BACOLOD CITY — Every New Year we are always bombarded by fortune-telling.

And in places like Quiapo in Manila, fortune tellers line up to tell the fortune of people, for a fee. And people come back again and again to listen to their “good fortune.”

A few days ago I was listening over Action Radio where Toto Willy Tortosa was predicting what lies ahead for 2009. It became more interesting when he was asked to foretell the result of the 2010 election.

He predicted for the mayorship Mayor Bing Leonardia will beat Congressman Monico Puentevella. I was not able to hear his prediction for the Congressman.

Toto Willy, my own good friend, is a well-recognized fortune teller but I believe, his being a resident of Sum-ag who knows of complaints of people there must have also colored his prediction.

People in Sum-ag and those living south of Pahanocoy are groaning about the terrible traffic that takes sometimes as long as an hour to negotiate a two-kilometer stretch of road. Blame the contractor.

Saturday night a cane truck fell in the ditch. Imagine, the traffic snarl again. Up to Monday the truck, minus the canes, was still there.

I pass by this road at least twice a day

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I don’t know where another fortune teller, a Madame Atri, lives. Interviewed by Carla Cañet and Teray Ellera, her prediction is also like that of Toto Willy. Bing will beat Monico. And for Congressman, she said, Cano Tan will win.

There were also other predictions. But they were not given through media, like that of Toto Willy and Madame Atri. So we cannot mention them.

These are good for Monico and others aspiring to run for Congress. Now, they will work harder. This can also be bad for Bing and Cano. These might make the two complacent, thinking they are winning.

The secret in politics is always to run scared.

We must not forget these many sayings which are as old as mankind: Fortune helps the hard worker. Fortune helps the frugal. And in war, fortune helps the brave.

Rich and successful people have told us they made their own fortune.

In high school, we were made to memorize Shakespeare’s Sonnet. “When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,/ I all alone beweep my outcast state…” This means when you get disgraced with your bad fortune before men’s eyes, you have nobody to blame but yourself.

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I like the President not signing the extension of the CARP bill. She resisted pressure. Now, CARP is dead. Cheers! Madame President.

And talking of CARP, the incident at Valley Golf Club involving DAR Secretary Nasser Pangandaman and sons hastens the burial of CARP.

By the way, how soon we forget. Secretary Pangandaman is not really that brave. He was afraid of stones.

Do you recall that when he personally went to Hda. Velez Malaga of Bob Cuenca in La Castellana to supervise the turnover of the CARPed lands, he was accompanied by many policemen?

When the farmers refused to let them, Pangandaman was seen in television ordering the policemen, “Hulihin mo yan.” (Arrest them.)

The police refused, and when stones began to rain on them, Pangandaman, throwing dignity to the winds, ran to the safety of the van.

Manila media did not mention that.

By the way, Valley Golf and Country Club was wrong in allowing security guards of the Pangandamans in the Club. My friend Buc-an Yulo, president of the Canlubang Golf and Country Club, told me a Japanese ambassador’s membership in Canlubang Golf was cancelled when, he teed off even while there were golfers in the fairway.

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We also forgot when an Iraqi newspaperman threw his shoes at U.S. Presdient George W. Bush in Baghdad, an earlier shoe pounding at the United Nations involved no less than the Soviet Union Premier and a Philippine Senator.

Soviet Union Premier Nikita Khrushchev attended a session in the U.N. sometime in early 1960s.

A Philippine Senator Lorenzo Sumulong delivered a speech which Khrushchev did not like. He took off his shoe and banged it at the table in the full glare and coverage of television.

The pounding of a shoe or throwing it at somebody is to show an insult. That made Sumulong popular.

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