement in government and non-government organizations; his influential media presence promoting democratic values and civic consciousness; and his ethical leadership grounded in Filipino nationalism and public service. As a true public intellectual, he exemplifies how research, advocacy, governance, and education can work together in pursuit of the nation’s moral and civic mission.

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VP Sara Duterte and the Risk of a Sure Win: On Power, Loyalty, and the Politics of Subtraction

*Dr. Rodolfo John Ortiz Teope, PhD, EdD, DM

If the election were held today—this February, this March, this very moment—it would be dishonest to deny the truth staring us in the face: Sara Duterte would be the frontrunner and sure winner. Her popularity is not imagined. It is felt. You hear it in conversations in tricycles, jeepney terminals, sari-sari stores, eateries like the Inopia Eatery located in Modesta Village, San Mateo, Rizal, and in family dinners where politics quietly enters the room. You see it in the sympathy that followed what happened to her father, in the emotions stirred by the ICC issue, and in the anger, the loyalty, and the sense of injustice many Filipinos carry in their hearts. All of that translated into numbers. Real numbers. Winning numbers.

And because she stands there—strong, visible, almost inevitable—people begin to circle.

This is how politics works. When someone looks like a sure winner, the noise grows louder. Politicians suddenly remember your name. Old allies return. New supporters emerge from nowhere. Everyone wants to be seen. Everyone wants to be close. Not always out of belief, but out of hope—hope for a position, for access, for protection, for a future seat at the table when power finally changes hands.

But here is the painful part that we rarely say out loud.

Sometimes, the people who shout the loudest in support are the very ones who quietly wound the candidate they claim to love.

I have spoken to ordinary Filipinos—neutral people, walang kinakapitan, walang hinihintay na pwesto—and their sadness is consistent. They say, “Gusto ko sana siya.” They admire the strength, the resolve, and the familiarity. But then they look around her. They see faces they recognize for the wrong reasons. Names associated with old scandals. Figures whispered about in stories of corruption, abuse, greed, and moral decay. And suddenly, love hesitates.

In their hearts, a fear begins to grow.

Because Filipinos know this lesson too well: when a leader wins, it is often not the leader who first benefits—but the people around her. The operators. The survivors of every administration. The political parasites who attach themselves to power and drain it until nothing is left but disappointment.

This is why politics is not always a battle of candidates. More often, it is a battle of supporters.

Hindi si Sara ang tinatanggihan ng ilan. Ang tinatanggihan nila ay ang mga mukhang nakapaligid sa kanya. Ang mga taong nag-iingay ngayon ay hindi dahil sa prinsipyo, kundi dahil sa pag-asa na sila ang mauuna sa pila kapag dumating ang tagumpay. And for many voters, that realization hurts deeply. Because they want to believe. They want to hope. But they have been burned too many times.

We have seen this political scenario before.

There was a time when another vice president looked unstoppable. The numbers were overwhelming. The momentum felt permanent. People said, “Sure win na ’yan.” And yet, as the years passed, the questions piled up. The issues were not answered. The shadows grew longer. And little by little, the numbers slipped away—not in one dramatic fall, but in quiet decisions made at kitchen tables and jeepney rides home.

Today, something similar feels dangerously possible.

Yes, her numbers rise. But they also bleed—slowly, silently. Not always because of what she says or does, but because of who refuses to step back from her shadow. Because of allies who treat her popularity as a personal shield. Because of supporters who attack critics instead of persuading them, who insult instead of listening, and who threaten instead of explaining.

And if this pattern continues—if the loudest voices claiming to love her are the same voices that keep destroying her through arrogance—then the danger becomes real. When supporters choose insult over persuasion, humiliation over dialogue, and character assassination over principle, they do not weaken the opposition—they weaken her. Every political opponent mocked instead of engaged, every ally burned instead of protected, and every supporter of another candidate maligned instead of won over is a lost opportunity. Elections are not won by shouting enemies into silence; they are won by convincing doubters, by drawing neutrals into belief, and by showing that leadership is built on principles, track record, and acceptability—not rage. If the battlefield remains one of personal attacks rather than accomplishments and ideas, then the dream of 2028 will not collapse overnight. It will fade quietly. Slowly. Until one morning, the nation wakes up to a surprise winner—someone no one expected—while the strongest candidate wonders how a sure victory slipped away without a single decisive blow.

And now, new names begin to surface. Not loud. Not dominant. Just steady. Just present. Taking small numbers here and there. In politics, those small losses matter. They accumulate. They decide elections.

This is the Filipino dilemma in its rawest form: “Gusto ko sana siyang iboto… pero kapag nanalo siya, sino ang makikinabang? ” That single question is enough to change a vote, enough to break momentum, and enough to turn certainty into doubt.

Perhaps this is not a criticism but a quiet plea. A moment for reflection. Because politics today is no longer just about strength—it is about trust. And trust is fragile. You cannot choose all your followers, yes. But you can choose who represents you. You can choose who stands closest. You can choose who speaks in your name.

In the end, many Filipinos do not abandon a candidate out of hatred. They walk away out of fear—fear that history will repeat itself, fear that power will once again be captured by the wrong hands.

And sometimes, the most painful losses in politics do not come from enemies—but from supporters who subtract where they should have added.

__________________

*About the author:

Dr. Rodolfo “John” Ortiz Teope is a distinguished Filipino academic, public intellectual, and advocate for civic education and public safety, whose work spans local academies and international security circles. With a career rooted in teaching, research, policy, and public engagement, he bridges theory and practice by making meaningful contributions to academic discourse, civic education, and public policy. Dr. Teope is widely respected for his critical scholarship in education, management, economics, doctrine development, and public safety; his grassroots involvement in government and non-government organizations; his influential media presence promoting democratic values and civic consciousness; and his ethical leadership grounded in Filipino nationalism and public service. As a true public intellectual, he exemplifies how research, advocacy, governance, and education can work together in pursuit of the nation’s moral and civic mission.

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