The RPN-9 video that was supposedly the PNP "smoking gun" to discredit media in connection with the Nov. 29 Manila Pen incident just showed Dana Batnag, reporter of Jiji Press, a Japanese news agency, talking with Marine Capt. Nicanor Faeldon, who was one of the Magdalo officers who walked out of their hearing at the Makati Regional Trial Court, proceeded to the Manila Pen and called for the ouster of Gloria Arroyo’s illegitimate government.

There was nothing in the picture as described by no less than the justice secretary and the PNP chief that showed a "female reporter giving helping Capt Nicanor Faeldon escape by giving him a press ID."

There was nothing in the picture described by PNP spokesman Nicanor Bartolome as a female reporter "may inaabot" (handing him something).

Is that rebellion as threatened by Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez?

This latest incident involving government lying shows the frustration of the Arroyo’s minions over media, that is seen now as the remaining democratic institution that Arroyo has not fully broken and tamed.

It’s Dana on whom they are now focusing. Earlier it was me, Ces Drilon and Charmaine Deogracias of NHK.

Newspapers accurately described the PNP’s operation as witch hunt.

Wikipedia describes a witch hunt "as a search for witches or evidence of witchcraft, often involving moral panic, mass hysteria and mob lynching, but in historical instances also legally sanctioned and involving official witchcraft trials."

The term is often used to refer to similarly panic-induced searches for perceived wrong-doers other than witches. The best known example is probably the McCarthyist search for communists during the Cold War.

In the 1950’s, American Senator Joseph McCarthy accused many American citizens of being Communists or Communist sympathizers, and hearings were held by anti-Communist committees, panels and "loyalty review boards" across the United States. These hearings, later deemed unconstitutional, resulted in ostracism, ruined careers or even imprisonment for tens of thousands, and represent a major breakdown in civil liberties and civil discourse.

One of those that McCarthy tried to destroy was broadcaster Edward Murrow of CBS. In the movie, "Good Night and Good Luck", there’s a passionate quote by Murrow which should inspire us as we battle the evil designs of Arroyo and her minions to destroy our democracy.

Murrow said: "We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law.

"We will not walk in fear, one or another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men - not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend courses that were, for the moment unpopular."

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We should send this text message to Arroyo, all officials of Malacañang, PNP chief Avelino Razon and to the military:

Stop destroying our sacred institutions. Defend the PRESS and STOP all forms of harassment.

The political system has been corrupted, the military and police have been divided, the courts and the church have also been compromised.

Now, the FOURTH ESTATE, the last bastion of democracy is under attack. LET US UNITE AND STAND TOGETHER TO DEFEND PRESS FREEDOM.