Good Lawyering Won the Libel Cases

 Volume 3, Issue No. 23

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

. . . . . A community service of The Filipino Web Channel (TheFilipinoWebChannel@gmail. com) and the Philippine Village Voice (PhilVoiceNews@gmail.com) for the information and understanding of Filipinos and the diverse communities in North America and beyond . . . . . .

 

 Our latest as of Thursday, January 6, 2022 

~ The knowledge of having been defeated in courts of law and paying for it as a consequence is eating away at the soul of this person who confesses committing a blunder in the choice of an advocate. Recipients of the court-ordered recompense are derided by the usual crybaby, due perhaps to inability to comprehend the amount derived from a money pool and lifetime of savings. 

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NEW YEAR'S HERE, TIME TO MOVE ON

Incessant Whining That Borders on Envy 

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

“It is not defeat that destroys you, it is being demoralized by defeat that destroys you.” ― Imran Khan

TORONTO - The pain of having lost a fight must be so profound it had to be restated for the nth time to the point it sounds ridiculous.

Reality is sometimes hard to take but the sad and conspicuous fact is we were vanquished two times in four libel suits. As one of the parties, I have long accepted that outcome whatever misgivings I might still have up to this day.

We fought relentlessly, particularly I as a seasoned journalist, except that the individuals entrusted with the task of advocating for us in courts of law were, in hindsight, not in the same league as our experienced antagonists.

The opposing party came well-prepared and argued the law adroitly. Meanwhile, one of our advocates kept us in the dark, suppressed our thoughts, and waged his version of the legal battle, not to win, but to fatten his purse from the self-declared money fount believed to be inexhaustible. The other advocate scrambled for case law at the same time extracting funds from a human ATM.

It leads me to ask: was the legal skirmish to find the truth fair and square from the get-go?

The unwitting answer - the heart of the matter - to that question comes from the same person who tirelessly whines about a loss. "I made a mistake of fighting by hiring the wrong person to defend us . . . " says the writer.

The consuelo de bobo is in owning up the blunder, which turned out to be catastrophic, as it led to extraordinary payments of litigation costs, damages, interests, and attorney's fees.

It escapes my understanding why the self-pitying grumbling would not stop inasmuch as the legal proceedings have ended several months ago.

The public lamentation is self-destructive. It diminishes self-respect. Losing money is not commensurate to sacrificing, then losing, one's dignity. Money is easily recoverable; amour-propre is not, that's my belief.

The endless harping only feeds the ego trip of the victors. Accepting defeat is not weakness, rather it is a sign of a robust, confident character capable of weathering challenges.

I remember someone making a vow to fight to the death, so, hyperbolic or not, this must be that fight worth a life. But the legal tussle is over, they won, we lost, period.

The public confession of committing a mistake in judgment should not be suffered by the plaintiffs in the cases. They won because of good lawyering; we lost because the defense was not as good or even better.

Whether or not the plaintiffs became "instantly rich" is nobody's business. They fought within the rules of the judicial system and succeeded, not because of "greed and diabolic power" but because they came prepared to do battle.

The fault lies not in those who triumphed, but in the individual who retained "the wrong person" on whose hands were placed the fate of the defendants. That "wrong person" is not entirely blameless either.

As for the "black spider widow" who grabs the limelight and photo-ops in the local social circuit and not knowing if her presence is appreciated, well, that's her own lookout. Why be consumed by this playacting? It could be a tease to pull one to shreds.

Envy does not get one anywhere. The widow can strut around like a peacock for all I care, after all, she's got the moolah, ironically, from the whiner. That hurts, that really hurts. (Copyright 2022. All Rights Reserved).