When logic takes a holiday at the House
There are moments in public life that make you pause mid-coffee and ask, “Did that really just happen?” Then you replay the clip and realize: Yes, it did. It wasn’t satire. It wasn’t a parody. It was a sitting congressman, during a formal impeachment hearing, explaining constitutional principles by referencing his personal reaction to a famous actress.
Quezon City Rep. Jesus Manuel Angel “Bong” Suntay—a lawyer, no less—attempted to defend Vice President Sara Duterte against impeachment complaints by arguing that thoughts alone are not crimes. Fair enough, as far as legal abstractions go. The distinction between internal desire and external action is a legitimate philosophical topic. But to illustrate this by recounting how he once felt desire upon seeing Anne Curtis? That leap was not just awkward. It was a textbook non sequitur.
For those who missed freshman logic: a non sequitur is when a conclusion does not logically follow from the premise. Suntay’s reasoning did not so much follow as wander off, take a tricycle to nowhere, and wave at us from irrelevance. The hearing was about constitutional accountability. What the public got instead was a detour into celebrity lust.
And this is not just some random uncle at a family reunion speaking out of turn. Suntay is a lawyer—a member of the bar—someone trained in the discipline of constructing arguments, identifying fallacies, and understanding decorum in formal proceedings. Law school drills into students the importance of relevance and precision. One can only wonder whether Suntay was absent that week—or perhaps sleeping soundly in class—when logic and rhetoric were discussed.
The irony deepens when one notices his name: “Jesus.” That is not a light name to carry in a predominantly Catholic country. The figure behind that name—Jesus Christ—set famously strict standards about discipline of thought and respect for others. In Matthew 5:27-28, the teaching is quite direct: even looking at a woman with lust is already a moral failure of the heart.
Yet here was a congressman named Jesus casually offering lust as a courtroom illustration. His full name even carries the word “angel.” But judging from the spectacle, the performance felt less celestial than terrestrial. If anything, critics might say it resembled the work of a fallen angel—one who misplaced both logic and discretion somewhere between the microphone and the imagination.
It would be easy to laugh—and social media certainly did—but this is not just comedic material. It is also a reminder of the extraordinary privilege attached to public office.
Members of Congress in the Philippines are not exactly struggling freelancers. Their official salary alone runs into the millions annually. Beyond that come the alphabet soup of benefits: representation and transportation allowance (Rata), committee and leadership allowances, bonuses, staff allocations, and travel privileges.
Then there are the larger pools of funds under their influence—“insertions” in the national budget, social aid programs, and the modern descendants of the old pork barrel system. Even after court rulings supposedly curtailed the practice, the mechanics of discretionary spending never entirely disappeared; they simply evolved.
Sheila Coronel of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism has long documented how legislators have grown wealthier over time while occupying public office. When one tallies the resources and programs that pass through a lawmaker’s orbit each year, the amounts can easily reach the neighborhood of P100 million to P200 million in funds under their watch or disposal.
Imagine being entrusted with that level of public responsibility. Imagine receiving that level of public compensation. And then imagine showing up to a constitutional hearing and explaining the law through a personal anecdote about a celebrity crush.
Even more astonishing is how far the example strayed from the issue supposedly being addressed. The discussion involved statements attributed to Vice President Sara Duterte regarding harm toward the president—a matter framed by supporters as hypothetical rhetoric. Yet somehow the defense arrived at a congressman’s imagined attraction to Curtis.
If the goal was to clarify legal principles, the analogy managed the opposite. The distance between the issue at hand and the example offered was so wide it could probably qualify for frequent-flyer miles.
Still, moments like this often pass quickly in the Philippine news cycle. A few viral memes, a round of late-night commentary, then on to the next scandal. The danger is that such episodes become normalized, dismissed as just another colorful moment in politics.
But they should not be taken lightly, not because they are the biggest scandal of the week, but because they reveal something deeper about standards.
Public office is not open mic night. Congressional hearings are not podcasts. Constitutional debates are not opportunities to test stand-up material about one’s celebrity fantasies. So yes, it was funny. Absurd, even.
But it was also funded, quite generously, by the Filipino taxpayer.
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Fr. Cyrain Cabuenas is a Catholic priest from Borongan, Eastern Samar, who currently serves in the State of Vermont. He is a former correspondent of the Philippine Daily Inquirer Visayas bureau.
